The Home for Wayward Clocks (20 page)

Pulling away, James took his pajama sleeve and polished the oily spot from the clock’s case, the spot left there by his own skin. He didn’t want his own body to ruin the patina.

Standing and putting his fingers on the light switch, James remembered Cooley’s words on the notebook paper. She asked if the cat clock hung in the same room as the dwarf tall clock.

She said dwarf tall clock. Not grandmother. James blinked. The words were still on the notebook paper upstairs. He could check and make sure she really used the right term.

Hitting the light, the darkness fell all around. James waited for his eyes to adjust. He always believed he could find his way around the Home blindfolded, just by following and recognizing all the different ticks and chimes. Now, he didn’t know if he could find his own room in the dark.

“Goodnight, friends,” James said out loud, hoping the clocks heard. Wishing he could hear his own voice.

I
n his sleep, James could still hear. He burrowed in deeper, listening to the ticking, the chimes, all the wonderful noise echoing throughout the Home. Everything was dark and it didn’t matter that he couldn’t see; he could hear. The ticking seemed continuous, all those clocks moving at different speeds, but then they began to stop. One by one, James heard clocks drop off and he scrambled to catch up with them, to find them again. The sounds grew fainter and fainter and then there was just one clock, one simple rhythm, ticktock, tick-tock, and he tried to catch it, he tried to press his ear to it, he felt himself growing thinner and thinner, fainter and fainter with the beat. “Mama!” he yelled. “Mama!” And then the sound left him alone, he couldn’t find it, no matter how he turned his head, and his heart slowed and stopped. And he died.

James woke up, the side of his face pressed into the pillow, his cheeks damp and his pajamas soaked with sweat. Turning on the light, he looked at the clocks, trying to hear through his sight, trying to imagine the sound as their pendulums moved back and forth and round and round. He had to hear! Staggering around the room, James stopped in front of one clock and then another, pressing his ears to their bodies, but nothing came through.

Falling to his knees by the bedside table, James looked at his mother’s anniversary clock. The dancing couples spun around and around, going forward, moving back, every fifteen seconds, and he tried to hear the soft ticking that followed him all his life, the ticking he used to listen to while his mother and his father fought, while she screamed and he whispered, until he left for good and then she left and came back, left and came back. James took the glass dome off the clock, exposing the dancers to air, and they seemed to twirl faster, and he asked them, out loud, he begged them, “Please be noisy! Please stomp your feet! Let me hear you!”

And they looked at James and twirled, but there was still no sound. He saw the gilded hands meet on the three, it was three-fifteen in the morning, and he pressed his ear to the clock’s base where he knew the music mechanism lay hidden, and he listened for the quarter-hour chime, the first part of the four-part Westminster, short and sweet, and there was nothing. The cold golden base vibrated against his skin, but there just was no sound. No sound at all.

James lunged to his feet and tripped over the blanket, hanging loose off the bed, and the glass dome flew from his hands and smashed on the floor. James saw the shards and pieces, the millions of sparkly-sharp shards and pieces, and he wanted to cry out, “Mama, I’m sorry!” because he knew she’d be angry, he wasn’t supposed to play with her things, and he knew the belt would be coming, and the leash, the cage, the root cellar, and he had to hide the glass pieces, hide them before she came, even though she wouldn’t be coming, he knew that, she was dead, but suddenly, it seemed as if she was right around the corner, leash in hand. The leash he hadn’t seen in years, but felt every day, tugs here and there, just the way an amputee feels his missing leg. Scooping up the pieces of glass in his hands, he felt himself cry out, felt his chest constrict and his throat tighten, when his fingers and palms were sliced, and he dropped everything back to the floor, saw the glass explode even smaller, but he heard nothing.

James had to hear. He needed that steady rhythm, everything was going haywire, he had to hear! He ran through the broken glass and down the stairs into the kitchen. Digging through the silverware drawer, James picked a long, slim knife, one he thought would slip through the passages in his ears and pop whatever was there, lance whatever was swollen, and allow the sounds in. Standing straight, he put the knife point to his right ear and felt it, shiny-sharp, against his skin.

