The Riddle of Us

The sphinx statue in the resort courtyard had been chipped at the nose—something about it made me think of our marriage. Beautiful from a distance, damaged up close.

"Are you going to eat that papaya?" David asked, not looking up from his phone.

"No. Help yourself."

I watched him spear the fruit with clinical precision. Ten days in Mexico and we'd said maybe fifty words to each other. The air conditioning hummed against the silence between us.

Outside, lightning cracked the sky open—a violent fracture of white that made the walls shudder. I could feel the storm in my teeth.

"I'm going swimming," I said.

"In this weather?" David finally looked at me. "The cable's out anyway."

The pool was empty, rain stippling the surface like bruises. I dove in, letting the water swallow me whole. underwater, everything was muffled and blue. I could stay here forever, I thought. I could just keep swimming until my lungs burned and the world went quiet.

But bodies are stubborn things. They need air. They need warmth. They need connection, even when it hurts.

I surfaced, gasping. Rain slicked my hair against my face. Above me, the sphinx watched through the downpour, stone riddle lips pressed shut.

David stood at the edge of the pool, shirtless, holding two drinks. Behind him, the lights of the restaurant flickered back on—power restored, cable news undoubtedly blaring inside.

"You're going to drown," he said, but his voice wasn't unkind.

"Maybe I want to."

He set the drinks down and stepped into the water, clothes and all. The pool swallowed his legs, then his waist, then his chest. He moved through the water toward me, leaving ripples that distorted us both.

"The sphinx asked a riddle," he said, when he reached me. "What walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, three in the evening?"

"Man," I said. "We change. We break down. We need support."

"The answer wasn't about breaking," David said. "It was about survival."

The rain fell harder. His hand found mine underwater, and for the first time in years, I didn't pull away.