The Meridian Riddle

Mara stood at the edge of the infinity **pool**, turquoise water vanishing into the slate-grey horizon. The corporate retreat had cost forty thousand dollars per executive, yet here she was, senior director of nothing particularly important, nursing a lukewarm gin and tonic while her boss droned on about synergies somewhere inside the climate-controlled conference center.

Her **iPhone** vibrated against the lounge chair—another Slack notification, another emergency that wasn't actually an emergency. She'd stopped checking hours ago. The screen reflected her exhausted eyes, dark circles that no expensive moisturizer could fix.

Beside her, a middle-aged man with thinning hair worked furiously on his laptop. A thick white **cable** snaked from the hotel's outdoor outlet across the walkway, a hazard everyone pretended not to notice. It was his lifeline, his umbilical to the machine that demanded constant feeding. Mara wondered if he'd chosen this, or if the life had simply accumulated around him like sediment.

"You gonna take that call?" he asked without looking up.

Mara glanced at her phone. It was her husband. Their marriage had become something they managed between flights and quarterly reviews, a series of transactions rather than moments. She declined the call.

"It can wait."

Above them, the **palm** fronds rustled in the artificial breeze from the resort's wind machines. They looked plastic from certain angles, which she supposed was appropriate. Everything here was curated perfection, including the executives pretending their jobs meant something.

"You know what keeps me up at night?" Mara said, surprising herself. "The ancient **sphinx**. It asked a riddle, and if you couldn't answer, it ate you alive."

The man finally looked up, blinking behind thick glasses. "What's the riddle?"

"That's just it," Mara said, watching the water blur into the sky. "We're already being eaten. We just haven't noticed the teeth yet."

Her phone buzzed again. This time, she picked it up.

**Your position has been eliminated.**

The message was stark, efficient. She lowered the phone into her lap, watching a single tear disturb the surface of her gin. Behind her, the conference doors opened, spilling forth executives who had just learned they'd been retained, their laughter sharp against the silence of her particular ending.

Mara took a sip, the ice clinking softly against the glass. The water had never looked more like falling. And for the first time in years, she wanted to jump.