Every spring, Walter noticed it again. Just slightly taller. Slightly wider. Marie teased him gently, calling it his “annual obsession,” but Walter couldn’t shake the sense that something about it was different each year, as though it kept pushing upward on purpose.
Some years, the change was barely noticeable—a few extra inches, perhaps. Enough to make him tilt his head, but not enough to justify digging again. Other years, however, the mound seemed unmistakably larger, rising with the thaw like something stretching beneath blankets.