A Slanted Lattice

I set my milk bottle down upon the painted sill beneath the bay window. Three seconds of silent observation. Suspended beside the glass hung a dual-string wand mechanism controlling the Venetian blind slats. With deliberate precision, I reached forward and pinched the lower plastic toggle between two fingers. Downward tension applied. A soft, sequential clatter echoed as thirty-two horizontal wood slats pivoted in unison, shifting forty-five degrees. Sunlight instantly fractured across the sill, casting an alternating grid of pale amber bars over my knuckles and the milk bottle.