The Night the Cable Died

The carnival goldfish—won when I threw a baseball at a stack of bottles freshman year—swam lazy circles in its bowl on Marcus's dresser. We were supposed to be studying for finals, but instead we were sprawled across his basement floor, watching some random show because that's what you do when you're fifteen and don't know how to talk about the things that actually matter.

Marcus wore that orange hoodie he refused to wash, the one that smelled like vanilla and his mom's fabric softener. I'd been low-key obsessed with that smell since seventh grade, which was pathetic, and he knew it, and I knew he knew, and we both pretended we didn't know anything.

The storm started slow—distant lightning painting the basement windows in strobe flashes. I was hyperaware of his shoulder pressed against mine, the way his knee kept bumping my leg when he laughed.

Then the cable died. Screen went black. Silence rushed in like it had been waiting outside the door.

"Finally," Marcus said, and I realized he'd been wanting to say something for hours. He turned to face me, lightning flashing behind him like a spotlight. "My dad's moving to Denver."

The basement suddenly felt too small and too huge at the same time. The goldfish kept swimming, oblivious. My chest was doing something weird, like it couldn't decide between being crushed or exploding.

"When?"

"August." He picked at a loose thread on his jeans. "I was gonna tell you, but I didn't know how."

August. Three months. The rest of the school year, then summer, then he'd be gone. I'd been wasting so much time pretending I didn't have feelings, and now we were on a timer.

The lightning flashed again, closer this time, and I saw everything—the tiny freckle on his nose, the way his eyelashes were longer than they had any right to be, the fear he was trying to hide.

I didn't think. I just leaned in.

His lips were softer than I'd imagined, which was weird because I'd spent way too much time imagining it. When we pulled apart, his orange hoodie was bunched in my fists like I might never let go.

"Okay," he whispered, like this was the answer to something he'd been asking forever.

The goldfish swam on, indifferent to the fact that our lives had just rearranged themselves around each other. The cable stayed dead. Some things, it turned out, were better than anything on TV.