The Goldfish in My Pocket

I was basically a professional spy at this point. Not the cool James Bond kind—more like the girl who'd spent forty-five minutes scrolling through Maya's Instagram story history, analyzing whether her latest post about "missing someone" was about me or just a vibe.

"You're doing it again," Jordan said, stealing a fry from my tray. "The spy face. It's creepy."

"I'm not spying," I lied. "I'm conducting research."

"You're staring at her from across the cafeteria like she's the last spinach dip on earth."

I froze. "Is there spinach in my teeth?"

Jordan grinned. "No. That was a metaphor. Your teeth are fine, tragically."

I relaxed, but only for approximately three seconds—because Maya was walking toward our table. ACTUALLY walking toward our table. My heart did that thing where it forgets how to heart.

"Hey," she said. "You're in my English lit class, right?"

I nodded. I was going to say something smooth and confident, something like "Yeah, I sit behind you" or "Yeah, that class is low-key fire," but instead I just kept nodding. Like a bobblehead. A bobblehead with zero social skills.

"So," she continued, "Mr. Harrison was talking about the riddle of the Sphinx today, and I was wondering if you wanted to study for the midterm together? I suck at symbolism."

The Sphinx. My brain short-circuited. Was this a test? Was I supposed to answer a riddle? What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs in the evening? The answer was man, but also me, currently, because I was about to fall over.

"I'd love to," I finally managed, my voice cracking like I was still going through puberty.

"Great! Here's my number." She wrote it on a napkin. "Also, nice goldfish."

She pointed at my keychain—the plastic goldfish I'd gotten at a fair and carried everywhere since my actual pet fish, Fin, died three months ago. I'd been meaning to take it off, but it felt like giving up on him.

"Thanks," I said, surprised she'd noticed. "His name was Fin."

"Cool," she said, like it actually was. "See you later."

As she walked away, Jordan smacked my arm. "Dude. She noticed your keychain. She's perfect."

I looked at the napkin with her number, then at my stupid goldfish keychain, and felt something light and bright bubbling in my chest. Maybe being a spy wasn't so bad. Sometimes the intelligence you gather is good news.