The Joint Test

Letter 21 of the Book of Forgetting

The path past the mill was dry and hard-packed. Noa walked ahead, her phone in her hand, and Liesl came behind with her stopwatch on a cord around her neck. The old well stood at the south edge, grey stone half-swallowed by grass.

"You sure about this?" Liesl said.

"I'm sure," Noa said. "Same stone, same heights, same moment. We'll point at each other so we know we're timing the same splash."

They set up at the well mouth. Liesl picked a stone from the pile, weighed it in her palm. Noa opened her voice memo app and held the phone out toward the water.

"Arm high first," Liesl said. "Three drops. You call it."

Noa called the drop. Liesl let the stone fall. The splash came. Liesl pressed her stopwatch.

"Three point one," Liesl said.

Noa checked her phone. "One point nine."

Liesl stared at her. "That can't be right. Same stone, same drop, same moment."

"One point nine," Noa said again. "That's what my phone says."

They did it again. Three point one on the stopwatch, one point nine on the phone. Again. Same.

Liesl set the stopwatch down on the grass. "You time mine now. I'll drop."

They traded. Noa held the stopwatch, Liesl held the stone and Noa's phone. Liesl called her own drop. The splash came. Noa pressed the button.

"One point nine," Noa said.

Liesl looked at the phone. "One point nine. So your phone says mine's ordinary."

"But your stopwatch says it's late," Noa said. "When you're holding it."

Liesl picked up the stopwatch, held it in her palm. "Let's do waist high. You time with your phone, I time with mine."

Waist high. Three drops. Liesl's stopwatch read two point nine each time. Noa's phone read one point six.

Knee high. Two point seven on the stopwatch. One point four on the phone.

Liesl sat down on the grass, the stopwatch in her lap. "So it's not the well. It's not the stone. It's not the air." She looked at the stopwatch. "It's this thing. Or it's me."

"It's not you," Noa said. "You're standing right next to me. We're hearing the same splash."

"Then it's the stopwatch." Liesl held it up. "Mechanical. I've had it twelve years. It's never been wrong."

"Maybe it's not wrong," Noa said. "Maybe it's measuring something else."

Liesl looked at her. "Something else?"

"Time," Noa said. "Maybe it's measuring time the way it actually passes here, and everything else is wrong."

Liesl turned the stopwatch over in her hands. The metal was warm. "That's a hard thing to swallow."

"It's a hard thing to measure," Noa said. "But you've got a timer that says one thing and a phone that says another. Somebody's lying."

"Or somebody's not." Liesl stood up, brushed off her apron. "Ivo wants me to test from inside the fog line. He said he'd talk to Gilead."

"You'd do that?"

"I'd do that." Liesl pocketed the stopwatch. "I want to see if this thing goes late inside the fog too. If it does, then it's not the well. It's the whole edge of town."

Noa picked up the stone, weighed it in her palm. "Same time tomorrow?"

"Same time," Liesl said. "Bring your phone. I'll bring my stopwatch. We'll find out which one's telling the truth."

They walked back toward town. The grey pressed at the sky. Somewhere a baby would wake and speak again, and I still did not know what it meant.