The Riddle of Unsaid Things

The sphinx in the museum's Egyptian wing stared with obsidian eyes, its limestone face eroded by three thousand years of judgment.

I pressed deeper into the shadows, adjusting the brim of my hat to shadow my face. A fedora, ridiculous in July, but necessary. When you're confronting your husband's mistress in public, anonymity becomes a luxury.

She stood before the glass case where the sphinx rested, wearing that orange sundress I'd seen on Instagram. The color I'd once complimented, the one that made her skin glow in photographs I now understood were carefully curated.

"You're thinking about leaving her, aren't you?" I said.

She turned. Recognition flickered, then settled into something like relief.

"How did you—"

"Because I'm thinking about leaving him." I stepped closer, lowering my voice. "Because we've both been living the same lie for two years."

The orange silk of her dress caught the museum lights, vibrant against the ancient stone behind her. We were two women in love with the same man, both realizing we'd been cast in supporting roles in his narcissistic production.

"He told me you were dead inside," she said. "That your marriage was a business arrangement."

"And he told me you were just a colleague with boundary issues."

The sphinx watched us, its riddle finally solved: What creature walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, and three in the evening? The answer was humanity—crawling through infancy, standing erect in adulthood, then leaning on canes and companions. But no one mentioned the part where you discover you're the third wheel in your own marriage.

"He's not coming," I said. "I checked his phone while he was in the shower. He's with someone else."

She laughed, sharp and bitter. "Of course he is."

We walked out together, two women who'd nearly destroyed each other over a man who'd moved on before either of us noticed. Outside, the sunset burned orange across the sky. I removed my hat and let the wind mess my hair.

"Dinner?" I asked. "My treat."

"Dinner," she agreed.

The sphinx remained behind, its secret safe: love's greatest riddle isn't who deserves it, but who's foolish enough to keep believing in it.