The Goldfish in the Room

She swallowed the vitamin with a glass of lukewarm tap water, staring at the goldfish bowl on the counter. The fish—Carlos had named him Ramses, after the sphinx they'd never seen in Egypt—swam in endless circles, oblivious to the packing boxes stacked throughout the apartment.

"You're like a riddle without an answer," Carlos had told her once, lying in bed after a Sunday afternoon of padel. She'd beaten him, as usual, her competitive streak something he'd claimed to love about her. Now she wondered if he'd meant it as a compliment or an accusation.

The terminal diagnosis sat on the kitchen table like a bear in the room—massive, dangerous, impossible to ignore. Stage four. Six months, maybe a year if she was lucky.

Carlos had packed his things yesterday, his silence louder than any argument they'd ever had. He couldn't do it. Couldn't watch her die. She couldn't blame him, really. Not everyone was built for that kind of bearing witness.

The goldfish swam to the surface, mouth opening and closing in silent bubbles. She'd need to find someone to take Ramses. Her sister, maybe. Or she could just let him go in the pond behind the building, let him become something bigger than a glass prison.

"The sphinx asks a question," Carlos had said during their last real conversation, his hand resting on her thigh, "but sometimes the question itself is the point. Not the answer."

She'd laughed then, but now standing alone in the half-empty apartment, she understood. The question wasn't why or how much time. The question was what she would do with whatever time remained.

She picked up her phone and scrolled through her contacts, thumb hovering over her mother's number, then her boss. Then she opened a new message and typed: I'm quitting. I have something I need to finish.

The vitamin had left a metallic taste in her mouth. She rinsed it with wine instead—Malbec, expensive, the good bottle they'd been saving for a special occasion. The occasion, she decided, was being alive. Being here, in this room, with time still stretching before her like a riddle she was finally ready to solve.