The Padel Protocol

I'd been metaphorically swimming through freshman year invisible—just another body in the hallway current—until Maya cornered me after third period with a proposition that made my stomach do actual backflips.

"I need you to spy on Chase," she whispered, leaning against my locker like this was totally normal friend behavior. Maya, who'd barely acknowledged my existence since we'd drifted apart in middle school. "He's captain of the padel team, and something's off."

"You want me to what now?"

"Spy. Observe. Gather intel." She lowered her voice. "I heard him in the bathroom yesterday, having this whole conversation. In Spanish. Fluent Spanish. But he's in Spanish 1H with me and can barely conjugate *ser*."

I should've said no. I had zero spy experience unless stalking my crush on Instagram counted. But Maya was looking at me with those eyes that said I'd been drafted into something bigger than myself, and honestly? I was tired of swimming alone in the shallow end of social irrelevance.

So I found myself at the community padel courts that Saturday, pretending to watch my cousin's match while实际上 tracking Chase's every move. He was terrifyingly good—grunting, smashing, looking like he'd stepped out of a teen drama where everyone's hair defies physics. Afterward, I "accidentally" bumped into him near the water fountain.

"Hey, you're Chase, right?"

He froze. Then, in perfect, unaccented Spanish: "*¿Quién es?*"

"*Soy Leo,*" I replied automatically, because my grandmother had drilled conversational Spanish into me since before I could walk. Chase's jaw dropped.

"Dude," he switched back to English, running a hand through his hair. "You can't tell anyone. I'm—"

"What? Taking Spanish 1H when you're basically fluent?"

"My dad," he groaned. "He thinks I should 'focus on other academics' and won't sign off on me testing out. So I've been fake-struggling through basic conjugations all semester." He looked at me, really looked at me, for the first time. "You won't snitch, right?"

"Nah." I grinned. "But you owe me. Also, you played really well out there."

"You play?"

"Swimming's more my thing," I said. "But I could be convinced."

The next week, I found myself at the padel courts again—this time as Chase's doubles partner. Maya caught us leaving and smirked like she'd orchestrated the whole thing. Maybe she had.

"Solid work, *espía*," she texted me later. "Glad you finally came up for air."