And he saw it. His reflection was in the kitchen window, he stood there with his hair straight up and a knife to his head, and he shuddered. He shuddered until he folded in half and dropped the knife to the floor.

It was insanity. It was insanity and James knew it and he didn’t know who to call. There was no one to call. There was no one. And even if there was, he would never hear them.

There was blood everywhere. Dripping from his hands and his bare feet. There was a red trail across the kitchen floor and James knew it led all the way back up to his bedroom. A wave of nausea hit and he straightened and vomited into the kitchen sink. He felt the heaves, felt his body convulse and bend, felt even his bleeding toes curl, and yet he couldn’t hear a sound. And James knew there were terrible, awful sounds coming from his stomach, through his throat, out his mouth.

Everything was such a mess and James couldn’t keep it like that. Peace had to be restored, everything needed to be in its place. Clean and shiny. He rinsed his mouth and got out the bucket and sponge and a cleanser. Getting down on his knees, James plunged his hands into the soapy water. The cleanser bit deep into the gashes and he thought he felt his skin peel back. But he gritted his teeth and set to scrubbing. This had to be cleaned up before anyone saw it. Before Mama saw it. Anything was better than the root cellar.

James made it as far as the bottom of the stairs. It was so hard to scrub the carpeting. Looking back, he saw that his bleeding feet were leaving a new path where he washed the old one away. His hands were burning. It was hopeless.

Dropping the sponge into the bucket, James crawled into the living room. After turning on the light, he climbed into his recliner. At least he could see the pendulums from there. He could watch the rhythm. Trying to quiet his body, James focused as hard as he could. He stared and stared, trying to sleep with his eyes open, and after awhile, he was able to see the clocks behind his closed eyelids. He could see them and he was able to sleep.

D
r. Owen and Neal broke the door down the next morning. James didn’t hear it, he was still asleep in the recliner. He woke up to find them shaking him, Neal wide-eyed and flushed, Dr. Owen checking James’ pulse. The door lay on the floor, completely off its hinges.

James could see their mouths moving, it looked like Neal was yelling, but James shook his head and tried to get up. That’s when he saw his hands, raw and shredded from the night before. Dr. Owen pushed James back into the chair while Neal disappeared. He came back with the notebook. Quickly, he wrote something and handed it to James.

“What happened? The door was locked and we looked in the window and saw blood so we broke our way in.”

James cleared his throat and tried his voice. “I broke a dome from one of my anniversary clocks. I cut myself trying to clean it up.”

Dr. Owen said something and Neal scribbled. “Why are your hands so red?”

“I tried to wash the floors.” James indicated the hallway, the last place he saw the rags and bucket. Neal looked around the corner, nodded and said something.

Dr. Owen pulled James to his feet. James followed both the doctor and Neal upstairs, picking their way around the glass, and then he sat on the bed. The room was a mess. Dr. Owen went into the bathroom and began running a bath while Neal stood there, his hand on James’ shoulder. Then Dr. Owen took over the notebook.

“Go soak,” he wrote. “Use lots of soap. When you come out, I need to look at your hands and feet, make sure there aren’t still glass slivers. Then I’ll bandage you up. I want to look at your ears too.”

James sighed and went into the bathroom. He couldn’t deny that his hands and feet hurt. They burned. And he needed Dr. Owen to look at his ears. There was nothing to do but obey. James shut the bathroom door, undressed, and sat in the tub.

The warm water seemed to help. He kept his hands and feet submerged as much as possible. He tried to relax, but he kept wondering what they were doing out there. He didn’t want them to touch anything.

James washed his hair as best he could in a tub; he really preferred showers. Standing, he decided to turn on the shower to rinse off, so he shut the curtain. The warm water hitting his back and shoulders felt wonderful. Then there was a draft and when James turned, Neal was there, his eyes hard. James yelped and quickly covered himself. “What are you doing?” he asked. “Can’t you let me just take a shower?”

Neal’s eyes dropped to James’ hands, then he nodded and backed away. James watched through the curtain, making sure Neal left the bathroom completely. Then he looked down at his own hands, trying to see what Neal saw, what he was looking for. It took a moment, but as James thought about last night, about how things must look, he was able to put it together.

