Still Water

The pool at Richard's estate had gone that particular shade of green—algae blooming in the silence, thick as resentment. Elena stood at the edge, her champagne flute catching the dying light of another endless summer.

"He never paid the cleaning service," she said, not looking at me. "Not after the crash."

The bull market had turned on Richard with particular cruelty. Margin calls, margin calls, always the fucking margin calls. I'd watched it happen in slow motion—the confident lunches, the expansion plans, the way his eyes had taken on that manic gleam of someone convinced gravity wouldn't apply to them either.

"You could still sell," I said. "The property alone—"

"And give them the satisfaction?" She turned then, and I saw how carefully she'd applied her makeup, how precise her jewelry had been arranged. Performance after performance after performance. Some friend I was, standing here in my thrift-store blazer, judging her for holding onto scraps.

The truth was, I'd come to ask for my own money back. The five grand I'd lent Richard three years ago, when his "can't-miss opportunity" had needed just one more push. But looking at Elena—really looking at her—I saw that every dollar had already been spent a hundred times over in shame.

"The pool was the first thing," she said quietly. "He stopped cleaning it, then the garden, then... everything. Just sat in his office watching charts until dawn. Like if he stared hard enough, the numbers would bend back to his will."

I thought about all the ways we pretend we haven't lost everything. The way I still checked my phone for messages from people who'd long stopped caring. The way she still dressed for parties that weren't happening anymore.

"Elena," I said, and the name felt strange in my mouth. "I didn't come for the money."

She looked at me then really looked, and for a second we were twenty-three again, drunk on cheap wine and the terrifying thrill of thinking we could become anyone we wanted.

"No," she said. "You didn't."

We watched the sun dip below the hedge, the water turning darker, mysterious again. There are things that drown in still water, and things that learn to breathe there. Friendship, it turns out, is mostly just holding your breath together and hoping someone remembers to pull you up.