The Party Fiasco

The vintage bucket hat pulled low over my eyes wasn't exactly doing its job. I'd spent two hours curling my hair and picking this outfit, yet here I was, hiding in Maya's basement like a total loser while everyone else was upstairs living their best lives.

"You look like you're plotting something evil," a voice said.

I jumped. Jake — Maya's older brother — stood there holding a tangled mess of Ethernet cable. He was wearing that same flannel he'd had on since eighth grade, the one with the bleach stain on the pocket.

"I'm not plotting," I said, which was only half true. I was definitely spying on the party through the basement door's crack, watching the popular kids who somehow knew exactly how to exist without wanting to dissolve into the floor every five seconds.

"Cool hat," Jake said, like he actually meant it. "Need help with that setup? The WiFi's dead again."

That's how I ended up kneeling beside him, untangling cable while my social anxiety spiraled somewhere between manageable and full panic attack. His fingers brushed mine, and I forgot how to breathe for exactly three seconds.

"You don't have to stay down here," he said softly. "They're not that scary."

"Easy for you to say. You're not the new girl who still eats lunch in the library."

"First party?"

"Is it that obvious?"

He grinned. "Only because you're hiding in a basement holding a CAT-6 cable like it's a weapon."

Something in his expression made me think maybe he got it. Maybe everyone felt like they were faking it, even the ones who looked like they had everything figured out.

Then someone upstairs screamed something about beer pong, and I was running before I could process what was happening. Jake caught my wrist.

"Hey. You got this."

The hat slipped back, and for the first time all night, I didn't want to pull it down again. "Yeah?"

"Yeah. Besides," he said, standing up and offering me a hand, "I'll be right there. Fair warning: I'm terrible at beer pong, but I make an excellent distraction when you need to escape awkward conversations."

The party didn't magically become perfect. But walking upstairs with Jake, cable forgotten on the floor, I realized maybe that was okay. Some things — and people — were worth the awkwardness.