She packed the key, her phone, and a change of clothes. On her way out, she checked the shipping log she’d photocopied from the warehouse. Twenty-seven tracks in North America had received polytrack from the Rotterdam facility in the past eighteen months. Twenty-seven ovals of grey composite, laid down over dirt and stone, absorbing the thunder of hooves.
The key in her pocket grew hot. Not warm—hot. She held it up to the streetlight. The brass had begun to soften, reshaping itself into a different form. Not a key anymore. A bit. The metal piece of a bridle, meant to go inside a horse’s mouth. polytrack imports
Within an hour, her account was locked. Within two, her landlord called to say the apartment above the laundromat had a gas leak and she needed to vacate immediately. There was no gas leak. She could smell it. She packed the key, her phone, and a change of clothes
She pulled her hand back. Her palm was clean, no residue. But the warmth lingered, climbing up her wrist, her forearm, settling somewhere behind her sternum. Twenty-seven ovals of grey composite, laid down over
Some of those horses, the exercise riders said, had started acting strange. Staring at nothing. Refusing to leave the track at night. And if you put your ear to the polytrack after a rain, just as the last light faded, you could hear it.