The Summer We Didn't Speak

The cat appeared at dusk, a scrawny calico with one ear missing, watching from the wrought-iron fence as Elena packed her suitcase. She'd seen it yesterday too—hovering near the padel court where Richard and the redheaded woman from accounting had played each evening, their laughter carrying across the resort grounds like something fragile and intentional.

That morning, Richard had mentioned he'd signed them up for mixed doubles. The way his eyes avoided hers when he said it—that was the moment she knew. Not the whispers by the pool, not the cocktail napkin with a phone number she'd found tucked in his beach bag. It was the avoidance, the careful curation of their days.

She zipped her bag and walked to the pool, empty now except for the calico padding silently along the edge. The water had that strange blue quality of artificial places, reflecting nothing but itself. She'd loved this resort when they arrived—loved the way Richard seemed to soften in the salt air, loved the champagne brunches and the promise of padel lessons and how, for a week, they were people who could afford to forget everything.

The cat dipped a paw in the water, testing. Richard had once said he wanted a cat. Their London flat was too small, he'd claimed, but really it was that neither of them wanted something that required staying in one place too long. They'd built their marriage around airports and hotel rooms and the idea that home was wherever they happened to be together.

She watched the cat retreat, shake its paw, disappear toward the padel courts where a lone figure practiced serves against the wall. Richard's silhouette. He hadn't noticed her suitcase by the door. He'd come back to the room expecting dinner plans, expecting another sunset together, expecting her to still be playing the part she'd agreed to three years ago when she said yes at the registry office.

Elena didn't follow him to the court. She checked her phone—one message from her sister, a work email she'd ignore. The pool's surface rippled in the evening breeze, and for a moment she almost believed Richard would walk up behind her, say her name like it still meant something. Instead, she picked up her bag, the cat's yellow eyes watching from the shadows, and walked toward the exit where a taxi waited beneath a sky that held onto daylight like it didn't know how to let go.