Riddle of the Social Pyramid

Maya's lungs burned as she rounded the corner, her Nikes slapping against the pavement. Running was the only time her mind went quiet—no AP History压力, no college apps stressing her out, definitely no thinking about how she'd crashed and burned at Homecoming.

Her iPhone buzzed in her pocket. Again.

She ignored it. Whatever it was could wait until she finished her five miles. That was the rule she'd made after last semester's breakdown: no screen time during runs. Mental health before likes.

"Hey!"

A figure stepped out from behind the old library building—Zach, the annoyingly cute junior who'd moved here from Seattle three months ago and already sat at the top of the school's social pyramid. The same pyramid where Maya occupied somewhere between "exists" and "who?"

"You're Maya, right? From Mr. Chen's English class?"

She slowed to a jog, wiping sweat from her forehead. "Uh, yeah?"

"I found something." He held up his phone. "Your number was in Chen's group chat, and I thought you'd want to see this."

Maya squinted at his screen. Someone had created a sphinx account—a mysterious anonymous profile that'd been posting riddles about students all week. Solve the riddle, get the power to expose someone's secret.

And the latest riddle? "I run every day but never move. I have a mouth but never speak. What am I?"

Maya's heart dropped. That was HER. Running every day for track, never speaking up in class, always staying silent.

"People are saying whoever solves this gets to expose any secret they want," Zach said quietly. "Someone already posted that Jessica cheated on her SATs. It's getting messed up."

Maya's thumb hovered over her iPhone screen. She could solve it. She could finally matter at this school. But as she looked at Zach—at how tired he seemed, how done with all the high school drama—she remembered why she'd started running in the first place.

To get away from all this.

"River," she said.

"What?"

"The answer is a river."

Zach blinked. "But that doesn't match you at all."

"Exactly." She turned back toward her route. "Some things don't need to be solved. Some things just... run."

Her iPhone stayed dark in her pocket as she picked up speed, leaving the pyramid behind her.