The Sphinx of Seventh Period

Maya adjusted her orange cardigan for the fiftieth time, suddenly aware of how bright it was against Carter's basement walls. This was exactly why she never went to parties. She was like a goldfish at a shark tank — tiny, out of place, and definitely not built for these waters.

"Hey, you're in my AP Bio class, right?"

Maya turned to find Jake leaning against the doorframe, holding a red Solo cup like it was a weapon. Jake. The guy who'd sat behind her since September, the one she'd spent entire lectures not-so-subtly watching through the reflection of her phone screen when she should've been taking notes on cellular respiration.

"Um, yeah," Maya said. "Bio."

"Cool." He nodded, and there was this pause that stretched out like taffy. "You're really good at that stuff. The whole, like, science thing."

Maya felt herself shrinking. "Thanks. My mom's big on academics."

"That's sick," Jake said, and she couldn't tell if he was being genuine or if this was some kind of setup. Like, was he about to ask her to tutor him? Or worse — was he about to invite her to join his friend group'spapaya-eating contest or whatever weird thing popular kids did these days?

Then he said something that made her pause: "You're kind of like a sphinx, you know? You're always in your own world, but it seems like there's a lot going on up there."

Maya blinked. Nobody had ever called her a sphinx before. Mysterious. Enigmatic. The kind of person who had secrets worth uncovering. And the way he said it — like he actually meant it — made something in her chest do this weird fluttery thing.

"I, uh..." She laughed, nervous but real. "I was just thinking about how my mom used to pack papaya in my lunch in elementary school, and all the kids would make faces like I was eating alien food."

Jake's eyes lit up. "No way. Papaya's legit. My grandma's got a tree in her backyard."

They ended up talking for an hour. About papaya and goldfish his sister won at a carnival that died three days later, about orange being the most underrated color (he'd worn orange socks to homecoming, she'd worn this cardigan), about how they both felt like they were faking their way through high school.

Later, when Maya finally left, her cardigan didn't feel so bright anymore. It felt like armor. Like something a sphinx would wear.