The Goldfish in the Room

Maya pulled her beanie **hat** down to her eyebrows, a security blanket against the flashing lights of Tyler's basement party. First party of sophomore year, and she already felt like a **zombie**—three consecutive nights of bingeing that true crime docuseries on **cable** would do that to you.

"Maya! You made it!" Tyler appeared with a red Solo cup, already swaying. "We were just having this deep convo about attention spans. Did you know goldfish have longer memories than TikTok users?"

A **goldfish**. Maya's childhood pet, Goldie Hawn, had lived for seven years. She knew exactly how long goldfish memories actually were. But she'd learned from painful experience that correcting Tyler at parties was social suicide.

"That's such **bull**," said a voice from the corner. Someone leaned against the washing machine, cable-knit sweater pulled up to reveal tattooed knuckles. Jamie, the senior who sat behind her in bio. "Goldfish don't even have hippocampuses. You're just repeating some Netflix factoid."

The room went quiet. Tyler's face fell. Maya felt that weird electricity she'd been reading about—the kind that made you do things you'd regret on Monday.

"Actually," Maya heard herself say, "goldfish can remember things for months. My mom's a vet."

Jamie's eyebrows went up. "For real?"

"For real." Maya's heart hammered against her ribs like a trapped thing. "Goldie Hawn knew when I walked into the room. She'd do this little spin thing—"

"Wait," Jamie said, pushing off the washing machine. "You named your fish after Goldie Hawn? That's iconic."

"Maya's always been lowkey obsessive about weird stuff," Tyler interjected, clearly trying to recover his moment. "She's like, actually interesting if you get past the whole hat-and-headphones vibe."

Maya waited for the embarrassment. The flush that usually crept up her neck whenever people noticed her. But Jamie was still watching her like she'd said something fascinating instead of just surviving.

"You doing anything later?" Jamie asked. "There's this zombie marathon at the Ritz. Midnight showing."

Maya's fingers instinctively reached for her headphones, but she stopped herself. "I thought you said zombie movies were **bull**."

"Zombie movies are bull," Jamie grinned. "Watching them with someone who actually knows stuff about animals? That's different."

She adjusted her hat, but not to hide this time. Maybe sophomore year wouldn't be so bad after all.