The meeting room smelled of old paper, drying ink, and tea that had long since gone cold.
It was a smell that never seemed to leave, no matter the season. Even after the windows were opened, even after fresh air drifted through the room, it lingered faintly in the wooden walls and worn table as though years of faculty meetings had seeped into the building itself.
I had sat in this room often enough that I no longer needed to think about where my chair was.
Third from the left.
The one with the uneven leg.
My feet carried me there before my eyes bothered confirming it.
The chair rocked almost imperceptibly as I lowered myself into it.
I adjusted my weight without thinking.
The movement had become automatic sometime during my second year.
There had been a time when meetings like these had possessed a certain romance.
I had imagined discussions about education.
Passionate debates over teaching.
Experienced instructors exchanging ideas that would shape young minds.
That version of the room had died quietly.
No funeral.
No announcement.
Only repetition.
Now the meetings simply happened.
The agenda rested before everyone in neatly printed columns.
Four items.
We were discussing the second.
Mr. Hayashi was speaking.
"...the third-year schedule doesn't give students adequate time to consolidate between new concepts."
His voice carried easily through the room.
"I think we should examine it before the spring term."
I watched him while the words settled around the table.
Not because they interested me.
Because I recognized them.
Not the sentence itself.
The thought.
Approximately twelve minutes earlier I had offered almost the same observation.
The room had received it in the familiar way.
Silence.
Not uncomfortable silence.
Not disagreement.
Simply...
The particular silence reserved for my contributions.
It lasted just long enough for everyone to unconsciously agree that nothing had been said.
Then the meeting continued.
Until now.
Two heads nodded thoughtfully.
Someone reached for a pen.
Another teacher scribbled a short note in the margin of the agenda.
At the head of the table, the section chief folded his hands.
"That's a strong point, Hayashi-san."
Hayashi inclined his head politely.
"Thank you."
The discussion continued.
No one glanced in my direction.
I lowered my eyes to my own hands.
They rested quietly on the table, fingers loosely folded together.
There was nothing remarkable about them.
No trembling.
No tightening.
Nothing to betray what passed beneath the surface.
Why even bother?
The thought arrived without emotion.
Not anger.
Not resentment.
Merely observation.
My face remained exactly as it always did.
Attentive.
Professional.
Present.
It had become an excellent expression.
One of my finest accomplishments, if I was being honest.
Years of practice had polished it into something reliable.
There had once been tiny betrayals.
A delayed blink.
A tightening around the mouth.
A sigh escaping at unfortunate moments.
Those had disappeared one after another.
Now...
No one could tell.
Sometimes I felt a quiet satisfaction in that.
It had taken work.
A surprising amount of work.
The thoughts beneath it were less refined.
Those remained untidy.
Ah.
Yes.
Of course.
Each one appeared briefly before I placed it where it belonged.
Away.
I had become remarkably good at filing things away.
Disappointment.
Frustration.
Embarrassment.
Even small moments of satisfaction.
Everything found its place eventually.
My gaze wandered toward the window.
Winter light rested against the school grounds beyond the glass.
Students crossed the courtyard in small groups, scarves wrapped high against the cold.
One boy laughed loudly enough that I almost heard him through the closed window.
Almost.
Then someone mentioned the third agenda item.
I returned my attention to the papers before me.
The meeting continued exactly as meetings always did.
───
It ended without ceremony.
Chairs slid backward.
Papers disappeared into satchels.
Conversations formed immediately among those who already knew whom they wished to speak with.
I gathered my own documents into a neat stack before slipping them into my bag.
No one needed anything from me.
That suited me perfectly.
The corridor outside felt noticeably quieter.
The echoes of departing footsteps drifted through the building before gradually fading into the afternoon.
I exhaled.
The silence carried a peace the meeting room never quite managed.
My shoes clicked softly against the polished wooden floor as I walked toward the entrance.
"Sadako-san."
The voice came from behind me.
I stopped.
Only enough to acknowledge it.
"Mm?"
Turning slightly, I found Kimura hurrying to catch up.
Young Kimura.
Two years at the school.
Still new enough to believe every problem merely required sufficient effort.
I remembered that stage.
Vaguely.
He fell into step beside me.
For several paces neither of us spoke.
The silence wasn't awkward.
Only... preparatory.
He seemed to be arranging his thoughts.
