The Aquarium in the Empty Apartment

The goldfish circled its bowl in endless loops, a perfect orange metaphor for how Marcus felt after Sarah left. Three months of walking through his life like a zombie—automatic movements, automatic responses, the hollowed-out shell of a person performing the motions of living.

He stood before the fishbowl at 3 AM, insomnia his only companion now. The dog, Buster, who had once been Sarah's shadow, now stared at the door with decreasing conviction. Some mornings Marcus forgot to feed him until the wet nose nudged his hand, a reminder that at least one living thing still needed him.

"You're the only one who notices I'm gone," Marcus whispered to the fish, watching its g pulse. Sarah had bought it on impulse, that last weekend before everything fell apart. She'd laughed about how it was basically a decoration with minimal maintenance requirements. The irony hadn't landed then.

The vitamin bottle sat on his nightstand, untouched since the day she'd packed her bags. She'd been the one who believed in supplements, in self-care, in the possibility of improvement. Marcus had believed in her belief. Now he believed in nothing except that grief was not a linear process but a series of circles, just like that fish swimming through water that had grown cloudy with neglect.

He reached for the bowl, considered letting the fish go down the toilet, joining all the other things he'd failed to sustain. But then he saw the tiny creature pulse again—alive, persistent, stupidly resilient.

"Fine," Marcus said, his voice cracking in the quiet apartment. "We'll both keep swimming."

He went to the kitchen, filled a glass with water, and finally took a vitamin. Then he poured fresh water into the bowl. Buster lifted his head from the floor, ears perked toward something Marcus couldn't hear yet. But the dog was waiting, and that would have to be enough for now.