Zombie Mode at the Padel Court

Monday morning hit me like a freight train. After staying up till 3 AM grinding ranked matches, I was running on pure caffeine and regret. My dad called it "zombie mode" — that state where you're technically awake but your soul has left the chat.

"You're playing padel with the cousins," he announced at breakfast. No room for negotiation.

Padel. The sport everyone at school was suddenly obsessed with. Of course this would happen the week I'd successfully avoided any physical activity that wasn't thumb exercise.

We got to the courts, and there he was. Mateo. The guy I'd been lowkey spying on via Instagram stories for months. He was wearing that coral hoodie I'd commented "fire emoji" on when he posted it last week. I immediately regretted every life choice leading to this moment.

"You play?" he asked, and I swear my palms started sweating like I'd been holding them over a stove.

"Uh, yeah. Totally. Big fan of the... ball thing."

Cringe. Absolute cringe.

The game was a disaster. I tripped over my own feet. My serves went everywhere except the court. At one point, I literally walked into a glass wall. But somewhere between my third humiliation and Mateo actually laughing WITH me instead of AT me, something shifted.

"You're good," he said, even though I definitely wasn't. "Want me to show you that backhand?"

We stayed after everyone else left. Just me and Mateo and the palm trees swaying over the court. My phone was blowing up — ranked match notifications, group chats, the whole digital circus I usually lived for. But for the first time in forever, I didn't care.

"You know," he said, "I've seen your gaming profile. You're that zombie_killa99, right?"

My face burned. "You spy on my profile?"

"Maybe." He grinned. "Teach me sometime?"

Walking home, phone on do-not-disturb, I realized something: zombie mode wasn't about being tired. It was about checking out. And maybe — just maybe — I was finally ready to log back into real life.