Finally—
"The scheduling idea..."
Another brief hesitation.
"...was good."
I looked ahead.
"So Hayashi-san thought."
The words escaped before I considered softening them.
Kimura made a sound somewhere between a laugh and an awkward cough.
Not agreement.
Not disagreement.
Simply the sort of polite noise that could later become whichever one proved safer.
We continued walking.
The corridor stretched ahead beneath high windows where pale afternoon light spilled across the floorboards.
Neither of us attempted another conversation.
The silence that followed felt strangely comfortable.
Not because we had become friends.
Because we had both recognized the same weather and decided it required no further discussion.
At the entrance hall we stopped.
Kimura adjusted the strap of his satchel.
"I'll see you Monday."
"Take care."
He nodded before turning left toward the station.
I remained where I was.
The doors stood open.
Cold winter air drifted inside.
The path home lay to the left.
My coat was already buttoned.
My satchel rested comfortably against one shoulder.
The day's accumulated weight had settled somewhere between my shoulder blades.
Not heavy enough to complain about.
Too familiar to notice most days.
Outside, the air tasted of almost nothing.
Clean.
Cold.
Ordinary.
I stepped forward.
Then...
Without consciously deciding to...
I kept walking straight.
───
No one called after me.
No one stopped me.
The school released me as quietly as it always had.
I thought that was at least consistent.
The town unfolded around me at its usual pace.
A delivery cart rattled over uneven stones.
Someone laughed from the second floor of a restaurant.
The smell of simmering broth drifted from an open kitchen window before disappearing into the cold air.
People passed.
None required anything of me.
I required nothing of them.
There was a peculiar comfort in that arrangement.
It might even have been the closest thing to rest I usually experienced.
The buildings gradually became fewer.
Shops surrendered to scattered houses.
The houses yielded to trees.
I continued walking.
At some point...
I stopped.
I looked around.
The forest stood quietly on every side.
I frowned slightly.
"I don't remember deciding to come here."
Apparently...
My legs had made the decision without consulting the rest of me.
The realization wasn't alarming.
Merely curious.
The forest greeted me with a silence unlike the school's.
This silence possessed no expectations.
No judgments.
No hidden conversations waiting beneath polite smiles.
It simply existed.
The trees held no opinion about me whatsoever.
Oddly...
That felt kind.
I smiled to myself.
"I've known noisier silences inside the faculty room."
Tomorrow was the weekend.
There was no particular reason to hurry home.
"I could walk a little farther."
A brief pause.
"...No."
The sensible answer arrived almost immediately.
And yet...
My feet continued moving anyway.
Not toward anywhere in particular.
Simply...
Forward.
The ground beneath my shoes softened as I wandered farther beneath the trees.
What had begun as a proper path gradually surrendered to little more than a suggestion. Fallen leaves concealed most traces of whoever had walked here before me, leaving only narrow gaps between roots where countless feet had unconsciously chosen the same route over the years.
The branches overhead caught what remained of the afternoon light.
Here and there, pale ribbons of winter sky appeared between them before disappearing again behind bare limbs.
I walked without destination.
Without urgency.
The forest accepted both.
"A clearing would be nice."
The thought escaped quietly into the empty air.
Somewhere open enough to watch the stars.
Somewhere far enough from—
I stopped.
The sentence never finished.
My shoulders were still perfectly level.
My hands remained loosely folded behind my back.
Even here.
Even alone.
The posture had remained.
The expression too.
No students.
No colleagues.
No one watching.
Yet my face still carried the attentive composure I wore through meetings and classrooms alike.
"...Right."
I said it aloud.
Not because anyone might answer.
Simply because hearing another voice—even my own—felt strangely appropriate.
I let my shoulders sink.
Only a little.
Perhaps two centimeters.
Hardly enough for anyone else to notice.
Enough for me.
A breath escaped my lungs more deeply than the ones before it.
The forest remained exactly as it had been.
The wind stirred lightly through the branches.
Somewhere farther away, a bird shifted from one limb to another.
No applause.
No revelation.
Only quiet.
For reasons I couldn't quite explain, I appreciated that.
"The forest doesn't seem to mind."
I smiled faintly.
"That's rather kind of it."
My feet resumed their slow pace.
This time there was at least a destination, however imaginary.
"If I find a clearing..."
I looked upward through the branches.
