Zombie Canonball

Leo stood at the edge of Miller's Creek, wearing nothing but swim trunks and the worst decision of his sophomore year: zombie face paint he'd refused to wash off after last night's marathon horror fest.

"Dude, you look like you died three days ago," Marcus called from the water, where everyone from the cross country team was already swimming. "You gonna come in or what?"

The problem wasn't the water. Leo could swim fine. The problem was that Maya—beautiful, track-star Maya who'd finally noticed him in bio last week—was currently treading water near the dock, and Leo was painfully aware that his pale, zombie-painted self was about to make the most uncool entrance in history.

"I'm good," Leo lied. "Maybe later."

"Bull." Marcus splashed water at him. "You've been standing there for twenty minutes. What's the deal?"

Leo's face burned beneath the green face paint. He'd spent all year building his reputation as the quiet, slightly weird zombie kid, and now he was about to blow it by proving he couldn't even handle jumping into a creek. Maya waved at him from the water, and something in his chest tightened.

Suddenly, she was swimming toward him, cutting through the water with easy strokes. "Hey, Zombie Boy," she called. "You coming in or staying on land with the living?" She grinned, and Leo's brain short-circuited.

"I—"

"Water's perfect," she said, treading water a few feet out. "Unless you're scared."

Something about her tone—playful, not mean—made Leo's paralysis break. He dove in, surfacing with a splash that sent water everywhere. The cool shock of it erased his overthinking, and when he blinked the water from his eyes, Maya was laughing.

"Nice zombie impression," she said. "Very convincing."

"I live to serve," Leo replied, and for the first time all day, he didn't feel like an awkward kid in face paint. He just felt like someone who'd taken a chance and jumped in anyway.