I rested my hand on the table.
That was all.
The surface felt cold.
Or I thought it felt cold.
A few seconds later I touched it again to check.
I was no longer sure.
I found a mark on my wrist.
Very faint.
As if I had worn something tight for hours.
I couldn’t remember wearing anything.
I took a photograph of it.
Out of habit.
Or for some other reason.
When I checked the folder, I discovered an identical photograph already existed.
Taken nine days earlier.
From the same angle.
With the same light.
I don’t remember taking it.
I thought about Sade.
Not his characters.
Not his instruments.
I thought about something much simpler.
The difficulty of distinguishing between a sensation and the expectation of a sensation.
I opened the notebook.
There was a note.
It didn’t seem important.
Just one sentence.
“Stop checking your wrist.”
I checked it immediately.
The mark was still there.
Or perhaps it was a different one.
I’m not sure.
I tried to remember when I had first noticed it.
Instead, I found something worse.
A forgotten conversation.
The call log showed that I had spoken to someone for forty-three minutes.
I recognized the number.
I didn’t remember the conversation.
Not a single word.
The only thing I remembered was sitting here.
Looking at the same table.
Running my fingers across the same surface.
I opened the photograph again.
Something was written behind it.
Not physically.
In the metadata.
“The contact happened earlier.”
I didn’t understand the sentence.
The unsettling part was something else.
The modification date was later than tomorrow’s date.
I closed the file.
I opened it again.
It was still there.
I’m beginning to suspect touch has nothing to do with skin.
Or pressure.
Or even contact itself.
Perhaps it has something to do with traces that appear before the experience that supposedly creates them.
This morning I found another note.
The handwriting was mine.
I remembered it perfectly.
I remembered writing it.
What I didn’t remember was why.
The sentence said:
“It wasn’t your hand.”
Hours later I found another.
“Yes, it was your hand.”
I placed them side by side on the table.
For several minutes I tried to decide which one was correct.
Then I realized something.
Maybe neither was trying to be correct.
Maybe they were trying to keep the question open.
I think I need to move my neck.
Or at least that sentence keeps appearing in the margins.
I found a new photograph.
In it, I’m touching the table.
I recognize the shirt.
I recognize the room.
I recognize the hand.
I have to move my neck…