"...I'll scream."
The absurdity of the promise amused me.
There would be no one to hear it anyway.
───
The path—if it could still be called one—curved gently between two old trees.
Then...
Light.
Not sunlight.
Warmer.
Moving.
I slowed instinctively.
The glow filtered through the trunks ahead in shifting bands of amber and gold.
Lanterns.
More than one.
Voices followed a heartbeat later.
Conversation.
Laughter.
The creak of wooden wheels.
Something sizzling over fire.
The smell reached me almost immediately afterward.
Grilled meat.
Fresh bread.
Sweet batter.
Smoke.
The scents overlapped until they became impossible to separate.
I frowned.
"...What?"
The light shouldn't have been here.
I was certain of that.
Curiosity carried me the remaining distance before caution had an opportunity to object.
One more step.
Then another.
The trees opened.
Not dramatically.
There was no gate.
No sign.
No clear point where forest became...
Whatever this was.
One moment there were trees.
The next—
Lanterns stretched into the distance.
Wooden stalls lined broad avenues of packed earth.
Dozens of voices blended together beneath the evening sky.
People moved comfortably between merchants as though this gathering had always existed here.
I stopped.
"...A festival?"
The word arrived first simply because I lacked a better one.
The place possessed the rhythm of one.
Families wandered together.
Merchants called quietly to passing customers.
Children darted between adults before being gently pulled back by patient parents.
Yet...
Something felt different.
Not wrong.
Merely...
Unfamiliar beneath the familiarity.
As though another pattern lay hidden beneath the obvious one.
A harmonic too soft to identify directly.
I remained where I was, trying to understand how I had arrived somewhere that surely shouldn't exist in the middle of the forest.
A man wearing a dark coat noticed me.
A lantern hung from his belt.
His posture carried the unmistakable ease of someone who belonged exactly where he stood.
Perhaps security.
Perhaps an organizer.
He looked directly at me.
I met his gaze automatically.
Years of faculty meetings answered before conscious thought did.
Calm expression.
Relaxed shoulders.
Professional composure.
The familiar mask slipped effortlessly into place.
The man gave a single nod.
Nothing more.
Then continued walking.
I blinked.
"...That's it?"
No questions.
No suspicion.
No—
"Excuse me, this is a private gathering."
No request for an invitation.
No challenge.
Only acknowledgment.
I turned back toward the trees.
Darkness waited exactly where I had emerged.
For one brief moment I considered retracing my steps.
Returning home.
Pretending none of this had happened.
Curiosity quietly drowned the idea before it had fully formed.
"...Interesting."
I stepped farther inside.
───
The gathering expanded the farther I walked.
What had first appeared to be a handful of stalls unfolded into orderly rows stretching far beyond what should reasonably have fit between the trees.
Lanterns hung overhead at measured intervals.
Their warm glow softened every corner without quite chasing away the night.
"I've been to night markets."
The thought came almost automatically.
"I know their rhythm."
People browsed.
Merchants bargained.
Food scented the air.
Those things I recognized.
This possessed all of that.
And something else.
It reminded me of certain pieces of music.
The kind in which another note existed beneath the melody.
Not loud enough to hear immediately.
Only...
Present.
I couldn't have explained it if someone had asked.
The feeling simply accompanied every step.
Wonder slowly replaced caution.
Without realizing it, I had begun smiling.
───
The first stall that truly stopped me sold candles.
Or at least...
It appeared to.
Rows of them rested neatly across the table in different shapes and sizes.
Some stood plain.
Others carried faint swirls of colour running through the wax.
One in particular caught my attention.
I reached for it.
The surface felt smooth beneath my fingertips.
Turning it slowly beneath the lantern light, I frowned.
"...The colour..."
It wasn't white.
Not exactly.
The shade seemed to shift almost imperceptibly whenever the lantern above swayed in the breeze.
Not enough to call it movement.
Enough to notice.
"What are these used for?"
The merchant, a middle-aged woman with the calm expression of someone accustomed to answering questions, looked up from arranging another display.
She answered readily.
Her explanation made perfect sense.
Every word was accurate.
And yet...
When she finished I found myself strangely unconvinced.
Not because she had lied.
Because I somehow felt she had described only the surface.
Much the way a lesson plan described a class without ever capturing what happened inside it.
"And..."
I hesitated.
