Tic, tic, tic. This one felt slow compared to his father’s
watch, whose soft heartbeats soothed him. He had to hide it in a drawer because
of how it bothered him. And now, returning to the quiet glow of the lamp and
drawing his book into lamp, Jessie exhaled, ready to relax. Yet when the
silence settled again, a clockwork call came from the roll-top desk. Tic, tic,
tic.
If he was an ungrateful man, he would have returned it, but
he was happy to have his family and the image of his son’s face when he gave
the gift. No, he simply wished that there were less gifts and less occasions
for gifts. The objects he had chosen to bring into his life were important and
each addition diluted his space. Perhaps this watch was a meaningful gift, but
how could one tell when it seemed to come with the menagerie of ties and mugs
and ceramic bric-a-brack. He was a luddite of a different stripe. A man
simultaneously modern and thoroughly backward looking.
The choice now was to either get up and move the watch
again, hoping that it would be out of range or to simply see if he could let
go, forgive the watch it’s boring insistence. The third option would be to
disbatch the infernal thing, but the rest of the family could be home at any
time and as had been his luck this week, everyone would be piling into the
kitchen the moment that the father’s day present slipped out of his hands and
into the trash, or, as was his impulse, smashing it with a hammer. He slipped
into these slight moral quandaries so easily these days.
Instead he chose a fourth option, surprising even himself.
He let his book fall shut without a marker, turned off the lamp he had received
on his wedding day, and walked out the front door leaving no note and having no
way to keep track of the time.
