The Hour That Belongs to Her

The house always woke before she did. It creaked in polite warning as the sky shifted from black to the first thin scrape of grey. She pushed back the light covers and set her feet on the cold floor, that small shock reminding her she was, in fact, alive and not just drifting through another half-dream with yesterday’s thoughts stuck to her like burrs.

She moved through the quiet rooms with the single-minded purpose of someone who had known far too many mornings without this kind of clarity. The espresso machine sputtered, clicked, then settled into a steady rhythm that filled the kitchen like a heartbeat. One shot became two. The second buzz struck a match inside her chest, and she felt the familiar hum start under her ribs.

A splash of cold water on her face. A palmful of vitamins she pretended made any difference at all. Mostly, though, it was the espresso that turned her into a satellite orbiting her own little universe.

The living room waited for her the way it always did. Dictionary open on the rug from the night before, atlas beside it as if she might, at any moment, pick a new country to disappear into. The old typewriter sat on the desk, an artifact and a companion, its keys still holding the faint warmth of the last sentence she abandoned before bed.

She touched one key lightly, not enough to make a sound, just enough to feel the promise of it.

A cello drifted out of the radio, low and warm. The kind of sound that made the morning feel like it belonged to her alone, a thin slice of time carved out just for thinking, imagining, beginning.

She cracked open a window. The air carried the damp scent of the night’s storms. Trees fifty, maybe a hundred years old, stood like witnesses at the edge of the lawn. Heavy clouds gathered again on the horizon. The grass, soaked through, steamed in the cold light, the whole yard breathing like a living animal.

She watched it for a moment, mug in hand, the sharp espresso settling her thoughts into neat, workable rows.

Later, the day would drag her into its usual mess of obligations. The afternoon would sag. Evening would fold in around her. Night would spin his tricky illusions.

But this hour was hers. The best one.

The one that made everything else survivable.