A Gift

I remember it now, so many years later, coming back to this very place I’d once set foot on as a young man…

A soft April evening was filled with clusters of pillar grey clouds that danced right above the vacant street lights. Bleak beige condos and side street stores connected for miles like a long train railway. Pedestrians from all walks of life were ready to return to their cozy homes for the new day to begin again. I trudged home silently with the setting sun walking beside me to keep company.

This feeling I had inside was unfamiliar as I did not know what it was… For me my life was absent of what it meant to truly live, mundane and empty at its root. Lost at a spiral’s end. It took me thirty minutes to walk from home to work and today was no exception. And every night I would always pass a certain convenience store along the cobblestone sidewalk on my way home. It was just around a small street corner right next to the bakery. On the outside, it didn’t look like much with the orange lights flickering dimly on the watches, dark and mellow in muted color. I had never been inside the store before. Hesitantly I crept inside, leaving the brown wooden door frame wide open. Watches of all shapes and sizes were displayed brilliantly on the metal framework that rested neatly in their designated place. The interior of the small store seemed humble in size. I leaned against the glass counter, admiring the presence of it all. Suddenly I saw what appeared to be a young woman of twenty-one who was kneeling down on her knees, cleaning an old vintage watch with a dirty yellow rag. She wasn’t beautiful by social standards, but her face said it all. She had a small dainty figure, big bright eyes that shone, and full red lips that were soothing to taste as if you were picking off a ripe juicy watermelon from its roots. The watch that she was holding was unique in size and color compared to all the other watches in the whole room. It had a silver metal buckle frame; circular, white, and well polished in sturdy condition. Along with it was a beautiful black leather strap that was glued to the lug. Her dark brown hair swayed when she darted sideways to my direction.

“Hello, how may I help you?” She asked curiously, rising upward within my reach in seconds. I waved my hand a patient no.

“No, I was just heading home as usual and I always pass this store. I’ve never been inside and I noticed the lights are always on so I wanted to take a look.” I answered calmly.

“Your first time then?”

“Yes”

I swirled around the vacant room to each individual piece of antiquity, examining intently at one every twenty seconds as I went along. She continued to wipe the black leather strap meticulously.

The awkward silence started to kick in, my mouth struggling to decide what to say next.

“Do you have a lot of customers here?”

“No, not that much. Everyday is usually a slow day. Some people come and go. They mostly just buy them because it looks nice. Others buy it because of practicality.” She replied coolly, blowing a strand of hair off her face.

“This is a really nice shop. Who owns the place?” I asked, waiting for her reply.

“It’s just me who runs the store now. Well- it belonged to my grandfather.”

“Your grandfather has a very nice store…” I formed a wide smile.

“Why, thank you”, the young woman replied with deep gratitude followed by a genuine cheerfulness, leaving her bare throat a little dry below a thin layer of insecurity.

“Just you and your grandfather?”

“Yes, just me and him...” She replied.

I pondered about what to say next but decided to change the overwhelming subject to something more suitable.

“I admire your store very much... how your store is connected to the sea…” I pulled my eyes ever so slightly away from her, my eyes surging with hers.

I averted my gaze to a distant watch hung on the wall next to me.

“No, That’s alright. Actually, being here reminds me of him.” She said. Her face turned sideways, as if recalling a recollection of melancholic memories she had spent half her childhood with, while biting hard on her lower lip; little drops of blood began to leak from her cracked lips, and her eyes kept darting back and forth.

My heart screamed at me to comfort her, to hold her arms in her lonely sorrow, just like I felt earlier and now at that very moment. Tick, Tick, Tick. Each tick filled another tick. My heart beat with each tick that moved with the clock. Until finally I mustered up enough courage to ask her that very question.

The young woman quickly wiped her lips with a small felt cloth, cleared her throat, and cheerfully asked an unnecessary question.

“Is that the watch you would like to buy, sir?” Her index finger pointed at the watch on the wall I noticed earlier.

“No ma’am…” I said.

“How did he pass away, if you don’t mind me asking?...”

...

