What We Kept

The divorce papers sat on the kitchen counter between us, weighted down by a forgotten bag of spinach that had already begun to weep into the paper. David wouldn't look at me. He was staring at the goldfish bowl on the windowsill, where Fin — our one joint purchase from seven years ago — swam in endless, stupid circles.

"You're being dramatic," he said finally, still not meeting my eyes. "This isn't about the goldfish."

"No," I agreed. "It's about how you haven't touched me in six months. It's about how I'd rather stare at the pool in our backyard and imagine jumping in with all my clothes on than sit through another dinner of your excuses."

Outside, beyond the sliding glass door, the abandoned pool we'd never properly maintained had become a swampy green, a breeding ground for mosquitoes and memory. I'd caught him watching it sometimes, that same glazed look he got during sex now — disassociated, waiting for it to be over.

A storm had been brewing all afternoon. The sky went purple, then violent white as lightning cracked the horizon. Something electric in the air finally made him turn toward me.

"Remember that fox?" he asked suddenly.

I did. Two summers ago, a fox had appeared at the edge of our property at dawn, sleek and startled and impossibly alive. We'd watched it from bed, pressed close together in the still-cool morning, both of us breathless at the small miracle of it. Later, we'd find it had gotten into the garbage and left a trail of decay across the lawn, but in that moment, we'd believed in something.

"We were happy then," he said.

"We thought we were," I corrected. "There's a difference."

The spinach had soaked through its bag now. The goldfish continued its oblivious circling. Lightning struck again, closer this time, and somewhere between the flash and the thunder, I realized I didn't want to salvage us anymore. Some things — marriages, evenings, the particular way a person says your name like it's a question — were meant to burn out, not fade away.

"I'll leave the fish," I said, standing up as the rain finally broke against the glass. "You always liked him more anyway."