The Cable Static Secret

Maya's palm was sweating against the remote control. Again.

Three weeks of this. Three weeks of watching him through the ghostly static of the cable connection her older brother had jury-rigged last summer. The cable TV lines ran along the side of both houses—hers and his—and apparently, somewhere in the tangle of wires and splitters, something had crossed. She could see into his room. Fuzzy, grainy, like looking through a dream.

She felt like a total creep. A total spy. But she couldn't stop.

His name was Liam. He played guitar shirtless with his window open. He had this cat—a white one with mismatched eyes—that would sit on his windowsill and stare directly into the camera she'd hidden behind her curtain, like it knew.

"You're being pathetic," she told herself. The cat on her lap, Mochi, blinked slowly in agreement.

Then came the Friday night everything changed. Maya's parents were out. She was fourteen, alone, watching Liam's room through the cable feed like a loser, when his phone lit up on screen. He was texting someone. The angle was perfect—she could read every word.

*Wish u were here*

*Prom?*

Maya's stomach did this terrifying flip-flop thing. Who was he texting? Some girl from his school? Some gorgeous junior with perfect hair and a confidence Maya couldn't even fake?

The next day, she saw him at the grocery store. Their eyes met. He smiled.

"Hey," he said. "You're Maya, right?"

Her palm was sweating. Again. "Yeah. Hi."

"I found something on my windowsill," he said, holding up a folded piece of paper. "Someone slid it under my screen last night. It said: 'Stop texting yourself. Everyone knows it's you.'"

Maya's face burned.

"Was it you?" he asked, but he was smiling. Not mean-smiling. Real-smiling.

"Maybe," she managed.

"Good," he said. "Because I was doing it hoping someone would notice. Someone like you."

The white cat appeared behind him, winding through his legs like it owned him.

"Want to help me fix this cable situation?" Liam asked. "My friend's dad works for the cable company. Says we could get actual channels if we stopped using it to stalk each other."

"I wasn't stalking—"

"You totally were," he said. "It's okay. I was too."

Maya's palm was still sweating. But for the first time, she didn't mind.