The Riddle at Reynolds' Pool

Marcus adjusted his headphones, trying to look casual as he leaned against the fence surrounding the Reynolds' infinity **pool**. From here, he had the perfect angle to **spy** on Maya—she was sitting on the edge with her feet in the water, laughing at something Jordan said. Her **hair** was still that impossible shade of blue-violet she'd dyed last week, the color now fading into something softer, more like twilight. Marcus had memorized the exact shade without ever meaning to.

The Reynolds' estate was weird like that—old money trying too hard. Beside the pool sat a concrete **sphinx** statue, its face chipped, one ear missing from when Jordan's older brother had tried to skateboard off it last summer. The sphinx seemed to stare at Marcus, a reminder that he was the outsider here, the one who didn't belong in Jordan's world of pool parties and expensive swimsuits and people who said "no cap" unironically.

"You gonna stand there all day, or you coming in?" Maya called out, catching him staring. Marcus felt his face heat up.

"Just, uh, taking in the scenery," he mumbled, which was honestly the lamest thing he could've said.

Later, when everyone else had migrated inside for pizza, Marcus found himself alone by the pool with the sphinx. That's when he noticed them—three **goldfish** darting around in the deep end, flashbulb-orange against the turquoise water. They must've been leftover from some party decoration, forgotten and now trapped in this chlorinated prison.

"That's messed up," Maya said, appearing beside him. She'd changed into dry clothes, her hair pulled back in a messy bun. "They can't live in there forever."

"We should catch them," Marcus said, before he could talk himself out of it. "Put them in an aquarium or something."

Maya looked at him, really looked at him, and smiled. It wasn't her polite everyone-gets-one smile. It was real. "I've got a bowl in my car from when I brought my turtle to school."

So they spent the next hour scooping goldfish out of the pool with a plastic cup while the sphinx watched silently, and Marcus learned that Maya's favorite song was the same as his, and that she dyed her hair because she wanted to be someone her parents wouldn't recognize, and that sometimes the best way to stop feeling like an outsider was to find someone else who felt the same way.

The goldfish swam in circles in their new bowl, safe at last. Marcus couldn't stop grinning. Some riddles, he decided, didn't need answers—just someone to help you ask them.