The Goldfish at the End of the Bar

The goldfish had been swimming in the same figure-eight pattern for three years. Elena knew this with clinical precision; she'd been watching it from the same stool at Manuel's just as long, ever since Thomas left.

"He's still alive," Manuel said, sliding her usual gin and tonic across the worn mahogany. "The fish, I mean. Not Thomas. Though I suppose Thomas could be alive too. You never hear from him?"

"No." Elena traced the condensation on her glass. "And it's a she. I've named her Margaret. After my mother. They both have that same vacant stare."

Manuel laughed, but the sympathy in his eyes made her look away. Margaret the fish glided past a plastic neon palm frond that had faded from pink to something the color of old bruises.

The door chime sounded.

Elena didn't turn. Some habits you kept because they were rituals. Some you kept because they were penances.

"Elena."

Her name in his voice again, after three years. She turned slowly, as if through water. Thomas stood there, his hair silver at the temples, lines she'd put around his eyes. He looked good. Thriving, even. The way people do when they've finally escaped whatever was slowly killing them.

"Can I?" He gestured to the empty stool beside hers.

"It's a free country." She turned back to Margaret. "She's still doing her eights. Still trapped. Still doesn't know she's in a bowl."

"I thought about you every day," Thomas said, not looking at her, watching the fish instead. "Every single day."

"That's nice."

"I'm dying, Elena."

The words hit the air like dropped glasses. She studied his face for the punchline, for the manipulation, but found only something she'd never seen before: surrender.

"Pancreatic. Four months, maybe five. I came back to—" He broke off, pressed his palm against his forehead, then against hers, something they'd done a thousand times when life got too big. His skin was cool. "I came back to say I was wrong. About everything. Especially thinking I could find myself by leaving you."

Margaret the fish swam to the glass, mouth opening and closing in silent witness.

"Thomas," she said, and her voice cracked clean through. "You absolute bastard."

"I know."

"You couldn't have called?"

"I needed to see your face when I told you. I needed to know if—" He stopped, swallowed. "If there was anything left to come home to. Even for just a little while."

Behind them, Manuel made himself very busy with glasses that didn't need cleaning. The neon palm frond caught the last light of day, glowing almost pink again.

Elena placed her hand over Thomas's on the bar, their fingers intertwining like they'd never been apart. Margaret swam a perfect circle, then another, breaking pattern for the first time in years.

"Four months," she said. "That's not long enough to fix everything. But it's long enough to try."

"It is," he said, and she heard the relief in his voice like water breaking against stone.

They stayed until closing, watching the fish swim new patterns in the bowl, neither noticing when Manuel finally turned off the neon palm and left them alone in the dark.