The Last Supper at Sphinx

The restaurant was called Sphinx, though Maya couldn't remember ever seeing an actual sphinx inside. Just cracked vinyl booths and the relentless hum of fluorescent lights that made everything—especially David's face—look sickly and gray.

'I think we should see other people,' David said, pushing his spinach salad around the plate. The greens looked wilted, like something that had given up hours ago.

Outside, lightning fractured the sky, illuminating the rain that streaked against the window like tears on a movie star's face. Maya watched the reflection of her own eyes in the glass—dark, hollow, unreadable. She should have seen this coming. The distance between them had been growing for months, a silent widening gap filled with unsaid words and cold shoulders.

'There's someone else?' she asked, though it wasn't really a question.

David nodded, not meeting her eyes. 'She's from work. She listens, Maya. She actually hears what I'm saying.'

A cat appeared suddenly from behind their booth—calico, skeletal, ribs showing through matted fur. It jumped onto the table between them, knocking over David's water glass. The liquid spread across the table, soaking the napkins, dripping into his lap.

Neither of them moved to stop it.

'This place is a metaphor,' Maya said quietly, watching the cat lap water from a puddle near the bread basket. 'Riddles without answers. Questions that don't matter.'

'I'm sorry,' David said, finally looking at her. His expression was so rehearsed it almost looked genuine.

Another flash of lightning, closer this time. The thunder shook the restaurant's foundation. Maya thought about all the evenings they'd spent here, all the conversations they'd never really had, all the ways they'd learned to speak without saying anything at all.

'You know what the Sphinx asked,' she said, standing up. 'The riddle. What walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, three in the evening.' She grabbed her coat. 'The answer is a man. But the real question is why we keep pretending any of this makes sense.'

She left him there with his spinach salad and the cat and the check they'd somehow need to split. Outside, the storm finally broke, and she walked into the rain without opening her umbrella, letting it wash her clean.