The Riddle We Never Solved

The orange sat in my palm, growing warm, while I watched Elena laugh at something Marco said across the padel court. Her backhand had always been better than mine—crisp, decisive. Unlike everything else about us.

A calico cat wound through the chain-link fence, eyeing me with that particular disdain reserved for disappointed gods. I tossed her a piece of the orange. She sniffed, unimpressed, and walked away.

"You still coming on Thursday?" Marco called over the net. Their league night. The night that used to be ours.

"Probably not," I said. "Busy."

The sphinx statue sat on our—I mean, my—mantlepiece now. A flea market find we'd laughed over, claiming we'd solve its riddles together. But the sphinx's silence had outlasted our willingness to ask questions. Some truths aren't mysteries to be solved; they're just decisions we make and then live inside.

Elena's serve smashed into the corner. Marco missed. She punched the air, fierce and radiant, and I felt something loosen in my chest—not forgiveness, just the ache settling into a more familiar shape.

The cat returned, sat, and stared. I tossed the rest of the orange over the fence. Watched it roll across the court between them, an absurd orange intrusion.

"What the—" Marco started.

Elena stopped. Looked at the fruit, then up at me. For a moment, the sphinx smiled between us, ancient and patient.

Then she laughed, really laughed, and I realized that sometimes the riddle's answer is simply: everything ends, and that's not the tragedy. The tragedy is pretending it won't.

I walked away to the sound of their game resuming, leaving them to their match, leaving myself to whatever comes after, while the sphinx kept its secrets and the cat finally deigned to eat.