Russian short story about an object you can only remember when looking at it

[SVM]

I’ve been looking for this story for nearly a decade. In college, a friend of mine shared some stories from a 20th century Russian lit class with me. One was “Walls and Shadows” by Sologub; the other is the one this post is about.

Here is what I remember about the plot of the story: two peasants—a man and his wife, I believe—obtain some kind of mundane, domestic object. I want to say it’s something like a salt shaker and made out of wood. This object has some weird mimetic quality that makes you forget it exists when you are not looking at it. The couple repeatedly “discover” the object with increasing surprise and alarm each time. This is the gist of the story. I don’t recall it being very long.

I’m fairly certain this is just a short story and not an excerpt from a longer work and from the 20th century (possibly 19th but likely not further back than that). I asked this same friend about it a few years ago and he had no idea what I was talking about. I have emailed the relevant faculty. I have asked just about everyone I know who knows anything about Russian lit. I have poured through many anthologies and short story collections, particularly those I know were on the course syllabus. Nothing.

Maybe I am misremembering something crucial and it has prevented me from finding this story all this time. This is my White Whale. Every few months I get obsessed with finding it to no avail. Does anyone know ANYTHING that might help me find this story???