What the Goldfish Knows

Sarah watched the goldfish circle its bowl, lips parting and closing in that perpetual silent Oh of surprise. Three years of marriage and she felt like that fish—swimming the same circumference, forgetting she'd already been here five seconds ago.

In the living room, Marcus was asleep on the sofa, the blue light of the television flickering against his face. She'd started calling him 'the fox' lately, though never to his face. It wasn't that he was cunning; he'd simply developed a talent for slipping away from conversations, from responsibility, from her questions about where his evenings went. He'd given her that sly grin last month when she found the receipt for the downtown hotel—'client meeting, honey'—and she'd nodded, swallowed her suspicion like another bitter pill.

On the kitchen counter sat the vitamin she'd started taking instead of dinner. B12, D3, something for hair that was already thinning. The doctor had said 'stress,' prescribed meditation she never did and supplements she forgot to take. She swallowed one dry, forcing it down.

Through the window over the sink: movement. A fox, unmistakable with its russet coat and black stockings, pausing at the edge of their fenced yard. It looked directly at her—something assessing in that amber gaze—before slipping through a gap in the fence and vanishing into the neighbor's yard. Wild things could find doors she'd never noticed.

The cable signal died, screen gone gray. Marcus stirred, swore, fumbled with the remote. 'Sarah? What'd you do to the cable again?'

'I didn't touch it.'

'You're always messing with the wires—'

'No, Marcus. I didn't.'

He turned on her then, eyes narrowing—that fox-like assessment—and she realized suddenly, violently, that she was tired of being the goldfish in his bowl. Tired of circling the same arguments, forgetting why she'd stayed, forgetting she had teeth.

'What?' he demanded.

'The hotel,' she said. 'I called them. No meetings that weekend.'

The fox in the kitchen. And this time, she thought, watching his face go still with recognition, this time she would not swim back to where she'd already been.

The goldfish mouthed its silent Oh. Somewhere beyond the fence, the wild thing kept running.