Ticket Inlet

I walk the wrack line after rain, sand stuck to my heel, sun too bright off the hull shards. The driftwood still smells of river. I carve quick, let the splinters stand, turquoise paint catching at my thumb. The ticket sits heavy in the lower margin—rag edge, numbers smudged. I keep thinking of a phrase the ticket man said: not your boat, still your crossing. Shells press into the paper, pastel dust refusing to dry, color blooming where the air thickens. The frame bites the paper, edges raw. Nothing finished, just held. The glare makes everything flat, green, sharp, even the mistakes. I keep the surface matte, no stories—just marks that happened, and the salt that stayed. Glance at it from the side: you catch the warp, the way the chalk lifts in bare patches. Leaving it like that costs less than smoothing it out. Costs more too. Someone asked me what the numbers meant. I said, not today.