Undercurrent

The pool party was everything Maya usually avoided: too many bodies, too much noise, too many eyes watching her every move. But Chen had invited her, and Maya had been **swimming** in a crush on him since sophomore year started three months ago.

"You coming in or what?" Tyler yelled, splashing water from the deep end. "Don't be a wimp."

Maya's best friend Sophie rolled her eyes. "Ignore him. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do."

But Maya did want to. She wanted to be the kind of girl who could dive in without thinking, who could laugh at Tyler's jokes, who could just exist without overanalyzing every micro-expression from Chen. Instead, she sat on the edge with her legs in the water, heart **running** a marathon against her ribs.

Then Chen slid in beside her. His wet arm brushed hers, and Maya's brain short-circuited like **lightning** striking a transformer.

"Hey," he said. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Just... thinking."

"About?"

Everything. Nothing. The way his eyelashes clumped together when wet. The fact that she'd never actually spoken to him outside of AP Bio. The absolutely terrible idea brewing in her head.

"I don't know how to swim," she blurted.

Chen blinked. "Really?"

"Really. I mean, I can doggy paddle. But that's it. It's embarrassing, right? Sixteen and can't swim."

"No," Chen said, after a moment that felt eternal. "That's actually... kind of cool." He stood up, water streaming down his chest. "I could teach you. If you want."

Maya's heart did something dangerous and wonderful all at once.

"Yeah," she said, slipping into the water beside him. "Yeah, I want that."

Later, she'd learn Chen had been waiting for an excuse to talk to her since the first day of school. But for now, she was just **swimming** in possibility, **running** toward something instead of away from it, and she'd never felt more **electric** in her entire life.