Sundays at Sunset

The orange light hit Miguel's face just as he served. His wedding ring, still on his finger after all these months, caught the sunset and flashed like a warning signal across the court.

"You're late," I said, returning the padel ball with more force than necessary.

"Work. Elena's lawyer needed more documents. More proof I was the one who—" He stopped himself, swung his racket, missed. "Fuck."

We'd been playing padel every Sunday for three years. Through his divorce, my promotion, the slow erosion of whatever we'd once meant to each other. Friends, we called it. Friends who drank too much beer after matches, who knew each other's secrets and sometimes pretended not to.

"Are you seeing someone?" I asked, watching his face.

He didn't answer. The sky deepened to bruised purple. The court lights flickered on.

"Are you?"

"Does it matter?"

"It matters to Elena. It matters to the kids. It—" He smashed the ball into the fence. "It matters to me."

The words hung between us like something we couldn't bear to touch.

I walked over to the bench, grabbed my water. My hands were shaking. Had been for weeks. Since the night I'd driven past his house and seen her car in the driveway—Elena's sister's car. Since I'd realized that while Miguel was drowning in paperwork and legal fees, I was the one sleeping with his wife's sister.

Not Elena. Her sister.

"I'm your friend," I said finally. "I'm supposed to be your friend."

Michael—Miguel, I kept calling him Miguel, he'd gone back to Michael years ago—Miguel looked at me like he could see the rot inside. Like he'd always been able to see it.

"Friends," he said. "Right."

He picked up his racket, walked to the gate. The orange light was gone now. The sky was just darkness and streetlamps.

"Next Sunday?" he asked, not turning around.

"Same time," I said, though we both knew there wouldn't be a next Sunday. There never really had been.