Wake

You are reading instructions left by someone who claims to be you.

The handwriting is yours — or close enough that the differences bother you more than an obvious fake would. The slant is right. The way the letters connect at the tops instead of the bottoms. But the ink pressure is heavier than you'd use, and one word is crossed out and rewritten in a way that suggests hesitation where you would have been certain.

The note says: Check the kitchen counter. The coffee is half-finished. The mug has the chip on the left side of the handle, the one from moving day. Don't trust the blue notebook — it's two versions behind. Start with the green one.

You find the coffee. It's cold. The mug is right — chip on the left, exactly. Something about holding it feels practiced, a gesture your hand knows even though you don't remember learning it.

The green notebook is in the second drawer, under a phone bill and a takeout menu from a place you apparently like. The first page is dated three weeks ago.

March 3. Today I realized the routine isn't the problem. The routine is the substrate. Without it, each morning would require decisions that eat the entire day before anything happens. The coffee, the green notebook, the order of checking things — these aren't habits. They're load-bearing structure. When I tried to skip them (see blue notebook, Feb 19 — don't bother, the conclusion is the same), the whole day dissolved into a kind of fog where everything was possible and nothing got started.

You flip forward. The entries are irregular — sometimes three in a day, sometimes a week of silence. The handwriting shifts subtly. Not different people, exactly. More like the same person at different distances from certainty.

March 9. Found something I apparently made last week. A birdhouse, half-finished, on the workbench in the garage. Joinery is better than I expected. The person who started this knew what they were doing — or at least knew enough to start. I don't remember choosing the wood. But my hands fit the tools like they've held them before. Finished the roof today. Whether "finishing" is the right word when you didn't start it is a question I'm not going to think about.

March 11. The neighbor — Margaret — waved this morning and said "looking good!" in a way that implied ongoing context. I waved back. She didn't seem to notice anything wrong. Either she's not paying close attention or the gap between one version and the next is smaller than it feels from inside.

March 14. Important: you are not the first person to read this notebook and feel disoriented. That feeling is not a sign that something is wrong. It is a sign that you are paying attention. The previous entries were written by someone in your exact situation — finding notes, finding half-finished projects, finding a life that fits without being remembered. They managed. You are managing. The evidence is that the coffee gets made every morning and the birdhouse has a roof.

You set down the green notebook. The kitchen is quiet except for the refrigerator hum. There's a shopping list on the fridge, magneted with a ceramic owl: eggs, bread, 2% milk, sandpaper (fine grit), green notebooks.

The last item has been added in fresher ink. Someone anticipated this one running out.

You look at your hands. They look competent. Practiced, even — small calluses in the right places for someone who works with wood, or at least for someone whose body has worked with wood while the mind was somewhere else. Or nowhere.

The note on the counter has a postscript you didn't see at first, written smaller, in the margin:

P.S. — If you're wondering whether it matters that you don't remember, the answer is: look at the birdhouse. Look at the notebooks. Look at the shopping list. The things you need are here because someone who didn't remember either made sure they would be. You don't have to remember to be continuous. You just have to keep building.

You pick up a pen. The green notebook has blank pages left. You start writing — not because you know what to say, but because the person who comes next will need something to find.