Summer Static

The moment I stepped through the gate, I regretted everything. Tyler's house screamed money—from the pristine **pool** glittering like something off Instagram to the actual **palm** trees framing the backyard like we were in Malibu, not suburban Ohio.

"Hey! You made it!" Tyler's voice cut through the bass thumping from portable speakers. He stood by the **padel** court, sweat glistening on his forehead, racquet resting against his hip. Padel. Because obviously tennis was too basic for this crowd.

"Yeah," I managed, clutching my towel like a shield. "Traffic was... traffic."

Lies. I'd circled the block three times working up the nerve to walk in.

Across the pool, Sarah laughed at something Chase said, throwing her head back. Chase, whose Instagram showed him playing varsity **baseball** since freshman year. Chase, who'd somehow become friends with everyone overnight while I was still the kid who'd once brought a **goldfish** to school for show-and-tell in fourth grade because my mom said it would teach me responsibility. (It died three days later. I learned nothing.)

"You gonna swim or what?" Someone called. I think it was Maya, Sarah's best friend and the reason I was even here.

"Yeah, just... gotta change."

In the bathroom, I stared at myself in the mirror. My palms were sweating. Again. Why were my palms ALWAYS sweating when I needed to be cool? Sarah probably never had sweaty palms. Sarah probably never questioned her entire existence while listening to muffled laughter through a bathroom door.

The music shifted—something upbeat with way too much bass. I could do this. Step one: exit bathroom. Step two: act like a normal human being. Step three: don't think about fourth-grade goldfish or how Chase's baseball cap was perfectly crooked or how everyone seemed to speak a different social language than I did.

I pushed open the door.

Sarah was by the pool edge, dangling her feet in the water. She looked up and caught my eye, smiling like she'd been waiting.

"Finally!" She patted the space beside her. "Saved you a spot. Chase thinks he's so good at padel, but I'm about to destroy him. You're on my team."

"Oh." I stopped, towel still clutched in my non-sweaty hand. "Okay."

She laughed, and it sounded genuine. "You're overthinking it. Just get in here, loser."

And for the first time all afternoon, the static in my head finally quieted down.