Six sheets came off the printer still warm, and I stacked them on the dryer lid to carry down. The top one said I had been selected. It did not say for what. The paper was recycled and gray, a little rough, and the toner had gone on unevenly so the word CONGRATULATIONS sat slightly raised where the roller had double-struck it.
The north wall is the one behind the laundry sink. The blocks stay cold there, coldest near the floor, and the older pages have climbed most of the way to the joists. Those are yellow now. They curl at the top corners where the heat pools. I did not start at the top on purpose. It just filled from the middle out, the way a drawer fills.
I pinned the new six low, under the yellow ones, along the run of pale block that was still bare. The saucer of pushpins sat on the sink edge. I pushed a clear one through the S in SELECTED. The block resisted, then took it. The next sheet overlapped the first by an inch. I did not read them again. I had read them once on the screen, which was enough.
The laundry sink dripped its slow drip. The bulb hung close and flat and made the fresh pages look grayer than they were against the yellow. You could see the seam where this week’s work met last winter’s. New paper is stiff. It had not learned the room yet.
The wall grew by a hand’s width. Down at the bottom corner, one pin had not seated all the way. The sheet stood off the block a quarter inch, a small paper tent, and a draft moved through it without lifting it free.