I thought the strange part was what I was reading.
I spent weeks trying to figure out which part felt strange.
An article.
A video.
A story.
Something specific.
It took me far too long to realize I was looking in the wrong place.
Because what eventually caught my attention was not the content.
It was something else.
It was the ease of it.
The speed at which something stopped feeling new.
I remember one night in particular.
Not because anything important happened.
Precisely because nothing did.
The mug was still beside the computer.
It was cold.
I know because I touched it.
Not because I remembered finishing the coffee.
The screen was still open.
The room looked exactly the same.
And yet a stretch of time had disappeared without explanation.
It wasn’t much.
Maybe forty minutes.
Maybe an hour.
Enough to notice the absence.
Enough to wonder where I had been.
My attention had been somewhere.
That was the problem.
Something had happened without me being able to point to the exact moment.
The alarm was still set.
I checked it the next morning.
Which means I did exactly what I was supposed to do.
My hand found the right place.
My finger pressed the right thing.
The time was saved.
But I don’t remember doing it.
I don’t remember the decision.
Only the result.
And for a few seconds I stared at that alarm as if it belonged to someone else.
As if someone had passed through during the night using my body to perform ordinary tasks.
The strange thing is that it didn’t scare me.
Or not entirely.
Because alongside the discomfort came something worse.
Curiosity.
Not about what I was reading.
About that moment.
About the exact instant when I stopped noticing the transition.
Because maybe I never came back for the content.
Maybe I came back to watch it happen.
To watch a decision slowly become something that no longer felt like a decision.
I need to move my neck.
I think about it.
I wait.
Nothing.
The mug is still cold.
The screen is still glowing.
I need to move my neck.
I think about it again.
And for a second an absurd thought appears.
I’m not waiting to move it.
I’m waiting to feel that the decision belongs to me.
And maybe that’s what unsettles me most.
Not wondering when I come back.
But realizing that some part of me has already returned before I notice it.
I have to move the neck the record cannot close I have to move the neck I am not moving it I should…
