The Orange at the End of the World

The pool hadn't been drained in three months. Green scum slicked its surface like an oil slick on a dead sea. Sarah sat on the chaise lounge, trailing her fingers through the water, while I watched from our fourth-floor balcony. The cable bill sat unpaid on the kitchen counter, third notice bright red against the granite.

We were becoming those people — the ones who stopped swimming, stopped watching, stopped caring. Dead-eyed commuters shuffling to subway stations at 6 AM, then shuffling back at 7 PM. Zombies in button-down shirts, eating dinner over the sink because setting the table felt like too much effort.

Sarah turned up to the balcony, an orange in her hand. She'd found it in the back of the crisper drawer, miraculously fresh while everything around us rotted.

"Remember when we used to come up here?" she asked, peeling the fruit. "When we first moved in? We'd sit on the edge, feet dangling in the water, drinking wine until the pool lights clicked off."

I remembered. I remembered how her laugh carried across the courtyard, how we'd splash each other at midnight when we should've been sleeping, how the water felt like possibility.

"We can still do that," I said.

She ate a wedge of the orange, juice catching on her lip. "The pool is gross, Michael. Look at it."

"I'll drain it tomorrow."

"You said that last month."

She went inside, leaving the orange half-eaten on the railing. I watched a fruit fly land on it, then another. Something small and vital being consumed while I stood there, paralyzed by the sheer weight of adult responsibility.

I picked up the orange. Still warm from the sun. I ate the rest, messy and urgent, juice running down my chin, sticky on my fingers. For the first time in months, something tasted real.

Down below, the pool water shimmered in the dusk. Alive or dead, I couldn't tell anymore. But I went downstairs with the hose anyway.