Static at 3 AM

Maya's eyes burned like she'd poured hot sauce directly onto them. The cable TV connection at Leo's house had been fighting a losing battle against the storm outside, flickering in and out like a dying heartbeat.

"I got this," Leo said for the fifteenth time, stubborn as a **bull** that refused to be moved, twisting the coaxial cable behind his dad's massive entertainment center.

"Bro," Jason laughed, throwing a piece of popcorn at Leo's head. "Your dad's gonna murder you if you break his setup again. Remember last time?"

"I was twelve then. I have skills now." Leo's voice was muffled from inside the cabinet. A spark lit up the dark space, followed immediately by the sound of something hitting the floor.

All three of them froze.

Maya felt like a **zombie**—which was ironically appropriate considering they'd spent the entire week marathon-watching every undead movie on streaming for Jason's birthday project. His film studies elective had assigned them to analyze horror tropes across different decades, and they'd somehow convinced themselves that watching seven zombie films in four days counted as "research."

"Please work," Maya whispered to the universe. Finals were next week. She needed this. She needed bad special effects and terrible dialogue and three AM conversations that went absolutely nowhere but meant everything.

The TV crackled. A blue screen flickered to life, then resolved into grainy static.

"I fixed it," Leo said, emerging from behind the cabinet with cobwebs in his hair and a triumphant grin.

"You sure did," Chloe said from her spot on the floor, not looking up from her phone. "Now we have atmospheric television. Very artsy."

They all dissolved into giggles—the exhausted kind that made your stomach hurt and tears leak from your eyes.

And suddenly Maya realized something so obvious it made her chest hurt: this wouldn't last forever. Someday there would be no more cable-repair emergencies at midnight, no more bad horror movie marathons, no more Jason falling asleep with pizza crust on his chest. Someday they'd all be different people, scattered across different cities, maybe sending each other memes on holidays.

But tonight? Tonight the cable still worked. The pizza was still warm. And she was exactly where she needed to be.