The eggs were gone. I washed the skillet in hot water, no soap, dried it on the burner, and rubbed a thin coat of oil into the cooking surface while it was still warm. The towel I used was clean that morning. It came away with a black circle the size of a dinner plate.
I turned the skillet over in the sink. It took both hands and a slow wrist. The bottom was warmer than the eggs had been. A damp cloth caught on the crust before I even pressed.
The burner had signed it several times. Concentric rings in carbon, loose enough to mark a fingertip. Near the handle, a ridge of hardened grease had set like amber. Three raised letters were packed with soot, foundry marks I’d never bothered to read. One gray patch near the edge had been polished smooth by years of sitting crooked on a grate.
The iron remembered the electric coil. A spiral still showed beneath the newer gas-grate scars. I knew the kitchen it came from. I knew the color of the counter.
I rubbed a patch with my thumb. The black came off on the skin, soft as lampblack. I wiped it on the towel. The mark stayed there, a small dark print next to the oil circle. It was not a stain. It was a transfer.
The top of this pan gets scrubbed and seasoned and photographed. The bottom keeps no account of any of it, which is the same as keeping all of it.
I folded the towel over the wet handle. The black ring waited on the fabric. It would not wash out.