Dead Channels

Maya lay beside the hotel pool at 2 AM, the water's surface reflecting a sickly yellow glow from the streetlights above. She trailed her fingers through the water, disturbing her own ghostly reflection. Beside her phone, the coaxial cable lay severed—a jagged wound she'd inflicted three hours ago when David called to say he wasn't coming. Their tenth anniversary. Two years of her salary spent on this suite. Another cancellation, another excuse about a merger that couldn't wait. She'd pulled the cable from the wall. She needed to hear herself think, or maybe she needed to hear nothing at all. She'd become something hollow these past years, moving through meetings and dinner parties and marital obligations like a zombie, performing the motions of a life she no longer felt living inside her. The water cooled her skin, and she thought about just sliding in—clothes and all—letting the chlorine erase everything: the inbox stacked with urgent requests, the fertility treatments they'd stopped discussing, the way David looked through her instead of at her nowadays. But then her phone buzzed,Incoming call flashing: DAVID. She watched it ring, vibrating against the concrete, the severed cable still lying between them like an accusation. She realized she didn't want to drown. She wanted to pull every cable that tethered her to this half-life. She let the call go to voicemail. The pool lapped gently against the edge, patient as a heartbeat. Tomorrow she'd check out of the marriage, too. But tonight, she floated in the possibility of finally, finally being awake.