A Stitch She Knew

The needle was thicker than the yellow thread. Mila held it too upright at first. The blunt tip slipped over the stitch and tapped her fingernail.

‘From the side,’ Grandma said.

She pointed to the little arch of thread rising above the grey back of the cloth. Mila tried again. This time the needle slid underneath. The thread rested on the metal, yellow against silver-grey.

All she had to do was lift it. She'd done that on Tuesday, on the ordinary practice cloth. That stitch had been a bit of thread she could use again. She'd twiddled it between her fingers while Grandma explained what would happen to a preserved room.

Now her hand wouldn't move.

‘Is something caught?’ Grandma asked.

Mila shook her head.

Aron's hands lay side by side on the table. His thumb rubbed an old fleck of paint. Nobody told her to hurry.

Mila lifted the needle. The yellow loop grew longer. A tiny hole appeared where the thread had been; underneath, the silver weave stayed whole. She put down the needle and took the loop between two fingers. With one steady movement, she drew the end back through.

The kitchen line was open.

There was no sound. The light beneath the cloth stayed just as pale. Grandma laid the yellow end beside the edge, near Aron's hands.

‘Just leave it lying there,’ she said.

Mila looked again at the empty stitch. Against the grey, the gap was almost impossible to spot. The preserved kitchen was still there, Grandma had said. Until they returned the light.

She turned her drawing the right way round. ‘That was the first.’

Grandma nodded. ‘Now you can draw it back through that green loop.’

More of the cloth needed moving than Mila had expected. Grandma slid a hand under the fold. Eva supported the broad edge to keep it from slipping off the table. Mila eased the yellow stitch back a little. It slid through the green loop, then caught on itself halfway.

She nearly gave it a harder tug. Instead, she put down the needle.

‘It's twisted.’

Grandma leaned forward. ‘That's one of your extra wraps. Look, you can make room here.’

With her fingernail she nudged the yellow loop a fraction sideways. Mila slipped the blunt needle under it and lifted it over the twisted thread. This time the stitch came right free.

Aron moved the loose end away from a screw hole in the table. He didn't hold on to it. As more thread came through, he laid it in a wide, slack curve.

Mila put a little tick on her drawing.

The second stitch was quicker. For the third, Grandma had to turn the cloth slightly. A silver line showed at the front, thin as the gap beneath a door. Mila stared until her eyes stung.

‘Is it open?’ she asked.

‘Partly.’ Grandma showed her the edge of the fold. ‘Nine stitches still caught along here.’

Ilyas came to ask who wanted tea. Aron raised his hand. Mila said no, then realised she'd like something warm to hold. Eva took Grandma's place so she could get up and stretch her back. The cloth could rest on the table.

At the other table, the tea smelt of mint. Ilyas had found Aron a mug with a crooked Christmas tree on it.

‘We've got an Easter bunny as well,’ he said. ‘That one's bigger.’

Aron took a sip and pulled a face. ‘This one's big enough.’

Mila blew across her tea. The clock on the wall said it wasn't eleven yet. She was tired in the way she usually only felt in a car, with streetlights sliding one by one across the window. But one look at the worktable woke her right up.

‘Shall I do a few?’ Grandma asked.

Mila looked at her fingers. The tip of her thumb was red from gripping the needle.

‘I want to stay beside you.’

‘Bring your chair over, then.’

Grandma freed the next four stitches. Mila kept their place on the drawing. Sometimes she got muddled because the back went the other way round. Then Aron held the cardboard upright so she didn't have to put her head on the table to see. He called out a number only when the stitch was completely free.

‘Seven.’

The sharp ridge had gone from the middle of the fold. A gentle curve remained, with a small doubled section at one end. The green loops were still whole. Mila kept her fingers off them. By now she knew how easily a nail could catch a thread.

She took the needle back for the last five. Her hand was steadier. She drew one stitch back the wrong way and spotted it herself: the yellow thread lay over the green again. She stopped, eased it back and began from the other side.

‘Like this?’

Grandma looked. ‘Like that.’

At the eleventh stitch, the last doubled layer slid apart. Mila could see the full width of the silver weave. The twelfth stitch still ran through a green loop, but without the fold round it, she could reach it easily. She drew the thread back and put down the needle.

Aron let the yellow end slip from his hand. He'd only lifted it to lay it clear of the table edge.

‘Twelve,’ he said.

Mila checked her paper. Twelve ticks. Much less seemed to have come out of the cloth than out of her drawing. Almost all the kitchen line was still there. Only at the tangle was there a break, as if someone had lifted their pencil in the middle of a sentence.

Grandma and Eva slid their hands under the broad cloth and smoothed the last part flat. No little ridge stood up anywhere. Ilyas turned the lamp so Grandma could examine the weave from both sides.

‘The silver's whole,’ she said.

Mila let her shoulders drop. Only then did she realise how high she'd been holding them.

She looked at the yellow thread beside Aron's hand. She could put the free end back through the tiny hole. She even knew how to close the line neatly. But out in the garden, the broken pattern would still lose its room as the light drained away. Grandma had explained that on Tuesday.

Mila returned her needle to the pincushion.

‘I don't want another look at the kitchen,’ she said.

Grandma moved the pincushion away from the cloth. ‘Then we won't.’

Ilyas glanced at the clock. ‘Quarter past eleven. I'll clear the path to the garden.’

Aron picked up the drawing without folding it. All twelve ticks fitted inside the pool of lamplight.