The Sphinx Knows Everything

The sphinx cat glared at me from my pillow, hairless and judgmental, like a tiny, angry philosopher. Its name was Mochi, because my sister thought everything cute needed a food name. I was pet-sitting for the weekend, which meant I was basically trapped in my apartment with a wrinkly creature that looked like it knew all my secrets.

"You're not going anywhere," I muttered, pulling my snapback down lower. The hat covered the disaster that was my hair—my attempt at DIY bangs gone wrong at 2 AM while doom-scrolling TikTok tutorials. Now I looked like a medieval page boy who'd lost his way to the Renaissance fair.

My phone buzzed. Group chat blowing up about Jordan's party tonight. Everyone was going. Even Harper, who once literally cried when a waiter got her order wrong. I couldn't show up looking like this. I couldn't show up at all.

Mochi stretched, yawning like she was bored of my existential crisis. Which, fair.

"ELEANOR!" My mom's voice through the door. "Did you take your vitamins?"

"YES!" I lied. The vitamin bottles sat on my desk—a rainbow of promises. Vitamin D for mood (lol), B12 for energy (double lol), and these weird gummy multivitamins that tasted like artificial fruit and parental disappointment. Mom had become obsessed with wellness since my older sister started college. Now every minor inconvenience meant I needed more supplements.

The truth was, no amount of vitamins could fix what was actually wrong. I just didn't know how to say it: that I felt like I was performing being a teenager, like everyone else had gotten the manual and I was just improvising.

Mochi hopped onto my desk, sat on my vitamin bottles, and stared at me with those enormous alien eyes. Something about her naked vulnerability made me want to tell her everything.

"I'm just tired," I whispered. "Of trying so hard."

She head-butted my hand, purring like a tiny motor. In that moment, I realized something: Mochi didn't have fur to hide behind, and she didn't care. She was just herself—wrinkly, weird, and completely unbothered.

I pulled off the hat. My bangs were still a mess, but whatever.

"You know what?" I told the sphinx. "Fuck it. We're going to that party."

And we did. Me and my hairless plus-one, wearing my failed bangs like a crown.