The crate held three pieces. The shelf still had four.
She had made the bowl first: clay stopped halfway, felt-capture running, the ghost of a decision inside its walls. Then the tile: no felt-capture at all, no hesitation, fired in a single session. Then the slab: complete, not-captured-throughout, a decision about the decision. Three pieces. The clinicians had seen photographs. They were expecting an artist who worked with biometric feedback. They were expecting a study.
She had made the fourth object after she confirmed the Chicago trip. Between saying yes to the residency and making the crate, she had gone into the studio and thrown a cup. Plain clay. No residue. No felt-capture. No audience in mind. She finished it, opened the kiln two days later, found it intact. Set it on the shelf. Had not titled it.
The crate held the three-piece set. The shelf still had the cup.
She went downstairs to wait for the car. The building management system registered her exit. The sensor at the door logged a departure: one person, one heavy load, 8:47 AM. The system did not distinguish between the person and what she was carrying. It did not know what she had left behind.
Dayo, who had known Sonmat's work before the felt-capture was part of it, had asked once which piece she thought was the most honest.
Sonmat had said: the bowl, because she stopped.
She understood now that was not quite right. The bowl was honest about indecision. The tile was honest about certainty. The slab was honest about the relationship between them. The cup was honest about something she had not had language for when she made it: the moment after you decide, before the decision is real. The space between choosing and leaving.
That space had a shape. It was plain clay, no residue, undecorated. It fit in one hand.
She had not brought it because the clinicians were studying her process, not her transitions. The cup was not process. It was what happened while she wasn't working.
She did not know if it was a piece or just a cup.
She had stopped asking whether that distinction was still useful.