The Goldfish at the End of the World

Maya hadn't been herself since the funeral. Three months of moving through days like a zombie—automatic, responsive to external stimuli but hollow inside. The office didn't help. fluorescent lights hummed their eternal complaint, and her coworkers spoke in meetings she barely heard, their words washing over her like static.

"You okay, Maya?" Sarah asked, placing an orange on her desk. "You've been staring at that spreadsheet for an hour."

Maya looked up. Sarah was the closest thing she had to a friend now, since Julie. The word friend still caught in her throat like bone.

"Fine," Maya said. "Just tired."

That evening, she found herself at Julie's apartment, packing up the last of things. The landlord wanted it cleared by Friday. Julie had been gone six months—cancer, moving fast, unfair even now—and Maya had put this off until she couldn't anymore.

The apartment was too quiet. Dust motes floated in light that slanted through windows they'd once sat under, drinking wine, talking about everything and nothing. Julie's hat collection hung on the wall—four knit caps, a sun hat, that ridiculous orange fedora she'd worn to Maya's thirtieth birthday party. They'd danced until 3 AM, Julie laughing with her whole body, arm slung around Maya's shoulders, whispering, "This is it, kid. We're going to be okay."

They hadn't been okay. They hadn't been anything.

Maya's hand shook as she reached for the fedora.

On Julie's bedside table, the goldfish bowl sat empty. They'd bought him together, this stupid neon-orange fish Julie had named Bart. "He's got personality," she'd insisted, and somehow she'd been right. Bart had recognized Julie, would swim to the glass when she entered the room, would follow her finger along the bowl's curve. He'd lived five years—forever, in goldfish time. Died two weeks before Julie did.

"He's waiting for me," Julie had said, weak smile in a hospital bed that swallowed her. "We'll have adventures."

Maya had thought she was joking.

Now she stood in Julie's empty apartment, holding the fedora, the orange from Sarah still in her pocket. She thought about Bart, about Julie, about all the things they'd never do together. The weight of it caught up to her finally—six months of grief compressed into this single moment, and she sank to the floor, hat pressed against her chest, and sobbed until she couldn't breathe.

The goldfish had lived and died. Julie had lived and died. Maya was still here, moving through days like a zombie, but maybe—maybe—she was starting to wake up.

She left the hat on. It looked ridiculous. Julie would have loved it.