Ledger of the Bright Knife

Ash clung to my tongue like a vow.

I kept my mouth closed until the taste dulled; then I opened it to the night and let the ash settle again. The street lamps wore haloes of grime. I walked beneath them, counting cracks. I kept the knife bright. I did not look at the mirror.

The mirror waited in the narrow hall, a tall sheet dark with old silvering. It liked the hour before dawn, when the house forgot its stories and the floorboards remembered feet. I faced the wall instead. I turned the shard face-down on the sill. I polished the knife with my sleeve. I touched the edge to my thumb and felt a clean, simple sting.

The crown lived in a drawer by the telephone, not a circlet, not a coronet, only a ring of thorns from the hedge, dried and patient. I didn’t wear it. I set it beside the knife and watched the points. The ash on my tongue made everything taste like rehearsals. I wrote one more line in the ledger.

The ledger had thin pages that took ink without bleeding. I wrote the date. I wrote the place. I wrote the one word I knew how to write. I closed the book and pressed it flat with my palm. I did not look at the mirror. I checked the knife again. I breathed and let the ash thicken behind my teeth.

I was supposed to be a simple thing. Carry. Clean. Return. Keep the numbers honest. Keep the knife bright. The crown wanted ceremony, but I had no head for it. The mirror wanted honesty, but I had no face for it. The ledger wanted totals. Totals are kinder than faces.

Downstairs, the back door stuck on its swollen frame. The yard smelled of damp soil and cold iron. Ash drifted from the chimney next door and lay on the rosemary like grey pollen. I held the knife to the light of the kitchen and then to the dark, testing the edge against both. I listened for a sound that wasn’t there. The ledger under my arm felt heavier than paper.

The mirror watched from the hall. Even when I did not turn, I could feel its surface like breath between my shoulders. It had learned my steps. It liked the pause before the going. It enjoyed the part where I swallowed ash and told myself the swallow was prayer. It kept its counsel. It kept mine.

Upstairs, the drawer clicked. The crown sighed as the thorns touched. The ledger wanted a sum and a signature, and the signature wanted a name in a hand that didn’t shake. The knife wanted only light.

I was the blade.

The knife had no need to name me; the echo already had. Iron sang in the marrow, and salt stung where I could not wash it away. The confession burned colder than fire.

I didn’t move for a long time. The hall filled with the sound of the refrigerator and then the emptiness between its sounds. I lifted the mirror shard and laid it face-up on the sill. I looked without looking; I let the glass catch the corner of my mouth, the place where the ash had whitened my lip. I lowered the shard and turned it again. I breathed until the breath steadied.

The ledger fell open to a page where the ink had dried to a faint shine. The columns made neat order out of evenings I no longer counted. I kept my finger on a line that began with a season and ended with a word that wasn’t mine. The ash shifted on my tongue and made the word taste like iron filings. I closed the book and closed it again.

The crown waited with a patience that felt like accusation. The thorns had a way of finding the tender places without looking. I touched it once. I lifted it. I set it down. The knife lay parallel to its ring, bright as a thought you don’t want. I closed my eyes and all three objects arranged themselves behind my lids and called themselves a family. I opened my eyes and took the mirror shard in my palm.

The mirror liked to speak only when it could be mistaken for silence. It said my name the way an invoice says a debt. It had no voice. The small letters floated in the deep silver and drifted apart like ash that had decided to become snow. I set the shard on my tongue and learned the taste of my own outline. I lifted it off and the taste stayed.

I cleaned the knife because that was what there was to do. I ran the cloth along the edge with the same care I use on words I know can cut. The cloth came away clean. The knife gleamed. It remembered hands. It remembered streets. It remembered doors that opened into rooms where the air didn’t move. It remembered a small sound that wasn’t a sound and a quiet that wasn’t peace.

Outside, a lorry rattled past and the window glass trembled. The tremble returned through the sill into my wrist and up the tendons into my jaw. The ledger slid under my fingers and stopped at the edge of the table. I lifted it and placed it beneath the mirror shard. I placed the crown on top of both. I pressed down until the thorns bit paper. I pressed down until the mirror showed nothing but the line of my thumb.

The ash receded and returned with each swallow. I considered water and decided against it. I considered light and left the lamps alone. The house had a way of holding its breath when I did. The knife glowed in the half-dark, a narrow sunrise no one asked for. I could have put it away. I could have left it there like a memory that had learned to sleep. I could have.

When the door finally opened, it was only the wind testing the latch. The mirror took the wind and made it seem like a figure. The ledger took the wind and made it seem like a signature. The crown took the wind and made it seem like a nod. I laughed once and the laugh sounded like a blade leaving a sheath. I swallowed ash. I leaned my tongue to the salt I kept in a paper twist and let the sting remind me the mouth is a ledger too.

I went to the yard and let the cold iron of the gate find my palm. I placed the mirror shard against the post so the sky could see itself in a slice. I pressed the crown onto a knot in the wood and let the thorns seat. I lifted the knife until the rosemary showed a thin line, fragrant where the cut would be if there were a cut. I lowered the knife and the rosemary held its shape. I breathed again. I waited through the waiting.

Dawn made a weak seam in the clouds. The mirror shard gathered a pale mouth and gave it back. The ledger under my arm grew warm with the heat of my skin. I listened to the street and then to the spaces between cars. A bird tried three notes and decided not to finish the song. I said my name softly and let the ash turn to something that wasn’t ash. I touched the knife to the rim of the crown and felt the smallest click.

The knife remembers.

I wiped the blade on my cuff and placed it in its drawer. I took the crown and slid it under the ledger where the pages could learn the shape of its patience. I lifted the mirror shard and turned it once, twice, three times. I set it face-down. I stood until my feet ached and then I sat. I rubbed my thumb where the edge had whispered. The taste in my mouth thinned toward metal and stayed there, bright as a coin on the tongue. The knife remembers—rusted now, bright against the iron.