The Summer Signal Died

Maya's iphone had been dead for exactly forty-seven minutes when her phone signal followed suit. Great. Now she was stranded at some campground in the middle of nowhere with her family and zero connection to civilization.

"Maybe this is exactly what you need," her mom had said earlier, tossing a container of fresh spinach into the cooler. "Time to unplug, Maya. Experience nature."

Yeah, right. Nature was overrated. Nature was bugs and weird smells and—

"Hey."

Maya jumped. A guy leaned against the tree next to their campsite, maybe seventeen, wearing a faded band tee and the kind of effortless confidence that made Maya suddenly very aware of her messy bun and sweatpants. His reddish hair caught the sunlight.

"I'm Caleb," he said. "You look like you're mourning something tragic."

"My signal," Maya blurted. "It's gone. I'm basically dead."

He laughed. "Same. My parents dragged me out here for some 'family bonding' time. I'd rather be literally anywhere else."

They ended up talking for two hours. About school, about how much they hated camping, about how their parents didn't get what it was like to be seventeen in 2026. Caleb was funny in a dry, sarcastic way that made Maya's stomach do weird little flips. He called her out when she complained about the spinach her mom forced on everyone at dinner. "Try it with actual ranch dressing instead of judging it immediately."

"You sound like my mother."

"I sound like someone who's been camping for three days and will literally eat anything that isn't burned."

Her dad returned from the cooler looking proud. "Look what I found at that farm stand down the road!" He held up a papaya like it was some kind of trophy. "Fresh papaya!"

"What even IS that?" Maya wrinkled her nose. It looked alien.

"It's fruit, Maya. God forbid you consume something that didn't come from a package."

Caleb tried not to laugh. He really didn't. But then he lost it.

"Oh my god, are you seriously laughing at my dad's papaya moment?"

"I'm sorry," he gasped. "But your face—"

They were still laughing when something rustled in the bushes nearby. Maya froze.

"Please tell me that's not—"

A bear lumbered into the clearing, sniffing the air near their cooler.

"Nobody move," Caleb whispered, suddenly very close to her side.

Maya's heart hammered. This was it. This was how she ended. No instagram posts, no final texts, just eaten by a bear while camping with her parents and a random guy with reddish hair and a nice laugh.

The bear sniffed the cooler, made a disgusted noise, and wandered off.

"Did that bear just—reject our food?" Maya whispered.

"Even bears have standards," Caleb said, and then they were laughing again, nervous and breathless and way too close to each other in the moonlight.

Her phone was still dead the next morning. But as Caleb handed her a slice of papaya (admitting it was actually pretty good) and they made plans to meet up again next summer, Maya found she didn't care quite as much as she thought she would.

Some signals were way better than wifi anyway.