The Clockmaker’s Exit
I watched him arrive at half-past never, in a hat too tall and shoes too loud, carrying a suitcase made of cloud, and a sigh that smelled of cinnamon and leather.
The town, all crooked chimneys and cobblestones, had never seen a man quite so unsure. He paused before the shop with the amber door— “The Time-Turner’s Trade,” a sign in cursive atones.
He stepped inside. The bell rang twice, though no one pulled the string. And from the shadows, the clockmaker emerged, fingers dripping stardust, eyes like broken springs.
“I’ll trade you,” said the stranger, voice feather-soft, “five years of rain for one day of sun. Or my left laugh for a right-hand gun that shoots only answers, never aloft.”
The clockmaker blinked, adjusted a pocket watch that ticked backwards and hatched tiny moths. “A bold barter,” he mused, “but not quite the cost. You’re trading time, sir, but time’s not what’s lost.”
They haggled in riddles and metaphors neat, over teas that changed flavor with every sip— first joy, then regret, then a childhood trip to a seaside town that never had feet.
And finally—handshake sealed with a spark— the deal was done. The stranger left pale, his suitcase now heavy, his shadow in jail, dragging behind him like a sinking bark.
But halfway down the cobbled decline, he paused. A pigeon wearing spectacles dropped a crumb that whispered, It’s not too late, you see— you can walk back in. The door won’t be locked. For free.
He turned. And oh, the whimsy of it! The amber door stood open, yawning wide, and inside, clocks dissolved into tide, and time unspooled like a tangled kite.
He stepped across the sill—just one step— and the clockmaker smiled, not unkind: “You’ve chosen to undo what was signed. Curious. Most stay bound by their regret.”
The suitcase burst into wrens mid-air. His shoes sprouted wings and flew south. The hat tipped low, confessed aloud: “I was never meant for this, I swear.”
And the clockmaker handed him back his laugh, still warm, still slightly cracked at the seams, and a key made of moonlight, which gleamed with the softest of what ifs, like a photograph.
No charge, no scolding, no cosmic debt. “Just remember,” the clockmaker said with a wink, “the bravest part of any wrong blink is turning back before you’re truly in it.”
I still see him sometimes, sipping tea at the edge of dawn, where seconds nap, reading a book with no beginning or map, smiling at pigeons who quote Voltaire.
And when the wind hums the right old tune, you might hear his whisper, light as a feather: You know when you’ve stepped into weather that wasn’t meant for you—just look for the moon.
For the door is always ajar, you see, for those who pause, and turn, and leave.
Thank You fo Read
Deborah C. Langley
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