What We Keep

The goldfish had outlived them all. Marcus found this amusing in the way only grief can make things amusing—this orange, unblinking creature swimming in lazy circles while everyone else was gone.

Sarah had brought it home seven years ago, a consolation prize after her third miscarriage. "We need something to care for," she'd said, dropping the plastic bag into the bowl. "Something that won't leave us."

Now Marcus stood in their kitchen—his kitchen, technically—and watched the fish mouth silently at the surface. The apartment was finally silent, no more shouts about whose turn it was to walk the dog or why the water bill was so high again. Just the hum of the refrigerator and the bubble filter's rhythmic push of air.

He'd moved out last week. Sarah had kept the dog. Buster, a neurotic terrier with abandonment issues, had gone with her, which Marcus found appropriate. The dog's anxious whining had been the soundtrack to their unraveling, each yip marking another night of sleeping back-to-back, hearts beating out of sync.

The goldfish though—Sarah hadn't wanted it. "You take him," she'd said during the division of possessions, as if this creature with a three-second memory carried any memory of them at all. "He was always your emotional support fish anyway."

Marcus poured himself a drink and watched the fish navigate its small universe. He thought about water, how it holds everything, how it had carried their relationship for so long—the shared showers, the bathtub conversations after long days, the tears they'd cried into each other's shoulders. Now it was just this: a bowl on a counter, one solitary life making its endless loops.

He touched the glass. The fish darted away, then slowly returned.

"Me too, buddy," Marcus whispered.

In the morning, he packed the fish into its travel container, a small clear box that fit in his palm. He'd find a bigger tank. He'd buy plants, maybe a little castle. He'd give this creature the room to swim that they'd never given each other.

The water bill would be his alone now. That was something.