Summer of Riddles and Regret

The sphinx statue at the edge of the golf course wasn't even a good one. Its left ear had been chipped off since before any of us could remember, and someone had drawn Sharpie eyebrows on it last summer that gave it a permanently skeptical expression.

"You gonna answer it or what?" Jeremy asked, swatting at a papaya-colored butterfly that had been following us since third period.

"There's literally nothing to answer, Jer. It's a statue."

"The sphinx demands answers, Marcus. That's, like, its whole deal."

I rolled my eyes, but part of me was stalling. Because behind the sad concrete sphinx was the baseball field where Skylar was leaning against the backstop, laughing at something Tyler had said. Tyler, who played varsity and drove a Jeep and had never accidentally referred to a teacher as "mom" during a presentation.

"What riddle would it even ask?" I muttered. "'Why did you text her at 2 AM and then immediately delete it?'"

"Hard same, bro." Jeremy actually looked sympathetic. "My goldfish has more game than you."

"You don't have a goldfish."

"Exactly. That's how gameless it is."

A baseball arced through the air, landing somewhere near our feet. Skylar started walking over, and my stomach did that thing where it forgot how organs worked. Jeremy, being Jeremy, decided this was the perfect moment to channel his inner chaos energy.

"Hey!" he shouted. "Your baseball—er, ball—landed near the sphinx!"

Skylar squinted at us. "What?"

"The sphinx!" Jeremy gestured dramatically at the statue. "Marcus was just about to solve its riddle. For real. Go ahead, Marcus. Hit her with it."

I was going to murder Jeremy. I was going to bury him behind the concession stand and tell everyone he moved to Canada.

"Okay," I said, my voice cracking approximately half an octave higher than normal. "What's the riddle?"

Skylar looked between us, then at the statue with its Sharpie eyebrows, then back at me. And then she smiled, actually smiled, not in a mean way.

"The riddle is: why are you guys hanging out with a concrete cat instead of coming to get tacos?"

The weird papaya butterfly landed on my shoulder. Jeremy looked like he'd won the lottery.

"Tacos," I said. "That's—that's a good riddle."

"Tyler's coming too," she added. "But if you don't hurry, he's eating your share."

Somehow we ended up at taco place, me walking next to Skylar while Jeremy tried to convince everyone that sphinxes were underrated mythological creatures. I didn't magically become cool or get the girl or anything, but later, when Skylar laughed at my terrible baseball joke and Tyler didn't even notice, I figured maybe that was okay.

Sometimes the riddle isn't something you solve. Sometimes you just live your way into an answer that's good enough.