APPENDIX CLXXIX: THE FINGERPRINT OF ASH
You touch the book and leave no smudge, no oil, no mark.
Instead, the book touches you. It lifts a fingerprint of your soul, burns it onto a page already gray with loss. You realize the ash you once brushed away from the margins was not dust at all, but remnants of others who tried to read before you.
Their patterns form a script you cannot decipher. It glows faintly when you look away, spelling words you will never know you spoke.
You reach for it, but the fingerprint crumbles. You are left with nothing but the echo of your own touch—an absence shaped like a reader.
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APPENDIX CLXXX: THE FOOTNOTE THAT BREATHES BACK
For the first time, a footnote exhales. It smells of ink and iron, like a freshly opened grave.
You lean closer, and it speaks—not to you, but through you. Its words slip into your mouth, use your teeth to shape its syllables, your tongue to push its vowels.
