Zombie State of Mind

Maya dragged herself through the last week of sophomore year like a literal zombie. Three finals, zero sleep, and her mom's new obsession with wellness meant Maya was surviving on those disgusting cherry vitamin gummies that tasted like cough medicine and despair.

"You look dead," Theo said at lunch on Friday. "Like, actually deceased."

"Thanks, Theo. Really boosting the self-esteem." Maya popped another vitamin gummy. Cherry punishment. "At least I'll make it to Kira's pool party alive. Maybe."

The annual pool party was THE social event. Cringe to admit it, but Maya's social standing for junior year kind of depended on not embarrassing herself. Which was unfortunate, because she had the coordination of a baby giraffe on land and the swimming skills of a terrified cat in water.

Saturday arrived with actual sunshine for once. Maya stood at the edge of Kira's pool, clutching her towel like a security blanket. Everyone looked so effortless. So confident. So not like they were mentally calculating how to gracefully exit a pool without revealing their entire existence.

Then she saw him—Liam, the human equivalent of those aesthetic Pinterest boards, looking like a zombie from his own finals week. Dark circles. Messy hair. Somehow still stupidly attractive.

"You too?" he said, sliding onto the lounge chair beside her. "I've been running on coffee and spite since Tuesday."

Maya's brain short-circuited. "My mom has me on these vitamin gummies. They're supposed to help with stress but mostly they just taste like betrayal."

Lamin actually laughed. Not polite laughter. Real laughter.

Then chaos exploded in the form of a golden retriever puppy that SOMEONE (she suspected Kira's little brother) had let loose. The dog—a ball of pure chaos named Pancake—made a beeline for the food table, knocked over a stack of Solo cups, then decided the pool looked like an excellent place to investigate.

"PANCAKE, NO" was screamed by approximately fifteen people simultaneously.

Liam and Maya both scrambled up, grabbed the wet, shaking, very happy dog together, and somehow ended up in the shallow end, fully clothed, soaked, laughing so hard their ribs hurt.

"Well," Liam said, pushing wet hair out of his eyes, "that's one way to make an entrance."

Maya looked down at her soaked dress (ruined), her bare feet (her favorite slides were lost somewhere in the chaos), and the dog currently shaking water all over both of them.

"Yeah," she said, grinning like an idiot. "Totally worth it."

Sometimes zombie mode was exactly what you needed to stop overthinking and just fall into the pool. Literally.