The Pocket Watch

by Michael Shaw

  Alex and I met at a local restaurant that had been around since we were kids. With all of the chains and bars around, only locals new this place was good, and it was definitely less sketchy than the outside implied.

  “That’ll be eight dollars” the cashier said.

  Alex held out his wrist.

  She scanned his Mark and handed him his drink.

  After we both paid and got our food, we sat down at our usual spot next to the window.

  “How’s Jason?” He asked.

  “He’s doing fine, but I can tell he’s about ready to bust out of there.”

  Alex grinned. “Maybe tomorrow I’ll pay him a visit. You know, after the interview.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, we could both go together.”

  He took another sip of his drink. “Yeah…”

  I eyeballed him. He held an uncomfortable face. “What’s up?”

  “I don’t know,” he scratched his head, “I think I’m just getting nervous about tomorrow.”

  “You have nothing to worry about,” I said. “You’ve gotten better grades than me in every subject since we were kids.” I leaned back. “And if I’m not nervous, you shouldn’t be.”

  “Well, thanks.” He ate a large bite of his sandwich. “What about you, then?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You look like you’ve got something on your mind, too.” His eyes trailed down to the table. He saw my skin. “What’s with the hand?”

  I slid my hands off the table. “Well, it’s-”

  “Are those burns?”

  “Okay… Listen.” I reached into my pocket.

  Alex watched me suspiciously.

  I hesitated for a moment, considering if I could trust him with this. But it led me to a realization. The only two people I could even think about trusting this with were Alex and Jason. Alex was my closest friend. I exhaled and pulled the watch out, holding it close under the cover of my hand.

  “What is it?” Alex peered at the watch.

  I opened my hands and showed it to him.

  His face fell a bit. “A pocket watch?”

  I nodded.

  “Well, I guess it looks cool, but what does that-”

  “Wait.” I held my hand up. “Watch this.” I looked around the restaurant. There were a few people inside. No one paid attention to us. I pointed at Alex’s fork. “Drop that off the table.”

  He looked at the fork. “What?”

  I nodded and opened up the watch. “Drop it.”

  He grabbed the fork. “Okay…” He held the utensil to the side. “Like this?”

  I kept my finger over the button. “Yes.”

  He shrugged and dropped the fork.

  I pressed the button.

  The flash forced my eyes shut. The ringing filled my ears. I.T. began counting.

  Alex froze. To the side, I saw the fork in midair. I grabbed it and held it in front of me. That was it. I pushed the button again, felt the flash, and time returned to normal.

  Alex blinked, still looking to the side where the fork had been. “What the…” He looked up at me. When he saw the fork, he turned his head to look back at the floor. “How’d you?” Back at me.

  I lifted the pocket watch and smiled.

  “What is that thing?” He asked quietly. He leaned forward and held his hand up to it.

  I let him take it. Allowing the pocket watch to leave my hand made my palm sting again.

  Now very intrigued, he examined the face of the cover.

  “I don’t really know what it is. I found it in a box of my parents’ stuff.”

  He grinned. “The one you always kept in the closet?”

  “Yeah.”

  He opened the cover. “And you didn’t find this until now?”

  I shrugged. “I had no idea it was in there.”

  He began to closely read all of the little labels and counters. “I.T.,” he said softly.

  “Alex.”

  His eyes peered up at me.

  “It sounds so dumb saying it out loud,” I took a breath, “but it can pause time.”

  He looked back down at it, the confusion in his face growing. “Yeah, okay,” he replied sarcastically.

  “I’m serious.”

  He looked back under the table. “But really, how did you do that? Have you been learning magic tricks or something?”

  “I’m not messing with you.” I took the watch back. “Look.” I pointed to the digital counters. “It’s not as old as it looks. And whenever I freeze time with it,” I put my finger on the I.T. label, “this counter goes up.”

  He narrowed his eyes to read it.

  I held the watch in front of him as he scratched his head over it.

  “Internal time,” he said.

  “What?” I gave the watch back to him as he stared at it, a spark in his eye.

  “Well, if I’m believing you on this,” he glanced at me, “which I guess I am…” He held the watch delicately under the light. “Then I think that ‘I.T.’ stands for ‘internal time.’”

  “Internal time,” I repeated.

  He nodded. “I’m not an expert, but…” His eyes met with mine. “There are different types of time. Just ask Doctor Quaid.”

  That was one of Alex’s professors from our last semester. “That guy’s crazy.”

