The Goldfish Effect

The hotel pool was empty at 2 AM, which was exactly why Mara had chosen it. She floated on her back, staring up at the glass ceiling three stories above, where emergency lights cast everything in a watery blue glow. The water cradled her weightless, forgiving in a way her marriage hadn't been in months.

"You're going to turn into a prune," David said from the poolside. He was sitting in one of the plastic lounge chairs, laptop open, the glow of the screen illuminating his exhausted face. The ethernet cable snaked across the concrete like a tether he couldn't sever.

"Prunes have wrinkles," she said, not looking at him. "I'm conducting an experiment in buoyancy."

"The presentation isn't until Tuesday, Mara. You could sleep."

"Could I?" She rolled onto her stomach and began to swim laps, slow and methodical. Back and forth. Back and forth. Like a goldfish in a bowl, she thought. Small space. No memory of where you've been. Just keep swimming.

They'd come to Chicago for what David called "a final attempt" and what Mara called "a courtesy." Five years of marriage, three of which had been spent in couples therapy, discussing communication styles and emotional availability in air-conditioned offices while their actual lives continued without them.

David closed his laptop finally. The cable lay slack between him and the wall jack. "My mother called earlier. She asked if we'd thought about—"

"Don't."

"—adoption, since, you know, the thing you want.

Mara stopped swimming, treading water in the center of the pool. The silence stretched, thin and fragile. "She asks every six months like I'll forget the conversation we had last time. Like a goldfish. Like if she just keeps asking, eventually I'll be someone who can give her what she wants."

"She's trying, Mara."

"Are you?"

David stood up, walked to the pool's edge. The water distended his reflection. "What do you want me to say? That I'm sorry I can't give you children? That I'm sorry our life isn't what you pictured when you were twenty-five?"

"I want you to tell me why you're still here."

He was quiet for a long time. Then he sat on the edge and put his feet in the water. "Because the alternative is acknowledging that sometimes love isn't enough. And I'm not ready for that yet."

Mara swam to where he sat and rested her chin on his knee. Up close, she could see the gray at his temples, the lines around his eyes that hadn't been there when they'd met. "The goldfish thing," she said softly. "They don't actually have three-second memories. That's a myth. They remember for months. They just choose to keep swimming."

David's hand found her wet hair. "Is that hope or tragedy?"

She closed her eyes, feeling the water support them both, however briefly. "I think it depends on the size of the bowl."