darker_london | Time's an illusion

The old walnut grandfather clock in the hallway wouldn't keep proper time.

Nia had changed the batteries in it three times, the last time even buying a brand new pack to make sure that wasn't it. But it wasn't. The batteries worked fine in the alarm clock beside her bed.

From the internet she learned how to open up the beautiful face (carefully putting aside the screws so she wouldn't lose where they each came from) and to tighten and re-hang the pendulum. But within two days the clock had lost time again.

She tightened the arms, and then two weeks later loosened the arms instead. After more research online she found that it might have been the weight of the arms and so she ordered a new set with her dad's credit card, and when they arrived she set them in place. The clock was an antique, brought over from her grandparent's place in Wales, and it seemed weird that its own hands should have become too heavy for it.

The new hands didn't help. The clock lost time.

Nia frowned at it, tapping on the reset glass face. There are ghosts in this house, Nia thought, and it's killing time.

(Before Jo, had this clock worked right? No, Nia would have noticed if it had been so wrong for that long. The broken clock was recent and so Nia couldn't blame death, not this time.)

"Are you still fiddling with that thing?"

The voice came as surprise and Nia turned, a little startled, to find her father watching her. It was the first time he'd spoken to her in eleven days.

"I don't think I can fix it," Nia admitted.

Michael looked past her and at the clock. He watched the hands moving for a long time before finally settling back on her. "Doesn't really matter. Just a clock. We'll get a new one."

"But this was Mamgu and Tadcu's clock," Nia said with sudden vehemence. "It's special!"

"It's just a clock, Ni."

"It's not, it's more, it's better." It was the clock that used to sit here at the end of the hall and chime properly back when they'd been a proper family, when no one had been dead and everyone talked. Nia just wanted the clock to work again, not because it could bring anyone back but because it felt important and beautiful and Nia needed that. (Serena was having one of her off weeks, and Nia had barely seen her mother at all. She was sleeping or hiding or crying - wherever she was, she wasn't near Nia. The house was too too big and Serena could disappear into it when she really wanted to. Sometimes Nia worried she'd somehow never see her again.)

Michael left. Because he didn't care about an old clock. It wasn't even from his parents; it was not from Grandma Emma and Grandpa Evan whom Nia still saw every Christmas and Easter and at church when they remembered to go. It was from Serena's parents, Mamgu Ffion and Tadcu Rhys, who died before Nia and Jo were even born. Serena used to talk about them enough when Nia was small that she almost felt like she knew them. They seemed more interesting and fun and kind than Emma and Evan, who were strict and smelled weird and had a house full of things she wasn't allowed to touch. Dead grandparents were maybe just more fascinating and accessible than live ones.

On the side of the clock, more than halfway down, there was a dark green mark on the wood. You could only see it if you leaned in close, and by now it was so old than it was just a smudge. Ten years ago it had been more clear - a little smiling frog with the words GREAT JOB! written above it. A stamp Jo had gotten from the store and proceeded to stamp half the house with. The stamp had soon been thrown away and they'd both been in trouble. Serena and Michael had been fairly sure it was Nia's idea and Nia's influence, something which Nia found supremely unfair.

But that little green mark remained, and no amount of polish had buffed it out. It was part of the clock now. GREAT JOB, said the clock, and Nia accepted the praise, because at least she'd tried.

In the night, while Nia slept, the clock stopped ticking for the last time. Nia didn't try to bring it back.