What We Keep in the Dark

The iphone glowed on the nightstand at 3 AM, its light painting Sara's face in ghostly blue as she scrolled through messages that weren't meant for her eyes. The discovery had come hours ago — casual flirtations that weren't casual at all, months of them, with a coworker whose name appeared in his calendar more often than theirs appeared together.

Down the hall, Bear — their elderly golden retriever, named in better times when such irony seemed charming — whined in his sleep, paws twitching. The cat, a sleek black shadow named Moon, wound around Sara's ankles, purring with calculated indifference, as if knowing something fundamental had shifted in the apartment's gravitational pull.

Sara set down the phone and picked at the skin around her thumbnails, a nervous habit she'd thought she'd broken years ago. The bedroom smelled like Mark's cologne still, cedar and something synthetic that she'd once found comforting. Now it made her stomach churn.

She rose and padded to the kitchen, Moon following with silent steps. On the counter sat the bag of oranges Mark had brought home yesterday — another peace offering from a business trip, as if citrus could somehow balance out all those late nights at the office. Sara peeled one, the spray of essential oils sharp and clean, so unlike the cluttered mess of her thoughts.

The first bite was impossibly bright, acidic and sweet, a moment of pure sensation that demanded presence. She stood there in the dark kitchen, juice sticky on her fingers, Bear now pressing his warm weight against her leg, and realized she wasn't crying anymore.

"It's just stuff," she whispered to the empty room. "It's just things."

The iphone would stay on the nightstand. The messages were already burned into her memory. But the orange in her hand was real. The dog leaning against her was real. The cat winding through her legs, demanding breakfast at 3 AM, was undeniably, wonderfully real.

Sara finished the orange, wiped her sticky hands on a paper towel, and made a decision. Some things you keep. Some things you leave behind when the sun comes up.