The Last Riddle

The apartment was quieter without him, except for the gentle bubble of the filter. Elena stood in the doorway, holding the plastic container of goldfish food like an unfamiliar object. Three weeks since David walked out, and this was the first time she'd entered what used to be their bedroom.

The goldfish — a carnival prize from their first summer together, improbably still alive after five years — swam to the surface, mouth opening and closing in silent demand. She'd argued for flushing it when they split. He'd insisted she keep it. Typical David, abandoning her with the one thing she secretly despised.

Her iPhone lit up on the nightstand where she'd abandoned it hours ago. Another notification from him: "Forgot to mention, the lease is up in August. We should talk."

Talk. As if talking hadn't been what unraveled them in the first place.

Elena sat on the edge of the bed they'd bought together, the mattress still bearing the impression of two bodies even though only one had slept there for weeks. She opened the photos app, her thumb hovering over the album labeled "Egypt 2021." There it was: David, younger and happier, standing before the Great Sphinx, making some joke about riddles and ancient cats being better than real ones. She'd laughed. They'd been so good at laughter then.

The goldfish bumped against the glass, its body flashing orange in the afternoon light.

"You're still here," she said aloud. The fish would outlast their marriage. There was something almost mocking about it — this creature with its three-second memory, perpetually rediscovering its tiny kingdom, while she couldn't escape hers. David had loved the sphinx's paradox: the guardian of secrets that spoke only in questions. What destroys us? What makes us whole? What walks on four legs, then two, then three?

Her phone buzzed again. Not David this time. Her mother: "Honey, are you eating?"

Elena typed a response, deleted it, typed again. She would eat. She would feed the fish. She would survive this部屋 this too, however slowly.

The sphinx had guarded its mysteries for millennia. She could guard hers for a few more weeks.

She sprinkled food into the tank. The goldfish rose to meet it, mouth opening, voracious and alive.