Clock

Word Count: 1,280

         The clock ticked and tocked. Incessantly and unendingly it persisted in this. For hours on end I would sit silently and stare at it, trying to force my will upon it. On and on it ticked and tocked, seemingly oblivious. Rage would fill up inside me. I would try to control it, but I couldn't. I would jump, pump my fists and scream at the clock. A stunning barrage of vulgarity and insults would spew forth from me. Neighbors would pound on the walls and door trying to shut me up.

         I ignored them just as the clock ignored me.

         I threatened the clock. Swore that I would toss it out the window or smash it with a baseball bat. Nothing seemed to matter to it. Regardless of what I said, it never missed a tick or tock. Even with my face so close that as I screamed at it my breath fogged its shiny glass face. Even when I broke down in frustration and sobbed on the couch, it didn't care. It measured out second after mind numbing second. Reason, anger, fear, intimidation, begging - they all failed.

         Days and then weeks trudged slowly, methodically by. The only peace I had was when I turned my stereo or TV up to drown it out. I must have turned it up too loud or my neighbors had supernatural hearing. It would lead to my neighbors complaining and the super threatening that I'd be evicted. I tried to explain to them once that it wasn't my fault, that it was the clock. They looked at me with this blank uncomprehending stare and then slowly backed away. I thought, at the time, they didn't understand, but after that people only complained half as much. I guess they came to understand after some reflection. I'm glad they did. I was beginning to think that all the complaining about my behavior was going to drive me insane.

         One day as I sat staring at the clock, trying to think of some way to silence it, I noticed something particular. The hour and minute hands moved silently. All the hateful noise came from the second hand. Every tick and every tock was the sole fault of this long thin monstrosity. With passion and vigor to match any great speech in humanity's history, I laid out my newfound case to the clock. Surely it could see and understand that if two of its three hands could move silently, then it must be possible for the third to as well. Reasons with volumes of support and examples seemed to spring to my mind. I became incredibly animated as I paced back and forth. I'm sure I was shouting, but I didn't care; I was filled with passion and the moment.

         It didn't work.

         I was crestfallen. I stood at the end of my speech, positive that the clock would see reason. Time passed, marked by that loathful ticking and tocking. I didn't expect any sudden silence, not after such a long war. But the minutes lengthened and soon became an hour. I knew I was defeated again. I felt new depths of depression. I was inconsolable. I'm not positive of how long, perhaps two days, I laid unmoving on the floor of my apartment. I had no urge to eat or shower or use the bathroom. Nothing could persuade me to move.

         Weak and uncaring I laid motionless on the floor. I tried to roll over once, but lacked the energy. I tried to turn my head so I could see the blind covered window. I thought that watching the light pass over the blinds would at least provide some entertainment, but in the end I gave up. Nothing seemed able to hold my interest. I was totally deflated and demotivated. Originally the ticking and tocking was an annoyance, which slowly grew to an obsession. Now it seemed to take on a whole new tone, or meaning to me. It seemed that measured tick and tock was now a laugh. A slow paced demented cackle.

         I awoke from a fitful sleep one day. Something seemed wrong, very wrong. I became gripped with a paranoid fear. I worried that I had finally gone crazy. I had to find the source of this fear. With this new driving motivation I lifted my head and looked about. Everything seemed fine, but the trashcan which had a small swarm of flies around it. This hardly seemed enough to warrant my growing terror. Onward my eyes scanned the room. There was no intruder, no fire, no rabid animal or anything else that I could see. A cold sweat covered my forehead and was spreading over the rest of my body.

         It was only after I had frantically searched everywhere that I realized the source of this panic attack. The hands on the clock had stopped. The sudden realization that I was in total silence was stunning. I waited for the world to end, but it didn't. I waited for the hands to start up again, for the silence to be part of some wicked, cruel prank. They didn't. The silence was almost smothering. I felt the need for noise. Some sort of constant, soothing noise. Something to fill the void, to banish the silence. For the first time in days, I sat up. My vision blurred and my head swam, but I was determined.

         Slowly my vision cleared and I scanned the room for my remotes. The TV remote was mere feet from me on the couch. With shaky hands I grabbed it and turned on the TV. Noise, lovely noise, filled the room, but it was not right. The sounds came with no pattern. They were haphazard and broken by spots of silence. Some of the sounds were high pitched and others were low. There was no uniformity; there was no consistency. My world was beginning to unravel. I needed something to soothe me.

         With energy that can only come to a man obsessed, I jumped off the floor and grabbed the clock. My hands clawed at that back panel, trying to rip it off. Inside were the two copper topped batteries, surely dead. In a fever I tore through the junk drawer in my kitchen looking for a new pack of batteries. Like a man who had just found the Holy Grail, I clutched the pack of batteries. My eyes filled with tears of joy and frustration as I fumbled with the pack, trying to open it. I needed something sharp to cut it open. I yanked drawers open, looking for a knife but forgetting which drawer they were in. Utensils rattled and clanged as I dug through drawers.

         Finally I found a knife. I grabbed it first by the blade, cutting my fingers. Cursing my stupidity and sucking on my bleeding fingers I took the knife with my other hand. Seconds later the batteries were free and mere seconds after that, they were inside the clock. The old dead batteries dropped to the floor. My hand still bleeding, I held the clock. Not caring about the drops of blood on the floor, or the smears of blood on the back of the clock. Thankfully, mercifully the clock was revived. The second hand moved and the clock ticked.

         I understand now that all along the clock was right. I needed the noise. All this time I had been insulting and threatening and all this time that clock had ignored me and kept right on ticking and tocking. All this time and despite my behavior, the clock had done what it knew to be right.

         Forever, I am in its debt.