The Last Riddle

The sphinx stared back at Marcus from across the gallery—its stone face cracked in just the way his reflection had begun to mirror each morning. He ran a hand through his thinning hair, the strands coarse and stubborn between his fingers. At forty-three, he'd expected to be somewhere else entirely.

"They want to move the Egyptian wing," Sarah said, appearing beside him with a papaya in hand—lunch from the cafeteria, its neon orange flesh impossibly bright against the museum's gray walls. "Corporate says it's not profitable. Can you imagine?"

Marcus nodded, bitterness rising like bile. "Bullshit."

"Exactly." She smiled, but it didn't reach those amber eyes that had once kept him awake entire nights. "Remember our honeymoon? That restaurant in Cairo where you insisted the waiter was trying to poison us?"

"The papaya was yellow," Marcus said softly. "I'd never seen one that color."

"You were so bull-headed then. Still are, honestly." She touched his shoulder, her fingers lingering. The familiar weight of her hand made his chest tighten.

"Sarah, I've been thinking—"

"Don't." Her voice cracked. "Just don't."

But she stayed. They both did, watching tourists photograph the sphinx, its riddle unanswered after four thousand years. Some questions, Marcus realized, weren't meant to be solved—only endured.

"The papaya's sweet today," she said quietly. "Better than Cairo."

He didn't answer. Couldn't. Instead he watched dust motes dance in slanted afternoon light, thinking how strange it was that the most painful moments often tasted like something sweet.