They thought he tried to kill himself. The knife in the kitchen, the blood, the marks on his body, particularly his hands. Too close to the wrists? Then James looked at his feet and sighed. Did they really think he was the kind of person who would attempt suicide by slicing his feet and palms, rather than his wrists?

James began to laugh, but then he stopped. If they thought he was nuts, giggling in the shower wouldn’t help.

When he got out, there was a fresh set of pajamas waiting on the lowered toilet lid. Someone must have come in again; James never heard the door.

And they must have looked through his drawers for the pajamas. James shook while he got dressed. He decided to get rid of everybody and then change into regular clothes. There were things that needed doing and he wasn’t about to stay in his pajamas.

The bedroom was completely straightened. The glass was gone, the carpet soft and clean, and the dancers from his mother’s anniversary clock still twirled, though they were exposed in the air. Ione was there now and she motioned to the bed. It had fresh sheets and was turned down, waiting. James grunted and climbed in. Anything to make them go away.

Before he could pull the covers up, the doctor sat down and took James’ feet in his hands. He held up a bottle and a tube, the labels turned toward James so he could read them. Alcohol and an antibiotic ointment. James winced; it was going to hurt. And it did. The doctor prodded at James’ feet for what seemed like hours. Then he smoothed on the ointment and wrapped both feet up in bandages. James wondered if he’d be able to get his shoes on. Then the doctor repeated the whole thing with James’ hands. With all the bandages, James’ fingers were barely able to move.

Next came the ears. James held still, even stopped breathing. He hoped the scope the doctor poked inside would somehow burst the bubble that was between James and hearing. He thought he heard a scraping, but it was so far away, he wasn’t sure if he really heard it or if he only felt it. Finally, Dr. Owen fluffed the pillow, placed it between James and the headboard and pushed James back. He covered James, carefully tucking in the blankets. Then he grabbed the notebook. It seemed like he wrote forever. Dr. Owen was always long in talking. He said he wanted to get the most out of his education and so he showed it off all he could. James wasn’t surprised when he wrote as much as he talked.

“James,” he started. The entry in the notebook looked like a business letter, complete with paragraphs. “You really made a mess out of your feet and hands. It looks like you’re clean of glass shards and I’ve covered you in ointment to prevent infection. I’ll be back tomorrow to change the bandages. Your eardrums are both still very red and swollen. It’s not surprising that you can’t hear. I want to give it a couple days before I send you to a specialist. This might clear up on its own. I’m writing you a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and an antibiotic. It’s too early to tell if there’s any permanent damage to the inner ear. It looks like both your eardrums burst. I’ll drop the prescriptions off at the pharmacy and Tom will send someone around with them later.”

More people in the Home. More that James couldn’t hear. How could he keep watch over the clocks if he couldn’t hear all these invaders moving in and out and around? James pictured them, touching the clocks, poking the pendulums, moving the hands out of sync, even backwards, and parts rained to the floor. James would never catch up, he’d never get it all sorted out. His heart began to race and he clutched both his ears and rocked in the bed.

Someone patted his wet hair and James looked up. It was Ione and she again made that shape with her mouth: Oh-kay. But James shook his head hard. To his horror, he fell into tears in front of them all.

Dr. Owen and Neal gaped, but Ione grabbed him. She wrapped him tight and held him to her chest and began to sway. James cried until he thought he was dry, every pore, every tissue dehydrated and shriveled and dead. And then he felt it. He pressed his head harder into her chest.

Ione must have been humming. James could feel the vibration through her skin. And there was a beat against his cheek. A ticking so strong and steady, she could have been one of the clocks.

Bum-bum. Bum-bum.

James closed his eyes and sank into the rhythm. His tears dried into her blouse. Then, tenderly and carefully, she set James back against his pillow.

For a second, James scrambled, trying to get close to her again. But her lips puckered, Shhh, and he stopped. She smiled. “Thank you,” James said. She nodded.

Dr. Owen waved goodbye. Neal said something to his wife, then nodded at James. He took up the notebook. “I’m going back to the shop,” he wrote. “Ione will stay. Molly will be here with your lunch.”