The Fake ID Incident

The summer before sophomore year, my best friend Carlos decided we needed glow-ups. Like, actual scientific ones. He bought these massive vitamin supplements from some sketchy site — horse pills that promised "radiant energy" and "peak performance." We choked them down every morning, convinced we'd transform before high school.

My dog, Buster, watched us with what I swear was judgment. He was this ancient golden retriever who'd seen me through awkward phases: the braces year, the anime obsession, that time I tried to pull off fedoras. If Buster could've talked, he would've told us to just chill.

The night of Jessica's party — the one we'd been prepping for all summer — a thunderstorm rolled in. Not cute rain. The sky went purple, then split with lightning that turned the whole backyard daylight-bright for one split second. In that flash, I saw something I wasn't supposed to: Jessica's older brother's crew, the seniors we'd been trying to impress, wasn't playing beer pong. They were on the porch, passing around... vitamin C gummies?

"Boosting immunity before finals," Tyler, the lacrosse captain, said, catching my stare. He held up the bottle like it was contraband. "My mom makes me take these. They're actually fire."

Carlos and I exchanged looks. All summer, we'd been torturing ourselves with those horse pills, thinking cool kids did cool things. But the older kids — the ones we'd put on this massive pedestal — were just taking vitamins their moms gave them.

"Yo," I said, stepping onto the porch like I belonged there. "My grandma swears by that brand."

"For real?" Tyler asked. "She got the mixed fruit ones? These are basic."

"She gets the variety pack," I said smoothly. "I'll bring some next time."

Buster, who'd followed me into the yard, chose that moment to shake himself off directly onto Tyler's limited-edition sneakers.

"DOG!" Tyler yelled, jumping back.

But then everyone laughed. Including Tyler. "Your boy's wild," he said, tossing me a vitamin C gummy. "You're alright, freshman."

Later, Carlos and I sat on the roof watching the lightning crack distant clouds, eating elderly vitamins like they were candy. We hadn't transformed. We weren't suddenly cool. But Tyler had followed me on Instagram, and Jessica had commented "who's the dog? 🥺" on my story.

"Next year," Carlos said, "we're just gonna be ourselves."

"Yeah," I said, scratching Buster's ears. "But maybe fewer horse pills."

Buster sighed. He'd been right all along.