The Party Pyramid Scheme

Maya stood at the edge of the backyard, clutching her iPhone like a lifeline. The screen glowed with three unread texts from her mom—classic.—but her real focus was on the social pyramid forming around the fire pit. Jake at the apex, naturally, his laugh cutting through the bass-heavy music. Then his inner circle of lacrosse bros, the popular girls in their coordinated crop tops, and finally everyone else spiraling downward in decreasing importance.

She should've stayed home.

"Hey!" A voice jolted her. Chloe, the girl from AP Bio who always wore mismatched socks, stood beside her. "You're breathing really loudly. You good?"

"Fine," Maya lied. Her thumb hovered over her phone screen, temptation to fake an emergency text growing stronger. "Just... observing."

"The pyramid?" Chloe nodded toward the fire pit. "It's intense tonight. Jake's been working his way through every girl here like he's collecting them for a quest or something."

Maya snorted. "Bold of him to assume he's the protagonist."

"Right?" Chloe's eyes lit up. "Oh my god, watch this." She grabbed Maya's wrist and turned her palm upward. "My sister taught me palm reading at summer camp. It's total BS but it's hilarious."

"Chloe—"

"Shh, I'm seeing visions." Chloe traced the lines on Maya's palm with exaggerated seriousness. "You're going to meet someone tonight. Tall, dark hair, annoyingly confident..."

"Jake? Seriously?"

"No, you idiot." Chloe looked up, grinning. "Someone better."

And then Jake was there, his shadow falling across them. "Hey. Mind if I cut in?"

Maya's stomach did that embarrassing flip. Chloe squeezed her hand—just for a second—before stepping backward. "Your palm awaits."

"What?" Jake asked.

"Long story," Maya said. And then, surprising herself: "You have something on your face."

"What?"

"Like, actual chocolate. From that s'more you destroyed earlier."

Jake's face went pink. The pyramid of his social dominance suddenly seemed a lot less stable.

Chloe was wheeze-laughing somewhere behind her. Maya's phone buzzed in her pocket—her mom again, probably—and she didn't even care. Because Jake was wiping chocolate from his chin, looking somehow smaller and more real, and Maya was thinking that maybe she didn't need to climb anyone's pyramid to be exactly where she was supposed to be.