The Sphinx at 2 AM

The party thumped against my ribs like a second heartbeat. Jake's laugh cut through the bass-heavy air, his arm already draped over Chloe's shoulder like he'd staked his claim. I gripped my iPhone till my knuckles turned white, screen dark because checking it again would make me look obsessed. Or desperate. Or both.

"Hey, you okay?" Maya appeared beside me, Solo cup in hand. Her eyes did that scanning thing—like she was reading me, trying to decide if I was good or if she needed to deploy the emergency friendship protocol.

"Fine," I lied. "Just need some air."

"You've been saying that all night," she said gently. "But sure. Go. I'll cover."

I bolted.

Running felt like shedding skin. The cold air burned my lungs, sharp and real. I ended up at the old park pond, water black and silver under moonlight, still except for where I'd thrown a rock two weeks ago with Maya and cried about college applications and how everything was changing too fast.

My iPhone buzzed. Unknown number. Probably another spam call, but what if—

Then I saw it.

A fox, crouched by the water's edge. Not moving. Just watching me with eyes that held absolutely zero judgment about how I'd spent the last hour pretending to be someone I wasn't.

We stared at each other. The fox's tail gave one tiny twitch.

"You're not going to ask me what's wrong, are you?" I whispered. "Or tell me I'm overthinking it?"

The fox dipped its head, drank from the pond like my entire existence wasn't currently crumbling under the weight of maybe-kissing someone who might not even like me that way.

A riddle formed in my head, sudden and weird: What sits at the edge of water, knows everything, says nothing?

The answer was watching me.

My phone buzzed again. This time I checked.

Jake: u left

Me: yeah

Jake: come back?

The fox turned, vanishing into shadows like it had never existed, like maybe I'd hallucinated the whole thing. But the pond still rippled from where it had drunk. Real things left ripples. Fake things didn't.

I typed: maybe

Then: actually no

I sat by the water, phone screen finally dark, learning how to be alone without feeling lonely. The fox knew something I was just starting to figure out: some questions don't need answers. They just need space to exist.