Extrasystoles

There is this moment when your heart loses its rhythm. One beat too many, a stumble, a brief pause — and then it beats on as if nothing had happened. Medically this is called an extrasystole: an additional heartbeat that pushes itself between the regular ones. Mostly harmless, say the cardiologists. No cause for concern.

And yet you feel it. That flutter in the chest, that brief hesitation of the organ that must never stop beating. It feels like an error in the system — like a motor that stutters briefly. And that is precisely where the deeper question begins: why does a heart stumble when it is organically healthy? Why does the most reliable rhythm in your body falter?