Electric Fish

The goldfish floated sideways in the bowl, its orange scales catching the afternoon light that slanted through the kitchen window. Three days dead, and Elena still hadn't flushed it. It had been Jonathan's fish—a ridiculous impulse buy from a street fair during that month when they'd pretended their marriage wasn't already underwater.

Her phone buzzed against the counter. Another Slack notification from David, wanting to know if she'd reviewed the Q3 projections. The iPhone screen glowed with its familiar blue light, a tether to expectations she couldn't quite summon the energy to meet today.

Outside, lightning fractured the sky—a sudden, violent crack that made the cat bolt from the windowsill. Barnaby, Jonathan's parting gift, the only thing he'd left behind besides debt and a collection of expensive watches. The cat despised her. She reciprocated the sentiment.

Elena opened the refrigerator and stared at the wilted spinach. She'd bought it with intentions of cooking something healthy, something that might make her feel like she was taking care of herself again. That was four days ago. Now the leaves were slimy, rotting, much like everything else in her life that she'd neglected.

The goldfish had lived two years. Longer than their marriage's last honest year. Jonathan had named it Lightning, for no reason she'd ever understood. A joke without a punchline, like most things between them.

She reached into the bowl, her fingers meeting the cold water. The fish slipped through her hands, the way all things eventually did. She flushed it without ceremony, watching it spiral away.

Her phone lit up again. A text from her mother: "Are you coming to dinner Sunday? Your father asked."

Elena typed "Yes" because it was easier than the truth. She was thirty-seven years old, successful on paper, completely hollowed out by the slow erosion of失望 and compromise. The cat returned to the windowsill as the storm broke over the city, rain washing away nothing at all.

She threw away the spinach. There would be time for self-care tomorrow, or the next day, or never. The lightning flashed again, and for a moment, she understood exactly how the goldfish must have felt—swimming in circles, waiting for someone to finally remember to feed it.