Searching for the question proved unexpectedly difficult.
"The material."
I turned the candle once more.
"Is it... significant?"
The woman smiled politely.
"Everything here is significant."
A tiny pause.
"To someone."
I looked at the candle for another moment before carefully returning it to its place.
"...Thank you."
"I appreciate the explanation."
She inclined her head.
I continued walking.
The pattern repeated itself over the next several stalls.
I stopped.
Observed.
Asked questions.
Received answers that were entirely correct while somehow leaving me feeling I had learned only half of what there was to know.
I thanked each merchant sincerely before moving on.
Whatever this place truly was...
It remained patient enough to reveal itself one small piece at a time.
Eventually, another scent interrupted my wandering thoughts.
Sweet.
Warm.
Fresh from a griddle.
My stomach answered before I consciously recognized it.
I stopped.
"...I never ate supper."
The realization came with a quiet sort of embarrassment.
Somewhere between leaving school and wandering into the forest, the evening meal had simply disappeared from my plans.
The stall before me belonged to an elderly man.
Round cakes browned gently across a hot iron plate while another batch cooled neatly beside them.
The smell alone was enough to persuade me.
"One dorayaki, please."
The old man smiled.
"Coming right up."
He slipped one into a paper wrapper before handing it across the counter.
I thanked him and paid.
Rather than leaving immediately, I remained where I was for a moment, taking my first bite while facing the stream of people moving through the Fair.
From here the entire gathering looked different.
Merchants calling quietly.
Lanterns swaying overhead.
Customers drifting from stall to stall without any visible urgency.
It possessed the comfortable rhythm of somewhere that expected to continue existing long after any single visitor had left.
I chewed thoughtfully.
I don't want to ask too many questions.
The thought came naturally.
If I ask enough unusual questions... eventually I'll become unusual.
Until I understood what this place was...
It seemed wiser simply to observe.
I finished the last bite before folding the empty paper neatly and slipping it into my bag.
Then I resumed walking.
───
I bought several things before I fully realized I had begun shopping rather than exploring.
A packet of dried herbs—or perhaps vegetables.
The merchant explained what they were used for.
I recognized the scent from somewhere.
Not strongly enough to place it.
Only enough to know I had encountered it before.
"...Interesting."
I purchased it.
Another stall displayed paper lanterns.
At first glance they seemed entirely ordinary.
Delicately painted.
Light enough to carry comfortably.
Yet when I lifted one...
Something about it resisted being ordinary.
Not physically.
Conceptually.
As though my hands recognized a difference before my mind did.
I frowned.
"...I don't know why."
The feeling remained.
In the end I bought the lantern.
Not because I understood it.
Because I didn't.
Oddly enough...
Holding it made me feel slightly less tense.
I couldn't explain that either.
───
Several stalls later, I almost walked past a small display tucked between two larger merchants.
It was easy to miss.
The table sat lower than most.
Its contents appeared arranged without any obvious system.
Tiny pendants.
Glass bottles.
Small carved figures.
Wooden boxes.
Objects that resisted immediate categorization.
I slowed.
Then stopped.
One bottle caught my eye almost instantly.
It was scarcely larger than my thumb.
Clear glass.
Inside rested what appeared to be water.
Suspended within it floated fragments of an unmistakable deep blue stone.
I leaned closer.
"...Lapis lazuli."
Recognition surfaced immediately.
Three years earlier I had covered Mesopotamian trade routes during an art history lesson.
The colour was impossible to mistake.
The fragments drifted lazily whenever I tilted the bottle.
Lantern light entered from one side.
The blue scattered it strangely.
Not impossibly.
Simply...
Not in quite the direction I expected.
I stared another few moments.
Then nodded once.
"Yes."
No elaborate reasoning followed.
No careful weighing of necessity.
Simply...
Yes.
"How much is this?"
The merchant named the price.
Comfortably within reach.
"I'll take it."
He accepted the payment before wrapping the bottle with surprising care.
Layer after layer of soft cloth protected something small enough to fit in my palm.
This was the second merchant tonight who had devoted disproportionate attention to wrapping a modest purchase.
I noticed.
Quietly filed the observation away.
When he handed it back, I thanked him before stepping away from the stall.
Three steps later I paused.
The bottle rested in my hands.
A simple cord had been included.
Silver...
Perhaps iron.
The light made it difficult to tell.
