Vitamin Dreams & Spinach Teeth

Maya's sophomore year started with her sister Chloe dragging her to a "wellness empowerment circle" in their neighbor's basement.

"It's not a pyramid scheme, Maya," Chloe hissed, adjusting her essential oils bracelet. "It's a network of independent wellness entrepreneurs."

Maya sank deeper into the folding chair, surrounded by women in athleisure discussing the transformative power of overpriced vitamin supplements. She was supposed to be at Jacob's party, but instead she was learning about gut biomes and manifestation boards.

"Your sister's gonna bear witness to your success," a woman named Tamara told Chloe, handing her a starter kit of gummy vitamins that cost more than Maya's monthly phone bill.

The next Monday, Maya's life became a ironic hellscape. Chloe had posted Maya's face on her "wellness journey" Instagram, captioned with something about sisterhood and glow-ups. Suddenly, people who'd never acknowledged Maya's existence were sliding into her DMs, asking if those gummy vitamins really cleared acne.

"Dude, your sister's selling those bear gummies?" Jason asked in AP Bio, pointing at Maya's locker. "My mom bought, like, five hundred dollars' worth last month."

"They're vitamin gummies shaped like bears," Maya corrected, wishing she could disappear into the linoleum.

The real disaster struck Tuesday at lunch. Maya, exhausted from Chloe dragging her to another "empowerment circle" the night before, grabbed the first thing she saw from the cafeteria line: a massive spinach salad. She sat across from Sarah, whose smile made Maya's stomach do actual gymnastics.

They talked about Mr. Henderson's terrible chemistry jokes. Maya laughed so hard she forgot herself—swallowed wrong, and spent the next five minutes silently panicking while a piece of spinach wedged itself firmly between her front teeth.

Sarah kept glancing at her mouth. Maya kept talking, praying she wasn't shouting.

"You have something—" Sarah started.

Maya bolted to the bathroom, extracting the spinach with shaking hands. When she returned, Sarah was gone.

By Friday, Maya had had enough. She deleted Chloe's wellness post from her tagged photos, blocked Tamara from Instagram, and confronted Chloe in their shared bedroom.

"I'm not your bear witness, Chloe," Maya said. "I'm not your success story or your gut health testimonial. I'm your sister who wants to go to parties and fail chemistry tests and have spinach in my teeth without it becoming content."

Chloe stared at her, then started laughing. "Those bear gummies gave me the worst diarrhea anyway."

Maya laughed too, feeling something in her chest unknot. Saturday, she went to Jacob's party. Sunday, she slept until noon. And Monday, she smiled at Sarah with perfectly clean teeth, even if her stomach was doing gymnastics again.

Some pyramids were meant to crumble. And some lessons couldn't be bought in a starter kit.