The Poolside Epiphany

The thunderstorm moved across the mountains like a bruise, violet streaks of lightning illuminating the glass-walled conference center. Elena sat on the edge of the infinity pool, her legs submerged in water that felt artificially heated, like everything else about this corporate retreat.

"You're going to turn into a prune," Mark said, dropping onto the lounge chair beside her. He cracked open a beer — his fourth of the evening. The cable knit sweater he'd been wearing earlier lay discarded on the wet concrete.

Elena didn't look at him. "I received a medical alert this morning."

The silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating. Mark's hand froze midway to his mouth.

"What kind of alert?"

"Vitamin D deficiency. Can you believe it?" Elena laughed, but the sound was sharp, fractured. "Three years of medical monitoring, and the crisis is finally here: I need more sunlight."

Mark exhaled, his shoulders dropping. "Jesus, El. You scared the shit out of me."

She turned to face him then. At forty-two, Mark was still handsome in that way that made men dangerous — the kind of beauty that made them believe they'd never truly age. But she saw the lines around his eyes now, the way his breathing had changed after last year's heart attack scare.

"We're all going to die, Mark," she said quietly. "Eventually."

"Not tonight." He gestured toward the storm. "Look at that lightning. Makes you feel small, doesn't it?"

Elena thought about her father, gone three years now. How he'd bear-hugged her at her college graduation, his massive arms swallowing her whole. A grizzly of a man, reduced to nothing by cancer.

"Sometimes," she said, "being small is a relief."

Mark set down his beer and slid into the pool beside her, fully clothed. The water surged over the edge, spilling onto the stone deck. When he took her hand, his fingers were cold and trembling.

"I was going to ask you to come back to my room," he admitted. "But I think I'd rather just sit here and watch the storm."

Elena squeezed his hand. They sat like that for a long time, two middle-aged executives in an expensive swimming pool, watching the lightning strike the mountains, neither one needing to say that tomorrow they'd pretend this never happened.