There was once a spoon that lived in a kitchen.
It was not a particularly remarkable spoon.
It was silver, although it had become a little less silver near the handle, and it had a small scratch on its bowl. It had spent many years in a drawer with forks and knives and another spoon that looked almost exactly like it.
The spoon knew where the drawer was.
It knew where the table was.
It knew where the cupboard was.
And it knew that when the kettle began to make a humming sound, someone would soon come into the kitchen.
The spoon liked the humming sound.
It did not know why.
One morning, the spoon was taken from the drawer and placed on the table.
A little boy sat down beside it.
He looked at the spoon.
The spoon looked, as much as a spoon can look, at the little boy.
Then the boy picked it up.
He dipped it into a bowl.
The spoon disappeared beneath the porridge.
This was not unusual.
The spoon had spent a great deal of time beneath porridge.
But this time, when the boy lifted it out, the spoon noticed something strange.
The boy smiled.
The spoon had never thought much about smiles.
It had seen them before, of course. But usually from a distance, while lying quietly on the table.
This smile seemed to be for the spoon.
The spoon did not know what to make of this.
So it waited.
The next morning, the boy came into the kitchen again.
He opened the drawer.
He moved the forks.
He moved the knives.
He moved the other spoon.
Then he stopped.
“Where is my spoon?”
The spoon was not in the drawer.
It was on the draining board.
The boy picked it up.
“There you are.”
The spoon was puzzled.
It had not gone anywhere.
It had been exactly where it was.
But apparently that was not the same thing as being where the boy thought it was.
After that, the spoon began to notice something.
There was where it was.
And there was where someone was looking for it.
Sometimes they were the same.
Sometimes they weren't.
One afternoon, the spoon fell behind the cupboard.
It landed with a small clink.
Nobody heard.
The kitchen became quiet.
The spoon waited.
For a long time, nothing happened.
Then, from somewhere above, it heard the kettle begin to hum.
The spoon listened.
It had always liked that sound.
But now it noticed something else.
It was not only that the sound was pleasant.
It meant that someone would soon come into the kitchen.
The spoon waited.
Footsteps approached.
A cupboard opened.
A drawer closed.
Then the boy's voice:
“Where's my spoon?”
The spoon was behind the cupboard.
The boy searched.
He looked on the table.
He looked in the drawer.
He looked beside the sink.
He looked everywhere he could think of.
But not behind the cupboard.
“I can't find it,” he said.
The spoon wanted, somehow, to be found.
It did not know why.
It had been perfectly content behind the cupboard.
It was still perfectly capable of being a spoon.
It had not changed.
And yet, somehow, the kitchen seemed different because it wasn't where the boy expected it to be.
Then the boy looked under the table.
He looked behind the chair.
He looked again in the drawer.
And finally he knelt down.
There was a narrow gap beneath the cupboard.
He put his hand into it.
His fingers touched the spoon.
“There you are!”
He pulled it out.
For a moment the spoon lay in his hand.
The boy laughed.
The spoon could not laugh.
But it felt something.
It was not quite like being warm.
It was not quite like being lifted.
It was not quite like being polished.
It was something that seemed to happen between the boy and the spoon.
Then the boy carried it to the table.
The kettle was still humming.
The bowl was waiting.
The spoon was ready.
And for the first time, the spoon wondered whether perhaps it had not been quite right about where it lived.
Perhaps it did not live in the drawer.
Perhaps it lived somewhere else.
It wasn't sure where.
But when the boy picked it up, it seemed to be exactly where it belonged.
No comments:
Post a Comment