Chlorine and Regret

The hotel pool was empty at 3 AM, which was exactly what David needed. Forty years old and freshly divorced, he'd flown to Tampa on what he'd told himself was a business trip, though the closest he'd come to business was staring at the ceiling of his room and wondering how twenty years of marriage could dissolve like sugar in hot tea.

He sat at the poolside bar, nursing a drink that was mostly ice. The bartender had left hours ago, but David had helped himself to the mini-bar and a room service tray that held a wilted spinach salad he'd ordered at midnight, hunger gnawing at him even when he couldn't stomach the idea of eating alone.

The pool lights cast rippling blue shadows across everything. He remembered Sarah in this same light—orange swimsuit, hair wet and slicked back, laughing as she pushed him into the water during their honeymoon. That Sarah had existed before the mortgage, before the fertility treatments, before the quiet accumulation of disappointments that had built a wall between them brick by invisible brick.

He took a bite of the spinach. It was warm and limp, completely unappetizing. But he chewed anyway, swallowing past the lump in his throat.

An orange floated in the pool—probably from the complimentary fruit bowl some guest had brought down. It bobbed gently in the filtered blue, surreal and strangely peaceful. David watched it drift, thinking how that orange was doing better in the water than he was doing in his life.

"You okay, man?"

David jumped. A security guard stood nearby, flashlight cutting through the gloom.

"Yeah," David said, though it was a lie. "Just thinking."

The guard nodded, took in the spinach salad, the empty glass, the lone orange floating in the pool like a miniature sun. "Pool closes at 2 AM, but I'll give you ten minutes. Don't do anything stupid."

David almost laughed. The stupidest thing he'd ever done was marry Sarah knowing she wanted children when he wasn't sure he did. Or maybe the stupidest thing was staying married for twenty years while they both slowly died inside.

He took out his phone, scrolled to her number. The orange drifted toward the pool's edge. The spinach salad sat half-eaten on the bar. David stood up, walked to the pool's edge, and watched his reflection shiver in the water.

Then he turned and walked back to his room, leaving the orange to float alone in the dark. Some things, he decided, were better left untouchable.