The Spinach Incident

Freshman year was supposed to be my glow-up era. Instead, I was stuck in the cafeteria with spinach in my braces, staring at Fox Williams—the senior who looked like he walked straight out of a TikTok edit.

"You got something, kid," Fox said, nodding at my mouth.

My face burned. I'd just tried to impress my crush by ordering something "grown-up" from the salad bar, and now I was that freshman with green stuff stuck in my teeth while the entire popular table watched.

"Thanks," I mumbled, scrambling to clean it off with a napkin.

But then Fox did something unexpected. He slid into the seat across from me, ignoring his usual crew at the pyramid of cool kids by the windows. "That salad bar is a scam anyway. Their spinach's always wilted."

I blinked. Was this actually happening?

"I'm Maya," I said, trying to play it cool even though my heart was doing cartwheels.

"Fox. Obviously." He leaned in, voice dropping. "Look, I need a favor, and you seem like someone who knows their way around a lie."

That's how I got roped into Fox's scheme to smuggle his emotional support cat into the school's abandoned basement, because apparently even the untouchable seniors had problems. The cat—appropriately named Chaos—had escaped and was currently somewhere in the ventilation system, and if the administration found out, Fox was dead meat.

"Why me?" I asked as we crept down the hallway during third period.

Fox grinned, and for the first time, he seemed real—not some social pyramid god, but just a guy scared of losing his pet. "Because you're the only person who didn't laugh when I tripped in the lunch line yesterday. That's rare."

We found Chaos curled up in the gym storage room, purring like a chainsaw. As we carried the cat back to Fox's car, I realized something: everyone was just pretending to have it figured out. The popular kids, the freaks, the ones in between—we were all just trying to survive high school one awkward moment at a time.

"Same time tomorrow?" Fox asked as he unlocked his car.

"Maybe," I said, suppressing a smile. "But I'm picking the spinach-free restaurant."