Tick

1000 words

Tick

There’s always a clock, solemnly clicking on to your death in the branches of a dead oak tree.

You search for the clock in this endless misty land, the clock that drills into your head with every click. It’s in a different place every time. It comes at 5:07, the only constant here.

A thick atmosphere drags at your body. Abandoned buildings tower around you. Cars sit in orderly lines in the traffic circle and it rains from a blue sky and bird-shaped shadows swoop around you. The rain changes to papers falling straight from the sky like rocks.

A statue stands at the corner of the plaza, barring your way. It’s covered in a stack of papers.

You avoid it.

           

Following the road the other way, you look over your shoulder. The statue stands there looking at you--a pudgy, soft teddy bear, striped in brilliant colors, smiling a little. Its eyes are giant and vacant and they stare different directions. It was not there when you walked down the road.

You dodge through perfect, rigid rows of dead cars, your feet shuffling through piles of medical charts. Maybe inside the hospital that looms ahead you can escape the paper rain.

           

Inside, you trip over an extension cord. Beeping surrounds you, pressing on your body. The statue is sitting on a chair in the corner. It’s holding a digital clock that reads 4:51. You think the statue’s eyes move, but you can never be sure.

The hidden clock ticks. Tick. Tock.

A doctor approaches the bed in the middle of the room. He is a tall man and he holds a clipboard with more medical papers. He leans over the bed and speaks to the person on it. Then he looks at you and holds out the clipboard. You cannot see his face.

For a moment, you stand still. Two, three, four breaths. You listen to your gut, deep inside--the voice that says you’ve done this all before.

You reach out and take the clipboard, your hands shaking. You look down at the scrawl, listen to the doctor’s voice, but you can’t make out any words, written or spoken.

You don’t need to. He’s telling you the cancer has spread. He’s telling you she has two weeks to live.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, the doctor chants.

           

You drop the clipboard. The words are like a weight on your shoulders, pulling you down, and you slump forward, grabbing the edges of the bed for support, your eyes closed. The metal rail is thin and hard under your palms. There is not enough air in the room.

Something compels you to open your eyes. You know what will be there, but you can’t avoid it. So you try not to look for too long. She died with her eyes open and no one has closed them yet.

The statue stands by the door, the only way out. You make eye contact and something jolts in your gut. You leave by the other door. Halfway down the corridor, you realize you are still holding the clipboard, but do not stop.

A heavy metal-and-glass door leads to a forest. Here, the ticking of the clock fills reality to bursting. You still have the clipboard in your hands, covered in charts and red lines that fill your head.

The clock is close, and it is closer. You can sense its footsteps behind you.

It already came, you tell yourself. For her. Not for you. For some reason, your insides still quiver.

You find the clock, nestled in the branches of an oak tree with ancient, gnarled roots that cling to the side of a crumbling cliff. The clock hangs suspended over the drop.

The clipboard gets in your way as you start to climb, maddened by the constant ticking. You drop it and try not to watch it as it disappears.

If you look back, the statue will stop moving. You don’t want to see it changing places without moving. You don’t look.

The branches end. Beyond you, they stretch brittle twigs over the abyss. The wind rocks you up and down in thin air. You reach for the clock and brush it with your fingertips as the second hand clicks over. 5:00.

The steady ticking that has haunted you all day stops. Branches creak, the only sound as you sway up and down. Your gut clenches so tightly you have to grab a spray of twigs to stay balanced.

           

It’s there. The statue. You edge away as it begins to climb. It’s covered in copies of the chart that told you your wife had two weeks to live. It scoots up the trunk of the tree toward you in dead silence, its eyes pointed different directions. Medical forms--death certificates--swirl around you.

You scoot farther back, ignoring the crackle of smaller branches as much as you can. The branch can’t hold you much farther.

The branch barely sways as the statue approaches. You can hardly see the statue through the storm of death certificates floating like giant snowflakes around your head. Thick, unreasoning panic settles into your stomach.

You know it’s going to happen, but when the statue’s head thrusts between the papers, so close you could feel its breath, if it were breathing, you scream. The twigs give under your weight and you fall. Time seems to stretch out and the whole motion is centered in your gut, stretching it, twisting it, as you scream without making a sound at the silent statue head looking down, watching you fall through a sea of death certificates. You wonder if you will ever hit the bottom.

Everything goes black. In the blackness, something tugs at you, calling your name, and you wonder if you will wake up.

You wake up in the middle of a city. Empty cars line the pavement in orderly rows. From all around you echoes the ticking of a clock, counting down to 5:07.

Tick.

Tock.