Riddle in the Router

Maya's fingers flew across her keyboard as she stared at the screen, frustration mounting. The ethernet cable lay coiled like a sleeping snake beside her desk, mocking her inability to fix the WiFi. Again.

"You gonna stare at that router all night, or actually help with setup?" her older brother Jay called from the hallway.

"I'm trying!" Maya shot back, though her voice wavered. Being the freshman tech chair for the fall festival felt huge—too huge. Like, what if she messed up the whole sound system? What if everyone found out she'd lied about her skills just to impress that senior, Alex?

Her phone buzzed. A text from Chloe: U coming to pre-fest? Alex is here 😏

Maya's stomach did that thing where it felt like it was trying to escape her body. She grabbed her daily vitamin gummy from the jar—her mom's attempt at keeping her "healthy" during stress weeks—and chewed it aggressively.

"Okay," she told herself. "You got this."

But she didn't got this. The festival speakers kept cutting out, and Alex was watching with this patient half-smile that made Maya want to disappear into the ground. Then Alex stepped up, reached behind the equipment, and swapped out a single cable connection.

"Sometimes it's the smallest things," Alex said, voice low and kind. "You're doing great, by the way."

Later, under the string lights while the band played, Maya found herself beside Alex again. "Thanks for earlier," she mumbled. "I felt like such a fraud."

Alex laughed softly. "Dude, everyone feels like that. It's called being human."

Something in Maya's chest loosened. "Wait, really? Even you?"

"Especially me." Alex nodded toward the school entrance, where a banner read "KNOW YOURSELF" in bold letters. "You ever notice how the most obvious riddles are the hardest ones? Like that sphinx myth—answer wrong, and you get eaten. But the answer's literally just 'man.' We overthink everything."

The metaphor hit Maya like a wave. She'd been so focused on appearing competent that she'd forgotten how to be real.

"Hey," Alex said, "wanna help me run the playlist tomorrow? No pressure, but... I think you'd actually be good at it."

Maya smiled, and this time it felt genuine. "Yeah. I'd like that."

As she walked home under the starlit sky, Maya realized something: she didn't need to have all the answers. She just needed to be brave enough to ask the questions. And maybe, just maybe, that was riddle enough for now.