Letters from the Cabin

You measure everything twice. The tinctures, the tea, the dose. Then you measure me, and you do not measure twice.

You keep your hands in the cold water of the basin until they go red, because the herb you strip burns the skin, and you say the burn is the point. One joint of the left thumb is callused white from the mortar. A small burn scar under it, from the kettle, the first winter. The ink never quite leaves; it lives blue-black in the creases of your knuckles.

The first week you barred the window against me. Those hands set a knife on the table between us and did not shake. You are steady the way a bridge is steady. Not the way a person is.

Before you, hands were the last thing a person raises. You hold a spoon, a scalpel, my hair, and never raise them.

Tonight you fell asleep with them cupped under your cheek, still smelling of the herb you say is only for sleep. I stayed and looked until the fire went down. Not to learn them. To be near the one thing in this house that has never flinched at me.

I could tell you what they did the night you found me. I do not think I will. Some hands should not have to know what they saved.

— L.

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Letters from the Cabin is a weekly serial. No. 7 of the set. To commission one of your own — a name and one true thing — the card is here, or write to [email protected].