Serving Up Truth

Martin stood at the baseline of the padel court, sweat dripping down his temples as he gripped his racket. The glass walls enclosed them like a transparent cage, trapping his marriage's last desperate breaths inside.

"You're not even trying," Elena said from across the net, her voice flat. She'd stopped caring hours ago.

"I'm trying. Just... tired."

She smashed the ball against the wall. It ricocheted back at him, a green blur he couldn't track. This was their fourth anniversary trip at the luxury resort—four days of avoiding the elephant in their marriage.

Earlier, at breakfast, he'd watched her pick at her spinach omelet, pushing it around the plate. She'd started taking those vitamin supplements last month, the expensive ones the doctor recommended after her second miscarriage. She was thirty-five now. The clock had become their silent third partner, ticking louder each month.

"Your turn to serve," she said now, walking to the water cooler. She drank slowly, her throat working, refusing to look at him.

They'd met at a corporate retreat five years ago. He'd been the ambitious junior executive, she the sharp-tongued analyst. He'd charged through their early marriage like a bull in a china shop, convinced success and fertility would just... happen. Now they were here, playing padel on a Spanish island, pretending nothing was wrong.

"Martin."

He looked up. She was holding the ball, not throwing it. The sunlight caught the gray streaks in her dark hair.

"I'm done waiting," she said. "For a baby. For you to decide what you want. For this..." She gestured vaguely at everything between them.

"Elena, please—"

"No. It's not fair to either of us." She bounced the ball once, twice. "I'm leaving when we get back."

The ball hit his racket and fell into the dust between his feet. Outside the glass walls, the Mediterranean stretched toward the horizon, indifferent and endless. He finally understood: some games, you don't get to replay until you win.