The Midnight Riddle

I looked like a literal zombie. Fourth consecutive all-nighter will do that to you. My concealer wasn't even concealing anymore—it was waving a white flag.

"You good, bestie?" Maya asked, eyeing my cafeteria tray like it might contain radioactive waste.

"Running on pure spite and Red Bull," I said, sliding into the seat opposite her. "AP Euro is absolutely killing me."

Maya's face lit up with that specific I-have-news gleam that usually meant I was about to get dragged into something. "So. There's this thing tonight."

"No."

"Hear me out! It's the school's annual Sphinx Hunt. Teams compete to solve riddles all over downtown. Winner gets Starbucks for a month."

I stared at her. "Maya, I can barely remember my own middle name right now."

"But hear this," she lowered her voice, leaning in like she was sharing state secrets. "Tyler's team is one person short."

Okay, now she had my attention.

Tyler Chen. The guy I'd been lowkey crushing on since September. The one who somehow made AP Calculus look like a chill hobby.

"And?" I tried to play it cool, but I felt my face doing something unholy.

"And they need a fourth person. His teammates are both sick." Maya's eyes widened significantly. "I told him you're in."

"MAYA."

"Look, you're gonna be a zombie anyway. Might as well be a zombie who's potentially making moves."

I hated that she had a point.

So that's how I found myself at 10 PM, standing in the town square with Tyler, his friend Jake, and Maya, clutching my first clue like it might bite me:

I have no voice, but I tell stories

I have no wings, but I soar

I have thousands of faces

But only one true form

What am I?

"That's... literally impossible," Jake groaned.

Tyler looked at me, actually looked at me, and my brain performed a factory reset. "What do you think, Elena?"

I stared at the paper, my sleep-deprived mind making unexpected connections. "It's a book."

Tyler blinked. "Wait, really?"

"Yeah. Stories, soaring through imagination, thousands of characters, but it's still just... a book."

Tyler's face broke into this smile that absolutely should not have affected me as much as it did. "That's actually genius."

We spent the next three hours running through downtown, solving increasingly ridiculous riddles, Tyler and me accidentally vibing over our mutual obsession with horror movies and terrible puns. Jake and Maya kept doing that thing where they'd mysteriously need to tie their shoes or check nonexistent notifications.

By midnight, we'd won. Tyler high-fived me like I'd personally invented oxygen.

"Hey," he said, as we waited for our prize coffee. "You're genuinely really smart. Like, scary smart."

"Zombie brain works in mysterious ways," I said, trying not to flush.

"We should study together sometime," he said, and I suddenly understood every rom-com I'd ever rolled my eyes at. "If you're not running on empty, I mean."

"I'm definitely running on empty," I admitted. "But somehow? That's okay."

Maya caught my eye from behind Tyler and gave me the most obnoxious thumbs-up in human history.

I rolled my eyes, but I was smiling. Some things are worth the exhaustion.