Poolside Riddle

The papaya sat forgotten on the lounge chair, its orange flesh browning in the late afternoon heat. Elena watched the goldfish circling endlessly in the resort pool's illuminated pond, their mouths opening and closing in silent desperation.

"They're trapped," David said, startling her. He'd appeared behind her chair without a sound. "But they don't know it."

She hadn't wanted this weekend away. Their marriage had become something she performed rather than lived. "You've been distant."

"I've been thinking." He sat beside her, not touching her. "About us. About the sphinx."

"The sphinx?" She remembered his graduate school obsession with Greek mythology. The riddle no one could solve. "What walks on four legs, then two, then three?"

"Man," he said. "But the real question is: at what point do you stop being yourself?"

The sun began to set, painting the pool in lurid pinks and oranges. A waiter cleared her uneaten papaya. The goldfish continued their mindless circles.

"I'm leaving," David said quietly. "After we get back."

She should have been shocked. But she'd known for months. They'd become like the goldfish — swimming in the same small space, brushing against each other, never truly meeting.

"The riddle," she said, "is that we pretend not to know."

His eyes widened slightly. She'd surprised him. After ten years, she could still do that.

"What if we don't go back?" she asked. "What if we solve the riddle differently?"

The goldfish broke the surface, briefly, before sinking again. Somewhere in the distance, a child laughed. She waited for his answer, but they were both just sphinxes now — riddle and riddler, forever posing the question.

"Then we'd have to want something else," he said.

She picked up her cocktail, the ice melted nearly away. "Do we?"

He didn't answer. The pool lights flickered on, revealing what the darkness had hidden — the same water, the same fish, the same endless circling. Above them, the first stars appeared, indifferent and remote.