The Goldfish Operation

The party was already in full swing when I arrived, fashionably late and psychosomatically nauseous. Through the chain-link fence, I could see everyone in the pool area—Jake's perfect hair wet, his laugh carrying across the yard like he'd personally invented joy. I adjusted my bucket hat, pulling it lower. If anyone asked, I was going for "aesthetic." In reality, I was going for "please don't perceive me."

My phone buzzed. GROUP CHAT: where r u???*

*On my way,* I lied. I wasn't going in there. Not yet. My plan was brilliant in its stupidity: I'd circle the perimeter like a creeper, assess the social topography, identify my entry point. I was basically a spy at this point. A spy whose cover would be blown immediately because her neon pink bikini was basically a homing beacon.

Behind the pool house, I discovered the padel court. Empty. Perfect. I could chill here, pretend I'd been playing padel (whatever that was—racquet sport for people too fancy for tennis?), and emerge once the drinking games started. Solid strategy.

Until I found the goldfish.

It was in a solo cup on the bench, doing the tragic back-and-forth that meant it had approximately three minutes to live. Some idiot's party favor, abandoned for beer pong. The fish looked at me with those bug-eyed WTF vibes, and I felt a weird kinship. Both of us, out of our element, circling the edges of the party.

"You too, huh?" I whispered.

"Talking to fish now?"

I jumped. Jake stood there, shirtless, holding two cups. Not beer pong cups—juice. He pointed at my hat. "Nice disguise."

My face burned. "I was just—"

"Spying on the party?" He grinned. "Me too. ADHD kicked in, needed a break." He sat beside the goldfish. "That's Toast. My sister won him, then immediately got distracted by a guy named Chad."

"Toast needs water that's not chlorinated," I said.

"Yeah." Jake looked at me, really looked at me. "You want to rescue him? I saw an unoccupied pond on the next street over."

We walked there in our swimsuits, carrying a cup with a fish, my hat feeling less like a shield and more like—well, a hat. We released Toast into the pond, and when we returned to the party, I didn't feel like a spy anymore. Jake didn't make fun of my hat. He just reached for my hand, and for the first time all night, I wasn't swimming upstream against my own anxiety.