Vitamin D Operation

Leo adjusted his dad's oversized sunglasses, feeling like a total fraud. The country club pool sparkled with teenage royalty—Maya Chen laughing with her friends by the deep end, glowing in ways that had nothing to do with the July sun.

"Dude, you're being super sketch," Marcus whispered, slathering on another layer of sunscreen. "Just talk to her like a normal person."

"Negative. Normal is for people without strategy." Leo tapped his phone like it was classified intel. "I'm on operation Vitamin D. Tactical approach."

"You mean the vitamin your mom makes you take because you're inside too much?" Marcus raised an eyebrow. "Big mood, but not a strategy."

Leo's plan was bulletproof: become mysterious. Attractive. Rumored to be interesting. His older sister's ex had mentioned Leo was "basically a spy" at summer camp last year—technically true, if hacking the cafeteria menu to unlock unlimited ice cream counted as espionage. The rumor had spread before Leo could correct it, and suddenly he was something.

Now he just needed to prove it.

"She's heading to the padel courts," Leo hissed, ducking behind a potted plant. Maya was definitely walking toward the racquet courts, hair wet and perfect. "Tail her."

"This is so creepy, bro."

"It's RECON, Marcus. God. You have no vision."

They "shadowed" Maya—which mostly meant walking twenty feet behind her while pretending to have an intense conversation about cheat codes. At the padel courts, she joined a mixed group. Some seniors from school. The kind of people who threw parties Leo heard about but was never invited to.

"Okay, phase two," Leo whispered. "Natural integration."

"You're going to play padel? You don't even know the rules."

"Fake it till you make it."

But before Leo could execute whatever terrible "casual" entrance he'd planned, Maya turned. Her eyes locked directly on him—behind the potted plant. Still wearing oversized spy sunglasses.

She waved.

"Leo?" she called. "Are you... okay?"

His brain short-circuited. "I'm conducting surveillance. On the sport. For academic purposes."

Smooth. Smooth as sandpaper.

But Maya laughed. Actually laughed. "You're so weird. Want to play? We need a fourth."

Marcus mouthed I TOLD YOU SO.

They played. Leo was terrible—constantly hit the ball into the fence, tripped over his own feet, invented rules that didn't exist. But Maya kept laughing, not at him but with him, like being bad at something was its own kind of courage.

Afterward, sitting by the pool with her friends, Leo realized something: he hadn't been mysterious. He hadn't been a spy. He'd just been himself, and somehow that had been enough.

"Hey," Maya said, passing him a vitamin water. "You're funny. You should hang out more."

The fake sunglasses slipped off his nose.

Yeah, Leo thought, actual sunlight hitting his face for the first time all day. Sometimes you don't need a strategy. You just need to show up.