The Pool Party Calamity

Maya stood at the edge of the **pool**, clutching her solo cup like it was a lifeline. The senior end-of-year party raged around her—music thumping, people cannonballing into the water, someone already puking in the bushes. Three weeks ago, she would've been right there in the thick of it, part of the social **pyramid** that ruled Lincoln High. Then came the incident with Tyler and the leaked texts, and suddenly she'd tumbled all the way from the top tier to social pariah.

Now she was just **running** interference between her former best friend Chloe, who was currently making out with some college guy on the diving board, and the realization that Maya's entire identity had been built on being part of Chloe's orbit.

"You gonna stand there all night looking like you're at a funeral?" A voice behind her. It was Levi from her AP Bio class, holding two cups. "Or you wanna actually have fun?"

Maya turned. Levi with his perpetually untied shoelaces and reputation for being weirdly into fungi. "I'm good."

"Bullshit." He held out a cup. "You're miserable. I can tell because you haven't checked your phone once. That's like, the universal sign of Actually Having A Conversation."

Something about his absolute lack of filter cracked her composure. She took the cup. "What is this?"

"Virgin sprite. I'm driving. Also I saw what happened with Tyler. Dude's a snake. You're better off."

They ended up sitting on the pool edge, feet in the water, while he explained his mushroom identification Instagram account and she admitted she'd only been friends with Chloe because she was terrified of being nobody.

"Nobody is better than being somebody who hates yourself," Levi said, splashing water at her.

Maya laughed—really laughed—for the first time in weeks. By the time the police showed up to shut everything down, she'd exchanged numbers with Levi, made peace with being at the bottom of the social pyramid, and realized that maybe growing up meant figuring out who you were when nobody was watching.

Running toward her car past the flashing lights, she checked her phone. No notifications. For the first time, that felt okay.