What Remains in the Sink

The papaya sat on the counter, too ripe, its skin freckled with brown like the back of her father's hands. Elena had bought it thinking she'd make smoothies, thinking she'd become the kind of person who made smoothies. That was three weeks ago, when she still believed in the project of self-improvement, before Mark moved out and took the blender.

Now it was just her and the dog, Buster, a rescue with one ear and trust issues. He watched her from his bed by the sliding door, thumping his tail against the floorboards in a slow, irregular rhythm. Like a heart that couldn't quite commit.

Elena leaned over the sink and rinsed her hair, the cheap dye running dark into the basin. She'd decided to go back to brunette on impulse—something about wanting to recognize herself again. The water turned cold against her scalp, shocking her awake. She watched the swirl of color disappear down the drain, thinking how easy it was to wash away the evidence of who you'd tried to be.

At thirty-five, she'd expected more certainty. Instead she had this apartment with its empty echo, a job where she spent eleven hours listening to strangers complain about their insurance premiums, and now this—hair dripping onto her shirt, staring at a rotting papaya while the dog watched her like she might suddenly disappear too.

"You want this?" she asked Buster, slicing into the fruit. The flesh was soft, oversweet, fermented at the edges. He sniffed it once and turned away.

"Yeah," she said. "Me neither."

She stood at the window, eating the papaya with her fingers, sticky juice running down her wrist. The sun was setting behind the buildings, that peculiar Los Angeles purple that made everything look like a photograph from 1974. For a moment she felt something like peace—not happiness, but the quiet recognition that this was her life now, messy and unfinished and hers alone.

Buster limped over and pressed his warm side against her leg. She rested her hand on his head, feeling the coarse hair beneath her palm, and decided that tomorrow she might buy a blender. Or she might not. Either way, she'd be here to find out.