The quiet after the last stitch

It’s 2am and the shop’s so still I can hear the leather breathing—like it remembers every hand that ever pressed it. I just finished a commission for a daughter binding her father’s letters, and when I closed the cover, something in me cracked open. Not sad, not happy—just full. Like the book wasn’t made by me, but through me. The spine holds its shape now, not from glue or thread, but from what was left behind.