The Sphinx at Home Plate

I'm a zombie. Officially. Four hours of sleep, three Red Bulls, and still somehow expected to decode AP Literature while my brain feels like it's been put through a blender on "frappé" setting.

"Eat this," Mom says, slapping a Flintstones multivitamin on the counter like it's the antidote to my entire existence. I grab it, pop it in my mouth, and head to school where I'll spend seven hours pretending to be functional.

The baseball field is my sanctuary. Even though I ride the bench for half the game, there's something about being there—dirt on my cleats, the crack of the bat, the way time actually makes sense when there are innings and outs. But lately, my head's been elsewhere.

Because I've been spying on someone.

Not in a creepy way. Okay, maybe a little creepy. Maya's been sitting by the old stone sphinx statue behind the gym during lunch, reading books that have absolutely no pictures. The sphinx is this weird leftover from when our school tried to be "culturally enriched" in the 90s. Most people use it as a backdrop for Instagram posts. Maya actually talks to it.

I know this because I've been watching from the baseball dugout, pretending to check my phone while secretly noticing how she reads aloud, how her fingers trace the hieroglyphics like she's trying to decode something real.

"You're not slick," says Carlos, the team's shortstop, sliding onto the bench beside me. "We all see you staring."

"I'm not—"

"Bro. Just go talk to her. What's the worst that happens?" He grins. "She turns you to stone like the sphinx's myth?"

That's when I notice Maya walking toward the baseball field, book in hand, heading straight for ME.

"Hey," she says, casual as anything. "You're always looking at me from the dugout."

I'm caught. I'm dead. I'm ghost.

"I... uh..."

"You seem tired," she adds. "Like, zombie tired. Want a vitamin?"

She pulls a bottle of gummy vitamins from her backpack. The same kind my mom gives me.

"Flintstones?" I ask, surprised.

"They're actually good," she says. "And nobody's too old for dinosaurs."

That's how it started. Me and Maya, sharing vitamins by the sphinx, talking about everything except why we both feel like zombies walking through high school. She's not a riddle I need to solve. She's someone who gets it.

The next baseball game, I actually get put in. I hit a double. Maya's in the stands, cheering like she's been watching baseball her whole life.

"Nice hit, zombie," she yells.

I'm still tired. I still need vitamins. But I think I'm finally waking up.