The Zombie State

I stood there feeling like a total **zombie**. The homecoming dance was in full swing around me - couples grinding, music thumping, people screaming over the bass - but I might as well have been undead. My palms were sweating so much I had to wipe them on my dress, and I was five seconds from just ghosting.

Then I saw him.

Tyler from AP Bio was standing by the **palm** tree in the corner, nursing a drink and looking exactly as out of place as I felt. We'd never spoken before, but I'd noticed him in class - always quiet, always drawing in his notebook instead of taking notes. Now he was wearing this orange button-up shirt that somehow worked, totally clashing with his messy dark hair.

I don't know what came over me. Maybe it was the desperation to not spend another second feeling like a social corpse. I found myself walking toward him, my heart running a marathon against my ribs.

"Hey," I said. "You look like you're hiding."

He jumped, then gave me this crooked smile that made my stomach do flip-flops. "Busted. You too?"

"Totally. I've been hiding in the bathroom for like twenty minutes."

"Nice. I claimed this tree ten minutes ago. So far, so good."

We ended up talking for, like, two hours straight. About everything - our weird families, how much we hated high school drama, his obsession with his pet **goldfish** (who apparently had better personality than half our class), my secret dream to become a photographer instead of going to college like everyone expected.

"My **goldfish** is literally my only friend who gets me," he said, and I laughed so hard I spilled my drink.

At some point, the slow songs started. Couples were swaying, and I felt that awkward tension where you're supposed to dance but neither person wants to make the first move.

"I should probably go," I said, even though I didn't want to at all.

"Or," he said, "we could stay. I mean, if you want. I'm not exactly great at dancing, but..."

"I'm not either," I admitted.

"Then we can be terrible together?"

And just like that, we were swaying to some cheesy song, not caring that we were off-beat or that people were staring. His palm was warm in mine, and I wasn't a zombie anymore. I was just a girl at a dance, **running** late for curfew, not caring at all.