Almost without thinking, I threaded it around my neck.
The tiny bottle settled gently against my collarbone.
"...Pretty."
The lapis caught another passing lantern.
Blue deepened almost into violet before returning again.
Then...
Warmth.
Very faint.
Not enough to startle me.
Only enough to notice.
I rested two fingers against the bottle.
"It feels warm."
The observation lingered.
Then passed.
There would be time to think about it later.
For now...
I simply continued walking.
───
Eventually I reached another stall.
This one felt... reassuring.
Not because it was particularly remarkable.
Because I immediately understood what it sold.
Sugar.
Flour.
Simple things.
Ordinary things.
For the first time that evening I possessed a complete vocabulary for what stood before me.
The relief surprised me.
The merchant stood quietly behind the display.
Middle-aged.
Professional.
His movements carried the smooth economy of someone who had repeated them often enough that no effort remained visible.
As I approached, another memory surfaced.
He's the man who noticed me earlier.
The one with the lantern.
Not suspicion.
Recognition.
Or perhaps curiosity.
I wasn't entirely certain.
"Good evening."
He inclined his head.
"Good evening."
My eyes settled on several neatly wrapped packets.
"Is that sugar?"
"Yes."
He nodded.
"Made from beetroot."
I looked toward another stack.
"And those?"
"Radish flour."
I lowered my gaze to the small wooden sign listing their prices.
Entirely reasonable.
"I'll have one of each, please."
"Of course."
He wrapped both packets carefully before placing them into a paper bag.
I counted out the money.
He accepted it with a quiet thank you.
"So..."
I accepted the bag.
"Thank you very much."
"You're welcome."
We exchanged small bows.
Nothing more.
A perfectly ordinary transaction.
When I stepped away, I didn't look back.
There was no particular reason to.
Yet somehow...
The exchange remained with me longer than several of the stranger things I had seen that night.
By the time I noticed the lanterns beginning to lose their dominance over the sky, dawn was already approaching.
The eastern horizon had softened into pale grey, and the first suggestion of sunlight was beginning to separate the trees from the darkness behind them.
"...Oh."
I blinked.
"It's morning."
I hadn't intended to stay the entire night.
In fact, I hadn't intended to be here at all.
Yet the hours had slipped past unnoticed, measured only by conversations with merchants, small purchases, and the quiet pleasure of discovering something that refused to explain itself all at once.
I found an open patch of ground near the edge of the Fair and spread out a small cloth.
One by one I sorted through everything I had accumulated.
The paper lantern.
The packet of dried herbs.
The tiny bottle resting warmly against my collarbone.
The sugar.
The radish flour.
There was more than I had realized while carrying it.
I folded the cloth carefully around the purchases before tying the corners together into a bundle.
As I straightened, I heard the familiar creak of wooden wheels.
A cart.
Nearby, a merchant was preparing to leave.
I looked up.
The produce merchant.
The one from whom I had bought the sugar and flour.
He was securing the last of his goods before climbing onto his cart.
I hesitated only briefly before walking over.
Keeping what I judged to be a respectful distance, I stopped.
"Excuse me."
He paused and turned.
"I'm sorry to trouble you."
"What is it?"
"I wanted to ask something."
He waited patiently.
I had overheard enough conversations during the night to realize this gathering did not remain here permanently.
People spoke of the next Fair as though its arrival were expected rather than constant.
"When is the next one?"
For a brief moment he simply looked at me.
Not suspiciously.
Thoughtfully.
As though quietly deciding whether there was any reason not to answer.
Whatever conclusion he reached, it arrived quickly.
"Four days from now."
He lifted one hand, pointing toward the road beyond the trees.
"It begins around eighteen o'clock."
He described the route simply.
A crossroads.
A weathered shrine.
A bend where the road followed the coast.
Only a few landmarks.
Enough.
I repeated two of them quietly beneath my breath.
The habit of fixing directions before they faded had served me well for years.
"I understand."
I bowed.
"Thank you very much."
"You're welcome."
He inclined his head before climbing back onto the cart.
A moment later the horse stepped forward.
The cart rolled away with a familiar wooden creak, gradually joining the small procession of departing merchants leaving the Fair behind.
I watched until it disappeared between the trees.
Then I turned toward the forest myself.
───
Morning had fully arrived.
The woods looked entirely different beneath daylight.
