Goldfish at the Office Aquarium

Maria pressed her palm against the cool glass of the office aquarium, watching the goldfish circle endlessly in its ten-gallon prison. She felt like that fish sometimes—swimming the same lap, day after day, going nowhere but moving nonetheless.

"You look like a zombie," Sarah said, leaning against the cubicle wall with her morning coffee. "Rough night?"

Maria managed a tired smile. "Mark's moving out."

"Oh." Sarah's sympathetic face did little to comfort her. "I thought things were better."

"They were. Then they weren't." Maria turned back to the goldfish. "He says I've been emotionally absent lately. Whatever that means."

"You have been walking around like the undead, Maria."

She laughed—dark humor, the only kind she could manage anymore. "Maybe I need more vitamin B. Or less. Who knows anymore?"

The truth was, Maria had been sleepwalking through her marriage and her life for months. The corporate merger that had everyone on edge had left her drained, performing the same tasks with increasing automation while her mind drifted elsewhere. She caught herself staring at nothing during meetings, her thoughts swimming in circles like that damn fish.

"I think I'm going to leave him," she said, the words hanging in the air like smoke.

Sarah set her coffee down. "You think?"

"No. I know." Maria pressed her palm harder against the glass. "I'd rather be alone and feel something than be with someone and feel nothing."

The goldfish nudged the glass, its bulbous eye staring blankly at her. Maria envied its simple existence—no failed marriage, no corporate burnout, no existential dread.

"So what are you going to do?" Sarah asked gently.

Maria turned away from the aquarium. "I'm going to start swimming again. Really swimming. And I'm going to leave this job. And I'm going to find out what it feels like to actually be alive."

For the first time in months, something stirred inside her chest—not much, but it was there. A pulse. A beginning.

"Good," Sarah said. "Because you look like hell."

Maria laughed, and this time, it was real.