The Last Thursday

The coiled cable lay between them on the bed like a dead snake, its plastic casing cracked where Maya had bent it one too many times. Three years of charging phones that rarely rang, of tethering them to a world that kept demanding more.

"You forgot again," Marcus said, not looking up from his tablet. The blue light reflected in his glasses, hiding his eyes.

Maya swallowed the vitamin D supplement dry, the pill scraping her throat. She'd started taking them last winter when the seasonal depression hit, when she stopped leaving the apartment before noon. Marcus had noticed then, asked if she was okay. Now he didn't ask anymore.

"I didn't forget," she said. "I just didn't think it mattered."

"Of course it matters. It's the dog's medication."

Barnaby, their aging golden retriever, lifted his head at the sound of his name. His muzzle had gone white over the past year, just like Marcus's temples. The dog's hip dysplasia had gotten worse, the vet bills higher. Marcus paid them without comment, just as he paid for everything else.

Maya stood at the window, watching an orange sunset bleed across the sky—a bruised peach color that reminded her of their honeymoon in Santorini. They'd been poor then, happy in ways that had nothing to do with the six-figure salary Marcus now commanded.

"I ordered the refill," she said. "It'll be here tomorrow."

"Tomorrow." Marcus's laugh was short, sharp. "Everything's tomorrow with you. The novel you're writing. The job applications. The therapy you keep saying you'll find."

"I'm trying."

"Are you?" He finally looked at her. "Because it doesn't feel like trying. It feels like you're waiting for something to happen instead of making it happen."

The accusation hung in the air between them, heavier than the humid evening. Maya wanted to defend herself, to explain that the depression was like a weighted blanket she couldn't throw off, that every day required a kind of courage he couldn't see. But she'd explained it before. He knew.

Barnaby whined, shifting his weight.

"I'll give him his pill," Marcus said, standing up. "Again."

He didn't say "I'll do it" or "Let me help." He said "again," and Maya heard what he meant: I'm tired of being the only one holding us together.

She watched him in the kitchen, his silhouette against the orange light dying behind the buildings. The cable on the bed caught her eye—one more thing that needed replacing, one more connection fraying beyond repair.

Tomorrow, she thought. Tomorrow I'll fix everything.

But she knew, with a sick certainty, that tomorrow had already run out.