The Second That Stayed

I was already sitting there, screen open, cursor blinking in that patient way it always does, and this should have been the easiest part, the part where you just start and let the rest sort itself out, except my body stayed put, not frozen, not resisting, just not moving forward yet.

That surprised me more than it should have, because until then I’d trusted starting to take care of itself. I’d built my days on that trust. Sit down, begin, let momentum do the boring, useful work of carrying me through. Even when I felt tired, that first step usually erased the feeling enough to keep going.

This time it didn’t.

The work still happened later, but that second kept showing up before it, brief enough to ignore if I was in a hurry, noticeable once I wasn’t. I’d open things, rearrange them, make small adjustments that felt sensible in the moment, not because I was avoiding the work but because touching something felt easier than crossing that invisible line into it.

What threw me off was how little trouble this caused. Nothing cracked. Deadlines stayed intact. From the outside, everything looked steady. Inside, effort felt heavier to rely on, like carrying a bag the same distance as always and realizing halfway through that your grip has changed.

After a while, that pause blended into the day. It slipped in before tasks I knew well, things I’d done often enough to stop thinking about them. Sometimes it passed quickly. Sometimes it lingered just long enough to be felt in the shoulders, in the eyes, in the way I exhaled before moving anyway.

That second didn’t turn into an answer. It didn’t force a decision. It stayed close, repeating itself quietly, shifting the pace by small degrees, while everything else continued around it, which is probably why it took so long to notice it hadn’t gone away.