Swimming in Circles

The goldfish had been dead for three days before anyone noticed.

That was the thing about the office aquarium — it was decorative, functional, entirely ignored. Like most of us here. I'd been feeding that fish for six months, watching it pulse against the glass in that desperate, frantic way creatures have when they know they're trapped. Susan from Accounting called it friend. She'd stop by my desk, cooing at the tank, telling me about her divorce, her Tinder dates, her slow spiral into whatever this place does to people.

I thought we were friends too.

Then came the restructuring meeting. The conference room smelled of stale coffee and desperation. When Miller, our VP, announced the "strategic realignment," Susan's hand shot up. She'd been preparing for this. I saw it in her eyes — the cold calculation of someone who's already sold you out.

"I think Elias's role could be absorbed," she said, not meeting my eyes. "For efficiency."

My stomach dropped like a called third strike.

That night, I packed my box. I stopped at the tank. The goldfish floated at the surface, motionless finally. Done with the swimming. I thought about all the times Susan had leaned against my desk, complaining about Miller, about the company, about how we were in this together. How she'd called me friend like it meant something.

Baseball had been the last thing we talked about — that World Series game last year, how we'd both stayed up too late watching it, texting each other from our separate apartments, connected by the screen glow and the game's slow drama. She'd said then, "It's good to have someone who gets it."

She got it all right. She got exactly what she wanted.

I flushed the goldfish down the bathroom toilet. Watched it spiral away. Somewhere, it would find a bigger ocean, or it wouldn't. Either way, it was done swimming in circles for someone else's amusement.

I left my badge on the desk. Susan didn't look up from her screen. She was probably already planning her next move, calculating who else she could sacrifice to keep herself afloat just one more season.

The parking lot was empty. I stood there a long time, breathing air that didn't smell like resignation, watching the sky darken. Somewhere, a baseball game was starting. Strangers were cheering. And for the first time in years, nobody expected me to show up and pretend I cared.