She stood still for a while, staring intensely at the watch she was holding next to her hand. I was uncertain as to how long, accompanied by the track of time, but it seemed like an eternity; like time itself was answering her question to penetrate the empty void that was separating between her and I. An empty sigh of defeat.

“He died from cancer…. He was a heavy drinker. He had a lot of debts to pay back from different people he owed money to. And in the end, he couldn’t take it anymore.”

“Have you decided on selling it by any chance? I mean why continue to sell watches when there’s barely any customers? What I’m trying to say is, wouldn’t it be better if you sell the place and live a better life besides here?” I asked wholeheartedly, focusing my narrow vision towards hers.

The young woman stopped what she was doing and rose to my level. Staring at me with those trembling doey brown eyes, she began to speak.

“There’s something special about watches. Not because it looks aesthetic or anything, but just the fact that we have a certain amount of minutes and hours in a day. All a watch does is point out how much time we have left before the day ends. Life revolves like a clock with a beginning and an end, changing people in the end. And I think there’s a meaning behind that.” She said. She continued, “And everyday as I’m taking care of these watches, I can feel his presence speaking to me, through his spirit, telling me to keep living life with value, just like these watches that tell time…” A slight pause. “Sometimes, you have to know when to stop, when to tell yourself'’I've reached the limit.’ ”
I was startled by her long answer. This young woman had something that I lacked. A quality that none of my friends and co-workers had at the factory I slaved away at work. She had an unusual way of living life, unnoticed by anyone else but her alone, like a massive pile of trash you had to dig through until you found that one piece you’ve spent so much time searching for. I longed for that quiet serenity she had, a quiet strength.

“What do you mean reach the limit?” I asked with my matter-of-fact response.
Her eyes began to tear up like a faucet as we stood gazing at the falling stars behind through the transparent window. She quickly wiped them away with one quick motion from her pale white hands.

“Are you alright?” I quickly realized what I’ve done, my mouth pouring with unbearable longing to say more than a couple words of false sympathy. I wanted to open my arms to wrap her behind my arms so tightly against her small back, to speak to her with my mind that everything was going to be alright.

“You should leave... The store’s about to close soon, and I need to clean up anyways.” She quivered silently, turning her back, revealing fresh purple bumps that ran past her visible flesh.

My eyebrows knit closely together at the sight of the view as my eyes turned to the ground in shame, but before I was about to exit the door, she stopped me.

“Here, I’d like you to have this, as a gift…”
She poured out her hand and showed it to me. It was the very same watch she was cleaning earlier before. I received the watch she gave me. “Thank you, but why?” I wondered.

She spoke. “Because there’s something about you that sets you apart from most of the customers I’ve talked to. Maybe because your eyes have a sort of gentleness you have for others. I feel as if we connect somehow, looking for the same meaning, just in different ways.”
I turned around to look at her, this time transfixing my face with hers.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“My name’s Alice”, she said half cheerfully, half sad.

“My name’s Ha-joon… It was nice meeting you Alice.”

“It was nice meeting you too Ha-joon….”

“I’d like to come back next time and talk more with you if that’s alright” I asked willingly, hoping for some kind of response.

“I’d love to…”

I nodded slightly at her and left the store.

But we never did. The next morning a nearby pedestrian happened to notice a shadowy figure hanging down by a rope strung on the ceiling of a certain watch shop, just around the corner of the bakery. Police officials ruled it out as a suicide. Rumor had it her store was about to be foreclosed because of the debts her grandfather couldn’t pay for so many years. No one had suspected his only granddaughter to take her life away at such a young tender age. It was eventually boarded up and sold off to an auction for an unreasonable price, never to be used again. The debt collectors who came by the store every week threatened to shut down her store in furious rage.
Sometimes I wonder what I would have done to help her. The fact was she was free of her suffering, leaping to another dimension that is out of this world, where time didn’t exist. Looking back, wearing the gift she gave me, I think about that day I entered her store and had that quiet conversation with her; two strangers meeting out of the blue as fate drew us together even if it was only for a short time.