The Riddle We Never Answered

The pool water shimmered like liquid glass, reflecting the bruised orange of sunset. Maya floated on her back, swimming slow circles while I watched from the patio, nursing a drink that had gone warm hours ago.

"You're quiet," she said, not unkindly.

"Just thinking."

"About us?"

"About the sphinx in Paris. That trip we never took."

Maya stood, water cascading off her skin like second thoughts. She'd posed the same riddle for three years: What are we becoming? Her question without an answer, her eternal silence wrapped in enigma.

Thunder rumbled in the distance. The humidity had been oppressive all day, the air thick with things unsaid. Then it came—lightning fracturing the sky, illuminating everything at once. Her face. The empty chair between our towels. The truth I'd been drowning in.

"I'm leaving," I said, the words finally buoyant.

She didn't cry. Just nodded, like she'd known this was the only way to solve us. Some riddles aren't meant to be answered—they're meant to be walked away from, leaving the question hanging in the air like the smell of approaching rain.