The Goldfish Summer

Maya's shift at Pet Paradise wasn't exactly how she'd pictured spending her summer before sophomore year, but hey, at least it paid for the new iPhone case she'd been eyeing. The one with the holographic finish that changed colors in the light, because obviously appearances mattered.

"You're doing it again," her coworker Jayden said, popping his gum. "That thing is glued to your hand."

Maya glanced at her iPhone, currently displaying eight unread messages from the group chat that was apparently planning something for Friday night. Something she definitely wasn't invited to. "It's not glued. It's called being connected."

"Yeah? To what?" Jayden nodded toward the goldfish tank in the corner. "That little guy's been watching you. It's judging."

The goldfish—a speckled orange one that looked way too lonely in its tank—did seem to be staring. Maya found herself drifting over to it during her breaks, just watching it swim in tiny circles, completely unbothered by whatever drama was unfolding on social media.

"Nobody ever buys goldfish," she complained one afternoon, checking her phone for the fiftieth time. Still no invite.

"That's 'cause they're basic," Jayden said, adjusting his backward cap. "But sometimes basic is underrated. Like, you ever notice how everyone's trying so hard to be different that they all end up the same?"

Maya rolled her eyes but couldn't exactly argue when her own feed was full of the same aesthetic posts, the same carefully curated candid shots, the same everyone pretending not to care while obviously caring way too much.

The goldfish—the one she'd secretly named Glitter—didn't post. Didn't filter. Just swam, existed, seemed weirdly content with its lot.

"You want it?" Jayden asked on her last day. "Manager's letting me take it home but my mom'll kill me."

Maya stared at her iPhone, eight new notifications from people who'd barely acknowledged her existence all summer. Then she looked at Glitter, doing its little goldfish thing, unbothered and unimpressed.

"Yeah," she heard herself say. "Actually, I do."

Driving home with the goldfish bag balanced on the passenger seat, Maya's charging cable connecting her phone to the car stereo, something shifted. The notifications could wait. Whatever was happening on Friday could happen without her. Glitter needed a tank setup, and maybe that was exactly the kind of real she needed right now.

Her phone buzzed again. Maya didn't even look.