Zombie Hearts

Marcus watched Elena sleep beside him, her breathing shallow and rhythmic, like something automated. She'd been like this for months—moving through their apartment as if her body operated on remote control. Eyes glazed, voice flat, responses delayed. A zombie of the woman he'd married, though no virus had done this to her. Just life.

He slipped out of bed and walked to the kitchen. The orange light of dawn spilled through the window, catching the baseball glove on the shelf—his college days, before the mortgage and the career that had hollowed him out too. He hadn't touched it in years. Elena had mocked him once for keeping it. "Sentimental crap," she'd said, back when she still had opinions.

Buster, their golden retriever, lifted his head from the couch and thumped his tail. Marcus buried his face in the dog's warm fur, inhaling the earthy comfort of him. At least someone still felt something.

He poured coffee and stood before the goldfish bowl on the counter. Three fish swam in endless circles, mouth opening and closing, never going anywhere. Elena had bought them on impulse during the second year of their marriage, claiming they'd be calming. Now Marcus watched them and saw only himself. Swimming. Waiting. For what?

Elena appeared in the doorway, wearing his oversized t-shirt. She looked at the coffee pot, then at him. "You're up."

"Yeah."

"I have that meeting at ten."

"I know."

She nodded, already turning away. That was it. The whole of their intimacy reduced to schedules and logistics.

"Elena," he said, and she paused. "Remember when we drove to the coast last October? We stopped at that roadside stand and bought oranges. You peeled one in the car and juice ran down your wrist. You laughed so hard you almost drove off the road."

She stood with her back to him. The silence stretched until he thought she'd leave without responding.

"I remember," she said softly. Then she was gone, her footsteps fading down the hall.

Marcus looked at the goldfish again, swimming their useless circles. At Buster, who'd gone back to sleep. At the baseball glove gathering dust on the shelf.

He drained his coffee cup. Today, he decided, he would call in sick. He would take the glove down from the shelf. He would find a roadside stand that sold oranges. And when Elena came home, he would peel one for her, and he would wait to see if anything behind her eyes still remembered how to feel alive.