Lightning Over the Sink

The dog—Marcus's rescue, really, though Eliza had been the one to walk it, feed it, clean up its messes for six years—stared at her from the kitchen tile. Its bowl was empty. Had been empty since Tuesday, when Marcus walked out with a suitcase and a half-hearted apology about needing space.

Eliza stood at the sink, watching lightning fracture the sky beyond the window. Each flash illuminated the disaster of their life together: the orange peels still curling in the compost bin from her attempt at fresh juice last Sunday, the spinach going slimy in the crisper drawer because neither of them had cooked in weeks.

Her phone buzzed on the counter—Marcus, probably. Or her mother asking if she'd heard from him. Or her boss with another emergency because the quarterly review was tomorrow and nobody could find the files Marcus had handled before he left without forwarding them, without a single thought for who would have to pick up the pieces he'd scattered everywhere like they meant nothing.

The dog whined, low and pathetic.

"I know," she said.

Outside, lightning struck somewhere close. The kitchen lights flickered. In that brief darkness, she remembered the way Marcus used to look at her across crowded rooms—the private language of raised eyebrows, half-smiles. Now she couldn't remember the last time he'd really seen her. Not the performance of being seen, but the actual thing. The way he'd stopped asking about her day somewhere around year three. The way he'd started sleeping in the guest room "because of his snoring" until it became permanent, unremarked, ordinary.

The dog nudged her hand with its wet nose.

She opened the refrigerator and took out the rotting spinach, the forgotten oranges. Some part of her wanted to keep them—as if letting them decay meant accepting what had happened. As if throwing them away would make it final in a way she wasn't ready for yet.

Lightning flashed again. The kitchen brightened, and for a moment she could almost believe Marcus would walk through the door with the takeout he used to bring on stormy nights, saying something terrible about the traffic while she pretended not to notice he'd forgotten her favorite dressing again.

Instead, the dog sat at her feet, and the room was quiet, and Eliza finally threw the spinach away.