Three Feet of Glass and Water

The goldfish—I called him Zuko, obviously—stared at me through three feet of glass and water, his mouth opening and closing in what I decided was judgment. Not that I could blame him. I was currently hiding in my bedroom while my party downstairs devolved into chaos.

"You're the real MVP," I told Zuko, sprinkling his food flakes. "At least you don't make things weird."

Downstairs, someone had definitely just put on that song everyone's obsessed with, and I could feel the bass through the floorboards. My mom appeared in the doorway, holding out a vitamin D supplement like it was a peace offering.

"Honey, you should come down. Jordan is asking about you."

"I'm good," I said, already knowing how pathetic I sounded. "Just—giving Zuko his daily dose of whatever makes goldfish not die."

She gave me that look. The one that said we'd talk about this later, preferably when I wasn't mid-avoidance spiral. But honestly, what was I supposed to do? Jordan had shown up with someone new on their arm—some junior who somehow already knew everyone, leaving me standing there like I'd missed a memo I didn't even know existed.

My phone buzzed. A text from my best friend: *dude where ARE you jordan literally asked about you five times*

I stared at the coaxial cable dangling from my wall—remnant of like, 2010, when we still had actual cable TV instead of streaming everything into oblivion. It hung there like evidence of how much things changed without you really noticing until suddenly nothing was familiar anymore.

"Hey Zuko," I whispered. "You ever feel like everyone else got the upgrade and you're still running on old software?"

He swam to the top, mouth opening, closing. Bubble, bubble.

"Yeah. That's what I thought."

The thing nobody tells you about growing up is that some days you're the goldfish and some days you're the bowl, and either way, there's only so much room before things get cramped. But maybe that's okay. Maybe you don't need to be the ocean. Maybe you just need to keep swimming, even when the water feels too shallow.

My phone buzzed again. *come upstairs jordan's in your room looking for you*

I took a breath, checked my reflection—mostly acceptable, vaguely capable of human interaction—and reached for the door handle. Zuko did a little flip.

"Wish me luck, buddy."