The Riddle We Never Answered

Sarah found him in the backyard at dusk, running laps around the perimeter of their property like a man trying to outrun his own shadow. His gray hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat, his chest heaving in the cooling air. This was the third night this week.

"David?" she called from the porch. "What are you doing?"

He slowed to a walk, hands on knees. "Thinking."

"About the divorce papers?" The words tasted like ash.

He straightened up, and in that moment, a fox darted between them— russet fur flashing against the darkening lawn, disappearing into the hedge. They both watched it go, this wild thing that belonged to neither of them anymore.

"Remember our first date?" David asked suddenly. "That baseball game?"

Sarah did remember. Hot dogs, cold beer, the crack of the bat, the way he'd looked at her in the seventh inning stretch like she was the only person in the stadium. They'd been married two years later. "You spilled mustard on your shirt."

"You laughed. I knew right then I'd spend the rest of my life making you laugh." He wiped his face with his shirtsleeve. "But the sphinx has her riddles, doesn't she?"

"What sphinx?"

"The one that asks: What's the creature that walks on four legs, then two, then three? We thought we knew the answer. Time. Aging. But maybe the real riddle is: What do you do when you realize the creature walking beside you has become a stranger?"

Sarah felt something crack open in her chest. "You're the one who wanted this. You're the one running—literally running—in circles."

"I'm running toward something, Sarah. Not away." He stepped closer. "I read something today. About how baseball players have the lowest divorce rate of any profession. Because they know how to lose. They know that tomorrow's another inning. But we—" his voice broke "—we've been playing like we're afraid to swing."

The fox emerged again from the hedge, watching them with amber eyes. Waiting.

"So what's the riddle?" Sarah whispered. "What's the answer?"

David took her hand, his palm familiar and alien all at once. "Maybe there isn't one. Maybe the sphinx is asking the wrong question."

"Then what's the right one?"

"Do you still want to watch the ninth inning with me? Even if we're losing?"

Sarah looked at their joined hands, at the wild creature watching them from the darkness, at the husband she'd spent fifteen years learning and somehow never truly known. The sphinx had no riddle. The riddle was in the asking.

"Always," she said.

The fox vanished into the night, and somewhere in the distance, the faint crack of a baseball bat echoed like a heartbeat.