The Weight of Water

Elena adjusted the brim of her straw hat against the merciless Mexican sun. At forty-two, she'd learned that some armor was visible — SPF 50, sunglasses wide as insect wings, this ridiculous hat she'd bought to hide the gray she couldn't afford to dye anymore.

'You're up,' said Marcus, younger than her by half, handsome in that careless way men are when they haven't yet had their hearts properly broken. He bounced a padel racket against his palm, the blue court blinding behind him.

She shouldn't have come to this corporate retreat. Shouldn't have watched David's phone light up with messages from HER all through dinner last night. Shouldn't have tasted the papaya at breakfast and remembered their honeymoon in Bali, how David had fed her slices with his fingers, sticky and sweet, before everything turned cold and clinical.

'Earth to Elena.' Marcus laughed. 'Unless you'd rather go swimming instead?'

Swimming. Yes. The ocean roared beyond the resort's infinity pool, dark and indifferent. She imagined walking into the surf fully dressed, hat and all, letting the salt water wash away the condominium discussions and the custody arrangement that David's lawyer had outlined over yesterday's lunch. She'd stopped swimming after the miscarriage, something about the weightlessness feeling too much like the emptiness inside her.

'I'll play,' she said, surprising herself. She stepped onto the blue synthetic surface, the heat rising through her soles. She adjusted her hat, squared her shoulders, and accepted the racket Marcus offered.

The game was fast — faster than tennis, faster than her thoughts could keep up with. She hit the ball hard, each shot a small violence she was permitted. Her body remembered how to move, how to anticipate, and for forty minutes she wasn't a wife whose husband had found someone younger. She was just sweat and motion and the satisfying THWACK of ball against wall.

After, they sat by the pool, breathing hard. Marcus ordered papaya smoothies. 'You've got a hell of a backhand,' he said, wiping sweat from his forehead. 'David never mentioned you played.'

David never mentioned lots of things about her anymore.

She tasted the papaya — sweet, tropical, nothing like Bali, nothing like marriage. 'I learned a long time ago,' she said. 'Sometimes you have to stop swimming against the current and just let yourself be carried.'

Marcus didn't understand. But that was okay. She wasn't speaking to him anyway.