The Goldfish Window

The moving truck had left three hours ago, taking Sarah and the IKEA furniture they'd assembled together on that rainy Sunday in 2018. What remained: Mark's dog, Buster, now sleeping on a cardboard box labeled 'Kitchen – Miscellaneous', and a ten-gallon aquarium containing one lethargic goldfish named Carl. Sarah had taken the good wine glasses and the cable subscription. Mark hadn't fought her on either.

He sat on the floor eating cold spinach straight from the plastic container, the dinner of a man who'd forgotten how to cook for one. The refrigerator hummed with a menacing familiarity. Beside him, Carl the goldfish pressed his translucent mouth against the glass, opening and closing in a silent plea Mark couldn't interpret.

'You think you had it bad,' Mark whispered to the fish. 'At least someone remembers to feed you.'

Buster stirred, his tail thumping rhythmically against the cardboard. Mark had been surprised when Sarah left the dog behind – Buster had always been hers, a rescue from that shelter in Baltimore where they'd spent their first anniversary weeping over abandoned animals while eating overpriced crab cakes.

The cable modem on the shelf blinked its green lights like a tiny, meaningless galaxy. Sarah had transferred the service to her new apartment – efficient to the end. Mark's phone buzzed. A text from his mother: 'Have you tried marriage counseling?'

He typed out a response, deleted it, typed again. 'She's already seeing someone, Mom.' Backspace. The truth felt too heavy to send through the air.

Carl did a slow loop around his plastic castle. Sarah had bought it for him on their third anniversary, the same year Mark lost his father and gained twenty pounds and stopped believing that things would work out simply because they were supposed to.

The spinach tasted like wet metal. Mark set it down and rubbed Buster's ears, the dog leaning into his touch with desperate enthusiasm. 'Yeah, buddy,' he said. 'I know.'

Outside, the neighbor's security light clicked on, casting long shadows across the empty room where they'd once argued about paint colors and wedding venues and whose turn it was to walk the dog. Mark wondered how many goldfish were swimming in apartments across the city, forgotten in the debris of breakups, looping silently through their plastic castles while their owners learned again how to be alone.