Vitamin D Deficiency

The iPhone buzzed against the nightstand at 3 AM, its blue light cutting through the bedroom's darkness like a cold blade. Elena's eyes adjusted slowly, recognizing Marcus's phone—not hers. He never locked it anymore, not since the baby scare last autumn when she'd needed to access his medical history in the emergency room.

The notification was innocent enough: a reminder. Vitamin D supplement, 8 AM with breakfast. But below it, a string of messages from someone named Chloe. The last one made Elena's stomach drop: "See you at the pool? Same time as Tuesday?"

Tuesday. The day Marcus started his new swimming routine. The day he'd come home smelling of chlorine and exhaustion, claiming he'd finally found something to help with his back pain. His back pain that required vitamin D supplements because his doctor said he wasn't getting enough sun.

Elena lay there until dawn, watching the light creep across the ceiling, remembering how she'd held him in the hospital last year when they thought he was having a heart attack, how she'd researched every vitamin, every supplement that might help. How he'd promised they'd take better care of each other.

She rose quietly as the first swimmers hit the community center pool. The front desk staff knew her by sight now—Marcus's devoted wife, bringing his forgotten towel, his water bottle, his vitamins. Today she brought nothing.

The pool area smelled of chlorine and damp concrete, a scent that had begun to permeate their life. Through the glass partition, she saw him immediately, cutting through the water with steady strokes. And there, waiting at the pool's edge with a towel draped over her arm, was Chloe—young, radiant, watching Marcus like he was the only thing in the world worth seeing.

Elena's phone chimed in her pocket. Her sister, checking in after the miscarriage, asking if she'd started taking her prenatal vitamins again, if she and Marcus were trying. "Trying," Elena typed, watching her husband pull himself from the water and walk toward another woman. "Always trying."

She didn't confront him. Instead, she walked to the pharmacy counter and purchased a bottle of vitamin D supplements. The clerk said they'd make her feel better, that most people didn't get enough sun. Elena nodded, thinking how some deficiencies are easier to treat than others, how some things can be fixed with a pill, and others—once broken—stay broken forever.