The Dead Pool

Elena stood at the edge of the abandoned pool, its cracked bottom choked with weeds and stagnant water. Three months since David left, and this was the first time she'd ventured into their backyard—their former backyard. The for-sale sign had been up for weeks, but no one wanted a house with a dead pool.

A movement caught her eye. The neighbor's cat, a ragged ginger tom, balanced along the top of the privacy fence, watching her with something that looked uncomfortably like judgment.

"He's not coming back," she told the cat.

The cat flicked its tail and continued along the fence, disappearing toward the street.

Elena's phone vibrated in her pocket. Another notification from the dating app David had convinced her to download. Cable internet had been installed last week—another thing David had arranged before he vanished into his new life, his new apartment, his new whatever-the-hell.

She pulled the phone out. Swipe. Delete. The app disappeared.

The pool's filter hadn't run in months. A thick layer of algae scum floated on the surface, green and iridescent in the afternoon light. David had promised he'd fix it. Had promised a lot of things.

Her mother called it his mid-life crisis. Elena called it cowardice dressed up as self-discovery. At forty-five, he'd decided he needed to "find himself"—a phrase that should trigger mandatory therapy for anyone who utters it.

A notification appeared: FINAL NOTICE: CABLE BILL PAST DUE.

She laughed. Let them cut it. She'd survive.

Elena walked to the pool's edge and crouched down. The water smelled of decay and abandoned dreams. She considered what it would mean to drain it, to clean it, to make it something new. To make the house something new.

Or she could sell it. Let someone else deal with the ghosts.

The cat reappeared on the fence, carrying something in its mouth—a dead mouse, its tail dangling. The cat dropped the mouse on the other side, out of sight, then licked its paw with deliberate slowness.

Survival, Elena thought. That's what this was. Not a crisis. Not an ending. Just the messy, unglamorous business of survival.

She stood up, her knees cracking, and pulled out her phone again. Not the dating app. The realtor's number.

"Sell it," she'd say. "Whatever you can get."

The water in the pool didn't sparkle anymore. But that was fine. Some things aren't meant to sparkle. They're just meant to end.