The Sphinx at Midnight

The hotel pool was empty at 2 AM, the only sound the gentle lap of water against tile. Elena kicked off her sandals and dipped her toes in. The water was cold, shocking, exactly what she needed.

On the far edge, a concrete sphinx stared at her with mossy eyes—a ridiculous ornament in a chain hotel off the I-95, its riddle painted across its base: "What walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, three in the evening?" The answer was supposed to be man, but at 47, with Richard's text still glowing on her phone ("It's not what you think"), the only answer Elena could see was: a woman who'd stopped recognizing herself somewhere around noon.

She slid into the pool fully, letting the water close over her head. For a few seconds, she just hung there, suspended in the muffled quiet. Then she broke the surface, gasping, and began swimming laps. Back and forth, counting strokes, trying to outpace the image burned into her mind: Richard leaning in too close to his research assistant at the conference reception. The way the girl's hand had lingered on his arm. The way he hadn't moved away.

Her hair, usually sleek and corporate-appropriate, was plastered to her skull. She'd found three gray hairs last week, each one plucked with increasing panic. She'd scheduled another appointment with the colorist for Tuesday, but now—floating in her clothes at 2 AM—she wondered what she was so afraid of. What was so terrible about letting time write itself across her body in silver ink?

Elena stopped swimming and treaded water, catching her breath. The urge to call Richard surged through her. She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to send him a picture of herself like this—fully dressed, swimming in a hotel pool in the middle of the night, some sort of bear he'd woken from hibernation. Look what you did, she'd say. This is your fault.

The thought was tempting. But as she floated there, she found she didn't have the energy for a performance. She was just tired, suddenly and overwhelmingly tired.

She pulled herself out of the pool, water streaming from her clothes. Her phone lay on the patio chair where she'd left it, screen dark. Elena toweled off roughly and walked over to the sphinx, dripping onto the concrete.

"The answer is man," she told the statue. "But I think the riddle's wrong."

She picked up her phone and powered it on. Richard's message waited, along with two missed calls.

Her fingers hovered over the screen. She thought about the girl's hand on Richard's arm. She thought about the gray hairs she'd plucked. She thought about the sphinx and its riddles, about how all the answers changed depending on who was asking.

Elena typed slowly: "I know exactly what it is."

She hit send, then powered off the phone before she could see if he replied. The sphinx watched her walk away into the night.