The Strand

Elena served with everything she had, the padel racket cutting through humid air like a weapon. I returned it lazily, watching her hair—that perfect, expensive blonde she'd had done the day before—stick to her neck in sweat. We'd been playing every Tuesday for three years, through my divorce and her miscarriage, through promotions and breakdowns. Or so I'd thought.

The cat behind the fence watched us with that bored, predatory indifference only cats can muster. Elena had picked him up from a shelter two years ago, naming him Lucky despite his tendency to scratch anyone who tried to pet him.

"Your serve's getting faster," I said, though it wasn't. Everything about her had gotten softer lately. More forgiving.

She missed my return. The ball sailed into the net, and I noticed it then: the long, dark hair tangled around the button of her polo shirt. My hair. Not from me hugging her—which I hadn't—but from something else entirely.

"You're distracted," she said, pouring water from her plastic bottle, the liquid spilling onto her wrist like she couldn't quite control her hands.

"Just thinking about Mark."

Her wife's name.

"Oh?" Something flickered behind her eyes. Fear, maybe. Or calculation.

"She mentioned you two had dinner on Friday. Said you were having such a great time, you forgot to text me back."

Elena's throat moved. A swallow, hard and visible. The cat meowed from behind the fence, a sound like tearing metal.

"We got caught up. You know how it is."

"I do," I said, and walked to the net to collect the ball. "I do know how it is."

The hair still wound around her button, dark and accusing. I'd recognized the dye job immediately—she'd been using my brand for months, ever since I'd recommended it. Ever since she'd started spending so much time at my apartment. Ever since she and Mark had become such good friends.

"One more set?" she asked, but I was already walking toward the gate, the cat weaving through my legs, purring like nothing in the world was wrong. Some friendships, I realized, you don't save. You just survive them. Or you don't.