The Geometry of Goodbye

The water in the fish tank had grown murky, same as everything else between us. I watched the neon tetras darting through the greenish haze, their bright stripes a desperate contrast to the decay of their environment. Marcus had promised to clean it last week, the same week he'd promised to choose us over her.

I sat on the floor eating an orange, tearing into the peel with unnecessary force, the citrus spray misting my fingers. The sharp scent cut through the stale air of our apartment—that particular brand of neglect that accumulates when two people stop trying. On the coffee table sat the glass pyramid paperweight he'd brought back from Cairo, something about how he wanted to build a foundation with me, something eternal and triangular and perfect.

The joke wasn't lost on me now. A pyramid is just a tomb dressed up as architecture.

My phone buzzed. Her name again. The third time this morning. I didn't need to read the messages to know what they said—the same things I used to say to him, the same desperate clawing at someone who's already one foot out the door. Love makes us all into beggars eventually.

I finished the orange, dropping the peel into the trash can beside the tank. The fish pressed against the glass, mouths opening and closing in silent supplication. They'd survive, I supposed. People always do, even in the murkiest water. Even when the geometry that was supposed to hold them together turns out to be nothing but a pretty glass tomb.

The pyramid caught the afternoon light, throwing tiny rainbows against the wall. Beautiful. Cold. Perfect. Just like the excuses he'd been feeding me for six months.

I stood up, grabbed my keys. The water could wait. So could he. Some foundations aren't worth saving.