Pyramids in the Breakroom

The iphone buzzed against the mahogany conference table, its screen illuminating the darkened office with a ghostly blue glow. Sarah stared at it—Mark's third missed call tonight. Outside, lightning fractured the Seattle sky, momentarily turning the floor-to-ceiling windows into mirrors reflecting her exhausted face.

"You're still thinking about him," Elena said, appearing in the doorway with a half-eaten papaya in one hand, its orange flesh glistening in the fluorescent light. "I can tell by that look. It's the same one you had when you found out about the pyramid scheme."

Sarah laughed, a dry, humorless sound. "That wasn't a pyramid scheme. That was a legitimate investment opportunity."

"Hun, your ex-boyfriend convinced you to put five thousand dollars into a company that sold 'quantum-infused water filters.' That's the definition of a pyramid." Elena leaned against the doorframe, deliberately casual. "Mark is just another scheme, Sarah. You keep thinking this time will be different."

The lightning flashed again, closer now. Thunder rattled the glass. Sarah's iphone lit up with a text message: *I miss you. Can we talk?*

"He says he misses me."

Elena took a bite of the papaya, juice dripping down her chin. "Of course he does. Now that you've stopped funding his 'music career' and his 'business ventures,' suddenly he's nostalgic." She wiped her face with the back of her hand. "You know what real love looks like? It looks like me bringing you fruit at 11 PM because I know you haven't eaten. It doesn't look like you sitting in a dark office waiting for a man who only remembers your number when he needs something."

Sarah watched the message fade on her screen. The office felt suddenly suffocating, filled with the ghosts of all the schemes she'd fallen for—all the pyramid structures she'd tried to climb, only to find herself crushed at the bottom.

"You're right," she said finally. "About Mark. About the filters. About all of it."

Elena smiled, soft and knowing. "The papaya was from my mother's tree, by the way. She says in our country, eating sweet things helps you recognize when something is rotten." She held out the remaining half. "Want some?"

Sarah took it. The orange flesh was impossibly sweet against her tongue, and for the first time in months, something tasted real. Outside, the storm broke, rain washing the city clean.