Zombie at the Pool Party

Chase crushed the orange **vitamin** C tablet between his teeth, the bitter taste making him wince. His mom swore it would boost his immune system, but honestly? The only thing he needed boosted was his social standing at Jackson's pool party.

"Bro, you coming?" Tyler called from the edge of the **pool**, already shirtless and somehow always confident.

Chase hesitated. He'd been a competitive swimmer since seventh grade, but something about pool parties hit different. Maybe it was the way everyone actually paid attention when you weren't racing laps. Maybe it was Maya floating on an inflatable flamingo, laughing at something Ethan said.

"Yeah, just... stretching," Chase lied, even though he'd stretched for two hours at morning practice.

"You good? You look like a **zombie**," Tyler said, splashing water at him.

Chase managed a weak laugh. "Morning practice killed me."

He slid into the water, the cool shock waking him up. That was the thing about pools — at practice, they were serious business. Here, they were this whole social battlefield where one wrong cannonball could ruin your rep. Maya waved from her flamingo, and Chase's stomach did that thing it always did when she noticed him.

"Hey Chase!" she called. "Show us that butterfly stroke everyone talks about!"

Suddenly, eight faces turned toward him. The pressure that normally crushed him during races? This was worse. But then Tyler started drumming on his chest like some cheesy sports movie hype man, and someone else joined in, and before Chase knew it, the whole pool was clapping this off-beat rhythm.

So he swam. And yeah, maybe he showed off a little, cutting through the water like it was nothing, letting himself feel powerful instead of awkward for once.

When he surfaced, Maya was actually clapping. "Okay, that was actually sick."

Chase wiped water from his eyes, feeling something shift inside him. Maybe tomorrow he'd be back to zombie-mode at 5 AM practice. Maybe the vitamin C wouldn't actually do anything. But right now? Right now, he was just a guy who could really swim, and for the first time in forever, that felt like enough.