Vitamin for the Nerves

Maya's palms were sweating so much she could practically water plants with them. She stood at the edge of the pool party, clutching her phone like it was a lifeline, watching everyone else actually living their best lives.

"Yo Maya, come try this!" Jake called from the cabana, holding up something that looked like an alien experiment gone wrong. "It's papaya. My mom's obsessed with 'exotic fruits' now."

Maya inched closer. The papaya sat there like a question mark in the middle of a pool party that featured way too much glitter and not enough of her actually participating. Jake grinned at her—that smile that made her stomach do that annoying flip thing it did whenever he looked her way for more than three seconds.

"I don't know," she said. "What if it's gross?"

"Living dangerously, I see," Jake teased, but his eyes were soft. "I'll take a hit for the team first." He took a bite, made a face, then shrugged. "Not terrible. Not amazing. Just... fruit."

She tried it. It was sweet in a way that felt unfamiliar, like something from a world where people were brave enough to try new things without overthinking everything first.

"See? Not so bad," Jake said. "Hey, you wanna get out of here? This party's giving me major secondhand embarrassment energy anyway."

They ended up at the convenience store down the street, sharing an ICEE and sitting on the curb like they were in a music video. Jake told her he'd failed his driver's test twice, and Maya admitted she still slept with a stuffed otter named Barnaby.

"Vitamin for the soul," Jake said when she admitted that. "Embarrassment keeps you humble."

Her palms were finally dry. The pool party, the papaya, the nerves—they were all background now. What mattered was this: Jake knew about Barnaby, and somehow the world hadn't ended.

Maybe trying new things wasn't so scary after all. Maybe the scariest part was just showing up.