Riddles at Midnight

The condo pool was empty at 2 AM, the water still and black as a forgotten dream. Elena sat on the edge, legs submerged, while Marcus paced the concrete deck with his iPhone pressed to his ear.

"It's going to voicemail again," he said, frustration cracking his voice.

"She's not going to answer, Marcus. Whatever she has to say, she can say it tomorrow." But Elena knew better. They'd been dancing around each other's silences for months.

A fox appeared at the treeline—rust-colored, watchful. It dipped its head as if acknowledging them, then slipped away into shadows.

"You know what she is?" Marcus lowered his phone. "A sphinx. Sitting on her pedestal of hurt feelings, posing riddles she won't explain the answers to. What did I do wrong? What do I need to change? Guess correctly or you're devoured."

Elena had heard this before. The way he talked about his ex-wife, as if her pain were a game manufactured to torment him. As if her boundaries were ornamental, not structural.

"Some riddles don't have answers you'll like," she said quietly.

He glared at her phone, face-up on the concrete. A message notification lit the screen. Neither of them moved to check it.

"You think I'm the problem," Marcus said.

"I think you want solutions to questions she stopped asking years ago."

The fox returned, this time with something in its mouth—a pool toy, forgotten from summer. The plastic turtle bobbed as the fox shook it, absurd and bright against the night.

"Look at that," Elena said. "Even the wild things carry baggage."

Marcus's phone buzzed again. His ex's name appeared on screen: a brief pulse of light, then darkness. He stood motionless, sphinx-like in his own right—guarding secrets he wouldn't speak, riddles he wouldn't solve.

Elena pulled her legs from the water. The condo lights flickered off, one by one, like stars winking out. Somewhere in the distance, a siren. Here, only water lapping against concrete, and two people who'd run out of words.

"Are you coming up?" she asked.

"In a minute."

She knew he wouldn't. Some pools you could swim across, and others you just learned to tread water in forever.