Sometimes years. Worse winter.
Since childhood?
Yes.
What happened when deaf?
The pencil stopped.
For almost a minute Elias did nothing.
Then:
Fever.
Clara stared.
He added:
They said fever.
Not I had fever.
They said.
Clara felt cold.
She wrote:
Do you remember fever?
Elias looked at her.
His breathing slowed.
He shook his head.
Clara moved the lamp.
She pushed his hair gently back.
He stiffened.
She paused.
Waited.
He nodded.
Inside the ear, beneath swollen skin, something reflected light.
Not wax.
Not blood.
Metal.
Clara’s pulse changed.
She wrote:
There is something inside.
Elias read.
Went still.
Metal maybe.
He looked almost angry.
Then frightened.
He reached toward the ear.
Clara caught his wrist.
Shook her head.
She boiled water.
Cleaned a pair of fine sewing tweezers in alcohol her father had packed among household supplies.
Elias watched.
His face hardened.
Clara wrote:
I can try.
He shook his head.
If stays infection could worsen.
Another shake.
Clara thought.
Then wrote:
Your choice.
Elias read.
The words affected him.
Perhaps because he had given her those same words in different form on the first night.
He closed his eyes.
Then nodded.
Clara’s hands began trembling.
She moved the lamp closer.
“Stay still,” she whispered even though he could not hear.
Elias watched her mouth.
Understood.
She inserted the tweezers carefully.
The metal lay deeper than she liked.
She nearly stopped.
Then caught an edge.
Elias jerked.
Clara withdrew.
Blood appeared.
She felt sick.
Elias grabbed her wrist.
Not hard.
She met his eyes.
He breathed through the pain.
Then nodded.
Again.
Clara tried.
This time the tweezers caught.
She pulled slowly.
Something black emerged.
Thin.
Covered in dark residue.
More blood followed.
Elias gripped the chair until his knuckles whitened.
The object resisted.
Then released.
Clara nearly dropped it.
A narrow strip of corroded material fell onto the white cloth.
Before she could examine it, something else clicked between the tweezers.
Hard.
She pulled.
A tiny piece of copper struck the cloth.
CLINK.
Both looked down.
The fragment was no larger than the nail of Clara’s smallest finger.
Green-black oxidation covered most of it.
Blood darkened one edge.
But beneath the corrosion, an engraved shape remained visible.
A black tree inside a circle.
Clara stopped breathing.
She had seen it.
The drawings in Elias’s loft.
She looked at him.
Every trace of color vanished from his face.
His hand rose slowly.
Not toward the ear.
Toward the copper.
His fingers hovered above it.
Then he recoiled as though the metal itself could burn him.
Clara grabbed the notepad.
You know mark?
Elias did not answer.
His eyes remained fixed on the cloth.
Clara wrote again.
Elias.