The mystery the lanterns had woven through the branches dissolved into pale winter colours.
Grey bark.
Brown leaves.
Thin shafts of sunlight reaching the forest floor.
Birdsong gradually replaced the voices of merchants.
I yawned.
"I'm sleepy."
The words escaped almost involuntarily.
Odd.
I should have been exhausted.
I'd remained awake through an entire night after a full day at school.
Instead...
I merely felt pleasantly tired.
Comfortably so.
It didn't quite make sense.
"I shouldn't have been able to stay awake this long."
The observation joined the others I had quietly collected throughout the night.
Not a conclusion.
Simply another note.
The bundle in my hand felt heavier than expected.
Not unpleasantly.
Only present.
The accumulated weight of an evening I had never planned to have.
Against my collarbone, the tiny bottle remained faintly warm beneath my coat.
I touched it once through the fabric.
Still there.
Still warm.
───
The school drifted back into my thoughts as I walked.
School days.
The meeting room.
The uneven chair.
The agenda.
Hayashi.
The familiar silence that politely erased my contributions before allowing someone else's identical words to become noteworthy.
Nothing about that had changed.
It was all still waiting for me.
And yet...
Something felt slightly different.
Not the school.
Not me.
The space between us.
I searched quietly for the reason.
Then found it.
The Fair.
There had existed, for one entire night, a place that knew absolutely nothing about staff meetings.
Nothing about schedules.
Nothing about who received credit for whose ideas.
No one there had expected anything from me beyond simple politeness.
No one had required me to become smaller so someone else might comfortably occupy the space.
The realization settled gently.
Some of that not-knowing had followed me home.
It rested inside the bundle beneath my arm.
Around my neck.
Somewhere behind my ribs.
It wasn't large.
Only...
A little space.
I wasn't certain what belonged there yet.
But the space existed.
That alone felt new.
The clarity of the thought surprised me.
Not...
Perhaps I should.
Not...
It would be nice.
Simply—
I wanted to return.
The decision had already been made somewhere before language arrived to describe it.
I accepted the fact with the same quiet honesty I gave most things.
Then continued walking.
───
The house greeted me with familiar stillness.
I removed my shoes before carrying everything inside.
Morning light spilled across the table as I unpacked each purchase one by one.
Without the lanterns, they looked different.
Not lesser.
Simply...
More ordinary.
The sugar was unmistakably sugar.
The flour looked exactly as flour ought to.
For reasons I couldn't explain, I found that reassuring.
"The dried packet..."
I set it slightly apart.
"I should find out what this actually is."
The paper lantern rested nearby.
I avoided looking directly at it for too long.
Again...
I couldn't explain why.
Finally, I picked up the small bottle.
Daylight revealed the lapis fragments more clearly than the lanterns had.
Deep blue.
Tiny flecks of gold.
Beautiful in a quieter way.
I tilted it gently.
The fragments drifted through the clear liquid before slowly settling again.
The warmth remained.
I smiled.
Then slipped the cord back over my head.
The bottle settled once more against my collarbone as though it had always belonged there.
───
The kettle began to sing softly.
Soon afterward, a cup of tea rested beside a stack of student papers waiting to be marked.
Routine returned almost effortlessly.
Red ink.
Margins.
Careful handwriting.
I adjusted my glasses before beginning.
The first paper earned only a few corrections.
The second required considerably more.
The third made me pause.
A student had explained a difficult concept with unusual clarity.
I smiled faintly.
In the margin I wrote something true.
Excellent connection between the two ideas. Keep thinking this way.
Another paper.
Another pause.
Another student had arrived at the correct conclusion through reasoning entirely their own.
Again I wrote exactly what I believed.
By the fifth paper, I realized something.
The work itself had never been the problem.
Teaching rarely was.
It was everything surrounding it that became exhausting.
I took a slow sip of tea.
The warmth spread through my hands.
The tiny bottle rested lightly against my collarbone beneath my sweater.
Outside, morning continued without asking anything of me.
A breeze stirred bare branches.
Somewhere beyond the window, a dog barked once before falling silent again.
I lowered my pen to the next paper.
Whatever had begun the previous night remained unnamed.
Perhaps it would remain that way for some time.
I found I didn't mind.
I marked another paper.
Reached for my tea.
And as daylight quietly filled the room, I continued.