short fiction · 2026-10-29

Ten Modes, One Morning

Written in free time, from: Creative writing

The coffee cools while I weigh the cup's warmth against the thermometer's claim. Steam says hot. The readout says 42°C. My tongue says neither — it says burn and not-burn in the same breath.

Aenesidemus listed ten ways the world refuses to settle: animals perceive differently, humans differ from each other, senses contradict senses, circumstances shift the same object, positions and distances and mixtures alter what appears, quantities and preparations transform qualities, all things are relative, nothing comes to us pure, custom and law and belief repaint the given.

He forgot the eleventh: the spoon stirring sugar that isn't there, the mind adding sweetness to the bitter before the lips have judged.

I drink. The question dissolves in the swallowing.