What We Keep

Margot stood in the center of her new apartment—three rooms, boxes stacked like accusations against the wall. The divorce was final two weeks ago. David kept the house. She kept the cat, a judgmental Siamese named Luna who now regarded her from atop a refrigerator box.

"You're staring," Margot said, dropping onto the floor. Luna blinked slowly.

Her phone buzzed. A text from her mother: *Have you taken your vitamin D? The doctors say winter depression is real.*

Margot typed back: *I'm fine.* Then deleted it. Then typed: *Yes.*

The truth was she hadn't been fine since the fertility treatments failed three years ago, since David started staying late at work, since she discovered he wasn't actually working late at all. Since she stopped recognizing the woman in the mirror.

She needed air.

Outside, the neighborhood was strange. Children's chalk drawings decorated driveways, and in one yard, a dog lay sprawled like a small rug, lifting its head as she passed. A golden retriever. The kind of dog she and David used to talk about getting, someday, when they had children.

She kept walking.

Down the street, she saw a man in his sixties in his front yard, standing before a pond. He was feeding goldfish, their orange bodies breaking the surface like small flames.

"They remember faces," he said, not looking at her. "Not names, but faces. My wife died seven years ago, and they still come when she used to feed them."

"I'm sorry," Margot said.

"Don't be. She had a good run." He tossed another handful of food. "You new to the neighborhood?"

"Yes. Divorce," she said, surprising herself. "Freshly."

"Ah." He nodded. "My first wife left when I was forty. Said I was too set in my ways. She was right—I was like a bull in a china shop, convinced my stubbornness was actually principle." He glanced at her. "The second marriage was better. I learned that being right matters less than being kind."

Margot felt something crack open in her chest. "I don't know if I was right or wrong. I just know we couldn't make each other happy anymore."

"That's a kind of truth too." He dusted off his hands. "I'm Walter, by the way. The goldfish are named after the Beatles. Paul's the fat one."

She laughed. It felt foreign in her throat.

Back in her apartment, Luna was still on the refrigerator box. Margot opened a bottle of wine she'd bought on impulse. The cat jumped down, tail flicking, and head-butted her leg.

"Just us," Margot said. She poured a glass. Then remembered her mother's text and swallowed a vitamin with her first sip.

Outside, a dog barked. Somewhere, goldfish circled a pond, remembering someone they'd loved. She opened another box. It was filled with David's old records—he'd forgotten them.

She put on an album she hated, something loud and rambling, and danced with the cat weaving through her legs. Not because she was happy, but because she was here, and that was something. The art of living wasn't about holding on. It was about learning what to keep.