Riddles by the Deep End

The golden retriever—her dog, now, though he'd chosen it at the shelter seven years ago—lay panting on the concrete, its hip clicking with arthritis. David hadn't wanted a dog that would get old before they did. Another thing he'd been wrong about.

The pool house was already crowded. Sarah's thirty-fifth birthday. People David didn't know, people he once knew, people who knew them in that terrifying way couples are known by their married friends. He stood by the deep end, nursing a whiskey he didn't want.

"You look like a sphinx," someone said.

He turned. It was Elena, Sarah's sister, holding a margarita with both hands like it was a precious thing. "Mysterious and inscrutable."

"I'm thinking about baseball," he said.

"At a pool party?"

"The season ended yesterday. World Series Game 7. I missed it."

"Did you bet money?"

"No. I just... I've watched every Game 7 since I was twelve. It was the one thing my father and I did together, every year, until he died. Then I kept watching alone. It's not about the game. It's about... continuity? Ritual? The sense that something matters enough to stop everything for it."

Elena's face softened in that way people's faces do when they realize they've stepped into something deeper than party chatter. "And you missed it?"

"I was finalizing the divorce papers."

The dog whined from its spot, stretched, then settled back down with a heavy exhale. Across the pool, Sarah laughed at something. The sound went through David like something physical.

"You know what the sphinx asked," Elena said. "What walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, three in the evening."

"Man."

"The answer was always just 'man.' But the real question was why the sphinx needed to ask. Why it needed someone to answer before it could let them pass."

"Maybe it was lonely," David said. "Maybe it needed someone to see it."

Elena looked at him for a long moment. Then she set down her margarita and walked toward the house, toward the party, toward her sister.

David stayed by the water. The dog's breathing slowed. The baseball season was over. Something else would begin in spring. That's the thing about seasons—they end, and then they begin again. The riddle was in the rhythm, not the resolution.

He set down his whiskey and waded into the pool, shoes and all.