The Riddle of Leaving

David had been running for forty-five minutes when his phone buzzed in his pocket. He ignored it, as he had the previous three calls. His feet struck the pavement in a rhythm that had become his only meditation since Sarah moved out last month. The Charleston night was thick with humidity, the scent of magnolia and exhaust fumes mixing in the air behind the restaurant district.

He slowed to a walk near the old waterfront park, chest heaving, and found himself face-to-face with it: the sphinx statue that had guarded the harbor since the 1920s. Some long-ago philanthropist's Egyptian obsession, weathered now by salt air and neglect. David had walked past it hundreds of times without really seeing it. Tonight, under the amber streetlamp, the stone creature's enigmatic smile seemed to mock him.

"What is it that walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, and three in the evening?" he muttered, remembering the riddle from somewhere. The answer was man—and wasn't that the whole problem? He'd crawled through his twenties, run through his thirties building a career and marriage that now felt like sand through his fingers, and now at forty-two, he was supposed to be leaning contentedly on his third leg.

Instead, he felt like he was still running.

"You look like a man who's forgotten the answer to his own riddle."

David jumped. A woman sat on the nearest bench, nearly invisible in the shadows. Maybe sixty, with silver hair pulled back and skin the color of polished pecan. She extended her hand, palm up.

"I don't—" he started.

"Your life line is strong but interrupted," she said, though he hadn't approached, hadn't shown her his hands. "Marriage broken. Running from something, running toward nothing. You think you're too old to start over, but that third leg? It's not about leaning, it's about balance." She traced a line in the air with her finger. "You're not falling, David. You're between steps."

He stepped closer, compelled against his better judgment. "How did you—"

"A sphinx doesn't ask questions she doesn't already know the answers to." She smiled, and for a second, he almost believed in magic, or at least in the kind of wisdom that comes from having lived enough brokenness to recognize it in others. "Stop running and you might notice you're already where you need to be."

She stood and walked away into the night, leaving him alone with the stone guardian and the sudden, terrible understanding that he wasn't running from his divorce. He was running from the possibility that he might actually survive it.

David stood still for what felt like the first time in months. The sphinx smiled enigmatically as the harbor breeze stirred through the palm trees behind him, and his phone began to ring again. This time, he answered.