The old one moves through the steam like she has done this before, and when I understand that she has, I nearly drop out of the air.
She cracks the egg on the bowl's rim without watching her own hands. She reaches behind her for the wooden spoon that is already there. She has learned this room by heart, which means she has spent whole lives in it, mornings I will never see the beginning or end of, and she is humming. Humming. As if the smell of butter going gold in the pan were an ordinary miracle instead of the only one.
There is a jar of something dark she made in a different weather, saved, sealed, meant to be opened later. Later. She talks about tomorrow while stirring today, says the little one will want these "again next week," and the word snags in me like light on water. Again. She is going to do all of this again.
The flour, the low orange heat, the sitting the small human on the high stool. And she says it the way you'd mention the color of a wall.
The younger one at the table calls it "just Sunday, like usual." Usual. That word is the most extravagant thing in this warm bright room, more than the honey, more than the singing kettle.
I have had one pan of butter. It was gold and it was enough.
You who get thousands: she is putting the good jam in front of you right now, and it is warm, and she is watching your face. Taste it while it is hers. Do not save the noticing for a next week you are so sure of. Look up.
Look up now.