Chlorine and Regret

The pool had been empty for three years. Elena stood at the edge, staring into the cracked blue basin where leaves and forgotten memories had settled into a sludge that no amount of chlorine would ever clean. Marcus wanted to fill it. He said it would be good for them — something to do in the evenings besides watching each other age.

"You need to get out more," he'd told her that morning, sliding a bottle of vitamin D across the kitchen counter like it was some kind of apology. "The doctor says you're deficient."

She'd laughed, bitter and sharp. "I'm deficient in a lot of things, Marcus."

Now she was here, at Jordan's house, because Jordan had called and said come, and Elena always came when Jordan called. They'd been friends since college, back when friendship was easy and didn't require negotiating boundaries or glossing over things that couldn't be unsaid.

The dog — Bear, a ancient golden retriever who'd belonged to Jordan's mother — wheezed at her feet. His muzzle was white, his hips failing, but his tail still thumped when she scratched behind his ears. "Hey, old man," she whispered. "Me too."

Jordan appeared at the sliding glass door, martini in hand, hair shorter than it had been last week. They were cutting it all off these days, the women of their generation, shedding the long locks they'd worn through marriages and divorces like surrender flags.

"He's not filling it," Jordan said, gesturing at the pool with her glass. "He says he will, but he won't."

Elena looked down at the dog, at the white muzzle, at the way his body settled heavily into the concrete. "Marcus says he will. He bought the supplies."

"That's phase one," Jordan said. "Phase two is admitting he's too tired. Phase three is hiring someone. Phase four is resenting the cost. Phase five is the pool sits empty another three years while you both pretend everything is fine."

Bear groaned, settling his head on Elena's foot. The weight of it was enormous.

"I slept with someone," Elena said. The words were small, quiet, dangerous.

Jordan didn't blink. "Marcus?"

"No. Someone else. Once. Six months ago."

"And?"

"And it didn't fix anything." Elena looked at the empty pool, at the leaves gathering in the deep end like dead thoughts. "It just made more things that can't be unsaid."

Jordan's dog sighed against her ankle, a long, rattling exhale that seemed to say: this is what happens. This is how it goes. You love things. They fail. You keep loving them anyway.

"Well," Jordan said, refilling her glass. "At least you're deficient in something other than vitamin D now."

Elena laughed, and it felt like the first real thing in months. Behind them, the house was dark. Ahead, the pool waited, vast and empty, as if something might eventually grow there besides regret. "Yeah," she said. "At least that."