The Sock Party

Vix found her sock at 2:14 p.m. on a Saturday.

It was not just any sock. It was the good one. The tall black one with the little stitched bats on it that actually matched her boots. It had been missing for three weeks and she had been conducting a low-grade, deeply philosophical mourning about it.

Tai found her staring into the dryer like it had betrayed her.

"You found it," Tai whispered, reverent.

"I found it," Vix said. "It was stuck in the sleeve of your giant hoodie."

Tai gasped. Her messy red bun wobbled. Her pointy ears went straight up.

"This is a miracle. This is a sign. We have to celebrate."

Vix, still holding the sock like a sacred text, said, "Tai, no."

It was already too late.

By 2:37, Tai had dragged their ancient inflatable pool into the parking lot of their apartment building. By 2:42, she had hooked up the hose. By 2:51, she had unrolled a neon yellow slip n' slide she claimed she found in their closet, which Vix had never seen before and was 90% sure Tai had just manifested through chaotic willpower.

"IT'S A BLOCK PARTY!" Tai shouted at the parking lot. She was 5'3" in swim shorts and a crooked t-shirt, red hair everywhere, grinning with her sharp canines out. "MY ROOMMATE FOUND HER SOCK! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!"

Mrs. Jensen from 2B leaned out her window. "What?"

"MY ROOMMATE FOUND HER SOCK!" Tai shouted back, even louder.

Vix stood in the doorway in all black, as usual, holding her bat sock, watching her life happen to her.

"Tai, you cannot throw a block party for a sock."

"Not for a sock," Tai said, solemnly. "For THE sock. There's a difference. Also, I already invited everyone."

Everyone turned out to be: Jamal from 3A with his bluetooth speaker, the kids from downstairs, and a very confused guy who was just trying to do laundry but got handed a popsicle.

Jamal turned on music. The inflatable pool filled up with very cold hose water. Tai cannonballed into it and immediately screamed.

"IT'S PERFECT! IT'S BAPTISMAL! VIX, GET IN!"

"I am wearing black jeans," Vix said. "In 80 degree weather. As always."

"So take off the jeans! You have shorts under there! You have the sock! Wear the sock!"

Vix looked down at the sock. Then at Tai, shivering and triumphant in the pool, hair plastered to her head, ears pink from the cold.

"This is so stupid," Vix muttered.

But she went back upstairs, changed into shorts, put on both bat socks, one old and one newly resurrected, and came back down.

Tai cheered like Vix had won an Olympic medal. The kids cheered. Jamal cheered. The laundry guy cheered.

Vix did not do the slip n' slide. She said slip n' slides were an example of late-stage capitalism's false promises of frictionless joy. Then she did the slip n' slide once when she thought no one was looking, shrieked, wiped out at the end in a puddle, and had to sit in the inflatable pool to recover.

Tai floated over to her, bumping shoulders.

"See?" Tai said, water dripping off her nose. "We celebrated correctly."

Vix wrung out her sock. "You flooded the parking lot because I found laundry."

"Yeah," Tai said, beaming. "Because you were happy about it for like, three whole seconds. That was big. I had to make it bigger so everyone else could see it too."

Vix didn't have an argument for that. She leaned back in the stupid inflatable pool, in the parking lot, in the sun, with a bat sock on each foot and her chaotically cheerful roommate beside her, and let herself be happy for four seconds this time.

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