Still Waters

The spinach was wilting in the heat—that's what I noticed first. Not the way Richard's hand lingered too long on her shoulder, not the forced laugh that didn't reach his eyes, but the goddamn spinach salad decomposing beside the pristine pool.

We were at the Hendersons' annual summer party, where everyone pretended their marriages weren't rotting from the inside out. The pool water was impossibly blue, artificial, like the smiles everyone wore. Richard and that woman—Sarah, I think—stood waist-deep in the shallow end. Her hand touched his arm underwater. I saw it from my lounge chair, saw the way he leaned into her touch like a starving man offered bread.

Twenty years of marriage and I was watching it dissolve in chlorinated water.

I took a bite of my wilted spinach. It tasted like bitterness and resignation.

"Honey, come in!" Richard called, with that boyish grin that used to make my chest ache. Now it just made me tired.

The pool beckoned—cool, forgiving water that would wash away the sweat and the evidence of my neglect. I'd stopped trying years ago, stopped caring about the spinach smoothies he loved, stopped swimming laps in this pool we couldn't really afford.

I stood up, smoothing my linen dress over thighs that had grown thick with comfort and complacency. The water shimmered before me, promising oblivion. Promising I could float, weightless, suspended in the moment before everything changed.

I stepped in. The cool shock of it against my skin. Richard watched me wade toward them, something flickering behind his eyes—fear? Relief?

"The spinach is terrible," I said, reaching them.

Sarah laughed. Richard's face went still.

I slipped beneath the water, held my breath, watched the light distort above me. For a moment, I could stay under forever. But my lungs burned and my heart knew—even underwater, some things can't be drowned.

I surfaced, gasping, to find them both watching me. Richard's hand had moved to his pocket. My wedding ring felt heavy on my finger, anchor and chain both.

"I want a divorce," I said, water streaming from my hair.

The pool went silent. Behind me, the spinach continued its slow decay on the paper plate, unconcerned with the ruins of lives.