a story by Andrew N.
I imagine the ticking of a clock, the little hand stuck forever at the seven; the right hand somehow working regardless. The clock still keeps track minute by minute, but the hour is stuck on this clock, to this wall, almost as if the building itself was trapped at seven o’clock. I find it odd that I obsess over the clock on the old elementary school. The building is decayed, the walls filled with rot and asbestos, the voices that visited these hallways escaped from the world, not trapped with the seven. I imagine the voices floating throughout the solar system, exploring the stars in ways I cannot imagine, and I begin to walk away from the drought of a school. The sidewalk is cracked and filled with the blossoming of plants. They will be gone soon, cleaned up by the local workers. They don’t despise nature; they just have to keep it out off the area, away from anyone in a city. Nature doesn’t belong here.
It haunts me.
The ticking of the clock that I imagine eats away at me every night. I see it in my dreams, the hands floating in front of me, and all I can do is watch and wait, but nothing ever comes or changes. It’s the same hour over and over to me, even though the world turns on. The lights flash, and the computer screens buzz, and I sit watching the clock’s motions with such dedication. Every night, the dream becomes lucid, and time stops. The clock refuses to move anymore and I am trapped in my mind, something I didn’t think was really possible.
The clock sits on the wall of the school, and I sit in front on the sidewalk. Criss cross apple sauce. When time stops, I try everything to avoid it. I try to reach towards the ends of the universe, like the voices that I so constantly obsess over. But all of them have disappeared. One travelled to the sun and began to sit for 1000 years hoping to find the pleasure in the pain that Buddhists dream of.
Four split ways, speeding off in opposite directions, to find what the universe may hold. Each a howl, a scream, a yell, a groan. They never look back, because a voice can’t look back when its eyes were left behind in a classroom. One dug to the bottom of the earth, hoping to find treasure she had read about in the ‘old’ books. Pirates and boys who sailed the seven seas leaving behind secrets, only ones which could only be wanted by a voice. The last sits on the edge of time, holding the hand: holding back any movement, giving herself justice and control. giving what she wants to give when she feels like it. It is passive and unforgiving. I sit on the sidewalk and I see the world move, the sun shine, the cracks in the ground deepen, the lights flash above my head, an eclipse, and the wall crumbling down brick by brick.
Criss cross apple sauce; bleu, vert, jaune, rouge orange et blanc; toothpaste, turtle, common, galaxy, princess, steely and cat’s eye. The left hand seems to wretch forward towards the 8, but I know it’s my imagination. Miss Suzy had a steamboat, the steamboat had a bell (ding! ding!) Miss Suzy went to heaven, the steamboat went to- hello operator please give me number 8, If you disconnect me I’ll just die of hate-
It must be itching forward because the feeling is something I have never felt. I imagine the future, the possibilities, and how time seems to feel real for once. The sun is still gone, but I don’t mind. The sky lights speed up, each a new line of white flutters, and as captivating as it could be, the clock was moving. The grown moaned to me and began to whimper, but the clock was moving.
With the little hand a millimetre away, I felt like a child again in grade seven on the last day of class, waiting for the hand to hit, and for class to be out. But this was different. I was old now, and I was covered with white hairs, etched into my body; overflowing and mixing into the ground. I am a colossus of time. The white lights approach me: four of them. The ground breaks open and gold overflows. The sun crashes towards the earth and time moves. The clock moves to strike eight but never does. The world looks around at me, and I mumble out, but it’s no use. I awake, sweating and mortified. I curl up into a ball, and imagine hopscotch and children. Voices flying through the sky, and one day joining them. I feel faint, but it doesn’t matter. The clock will never strike eight.
