What Goldfish Forget

The office aquarium hummed against the wall, a single goldfish making endless laps in water that had grown cloudy since the last cleaning. Three seconds, they said. That's all a goldfish remembers. Round and round the plastic castle, everything new every time.

If only it were that simple.

I checked my phone again. No message. Not that I expected one—it had been three months since Maya walked out of our shared apartment with two packed suitcases and her collection of vintage postcards. She'd been my best friend for seven years before that drunken night when the boundary dissolved like sugar in hot tea.

"You remember when we used to talk about everything?" she'd asked that last morning, standing in the hallway with her coat already on. Her hair was that particular shade of orange-red she'd been dyeing it since college, bright as a warning sign.

I'd wanted to say we still talked about everything. But somewhere between friendship and whatever we'd become, the conversations had grown careful. We'd started editing ourselves. That's what nobody tells you about sleeping with your friend—the things you lose, not just the things you gain.

The goldfish nudged the glass, its mouth opening and closing in silent repetition. I tapped the aquarium with one fingernail and it darted away, startled anew.

Maybe the three-second thing was a myth. Maybe fish remember everything—the temperature of the water, the shadow of a net, the way the light hits the glass at 3 PM every weekday. Maybe they just keep swimming anyway.

My phone buzzed. A name I hadn't seen in months.

"Coffee?" it read. "If you're still talking to me."

I watched the goldfish complete another circuit, returning to the same spot as if discovering it for the first time. Some things you don't forget. Some things you just learn to carry with you while you keep moving forward.

I started typing.