  “No doubt about that, but hear me out.” He pointed at the second hand on the clock. “It’s 2:46 pm and 13 seconds on May 16th, 2042. That’s external time. It’s the clock we’re all living on. Internal time, on the other hand, is your own timeline.” He lowered the watch. “I guess.”

  “You don’t sound so dogmatic about it.”

  “It’s just weird to be talking about something like this as though it’s real.”

  I leaned back. “Internal time…”

  He nodded. “If you’re pausing time, like you say you are, then your internal clock keeps on going. If in the span of one hour, you paused time, waited thirty minutes, and then unfroze time, then an hour of external time,”

  “Was an hour and a half of internal time for me.”

  He closed the cover. “Yeah.”

  I slowly nodded my head. We both just stared at the watch.

  “At least, that’s what I think.” He handed it back to me.

  “That’s why the counter goes up,” I thought aloud. “It’s counting how much internal time passes for me.”

  Alex rubbed his hands together. “Listen, Jon, if something like this is really possible, you probably don’t want many people knowing about it.”

  I slowly put the watch back in my pocket. “Of course.”

  “And you need to be careful with it,” he continued. “If even one thing goes wrong, you could mess up a whole lot-”

  “Alex, trust me. This is still way over my head. I don’t plan on doing anything dangerous with it.”

  He nodded. We both shared a long moment of eye contact.

  Finally, he looked down. “Have you gone back with it?”

  “What?”

  “You know,” he put his hands in air quotes, “back in time?”

  “No,” I replied. “I don’t even know if it can do that.”

  He stroked his chin. “Then why all the labels for the day? And the year?”

  “Even if it could go back, I don’t know if I would want to risk it. Pausing time is simple. You press the button, you do what you need to do, and you press the button again. I can control that. But time travel…” I pictured it. “Time travel makes things much more complicated.”

  Alex wiped his face with a napkin. “That’s a smart move. Just speculating here, though, if you wanted to…” He made a circular motion with his finger. “I bet all it would take is a spin of the dial.” He put the napkin down. “But you’re right. It’s probably best not to risk it.”

  I imagined it. Time travel. Could the pocket watch do that? And what would happen? Would it be a tour of the past? Would I fly through some portal like in the movies? Would I be able to cha
nge anything?

  Could I really be able to change the past? “Maybe I could try it…” I said quietly.

  “Forget I mentioned it. Really, I was just thinking out loud. That thing may not be…” He took a long stare at my right hand, “the safest.”

  I stared at the table.

  He leaned forward. “Listen, I know what you’re thinking, but don’t take it that far. You can’t go chasing after that stuff like before.”

  “Right…” I responded.

  “Be smart with that thing. Don’t go trying to change the past or something.”

  My stare endured. “And why not?”

  “Jon, don’t make this about your parents again.”

  I looked up at him. “Maybe it can time travel.”

  He sighed.

  “You’re telling me you wouldn’t change the past if you could?” I put my hands on the table.

  “Remember who’s talking to you.” His voice grew quiet, intense. “It’s not as if I don’t understand where you’re coming from.”

  “Wouldn’t you save him?”

  He and I locked eyes. Alex breathed through his mouth. Silent, but shaking.

  I gripped the table more tightly. “If you had the chance, wouldn’t you keep your father from dying?”

  Our eyes stayed focused. His lips parted. He took a breath to speak, but he hesitated.

  I kept my mouth closed.

  Alex finally broke, letting his eyes lower. Looking down, he said, “The present is now, Jon.” He put his napkin on the plate in front of him. “Our fathers would have wanted us to live in it.”

  Chapter 5

  I returned home after my lunch with Alex to get a few more things ready. He promised he wouldn’t tell anyone, and I promised I would be careful with the watch.

  While unpacking a few more items from college, I got a call on my cellphone.

  I picked up. “Hello?”

  “Hi. Jonathan Ashe?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is David Kemp. Just calling you to verify that we still have your interview set for tomorrow at 1:00 pm.”

  “Great. Thank you, David.”

  “We’ll see you tomorrow.”

  ∞

  It itched so badly. I rolled my sleeve up and examined my right arm. It had gotten worse. An odd rash had appeared up the length of my arm. Still light, still nothing terrible. But the irritation had come back. And on my hand, it was as though my palm were shedding. A layer of dead skin peeled off of the surface.

  This was just the beginning of the ailments that returned to me that night. Aside from my arm, my head still received the brunt of the fatigue. Surprisingly, my eyes had no pain. It was my forehead and ears, mainly.

  I took a seat on my bed and took a pill for the headache. Next to me lay the pocket watch. I stared at it, and oddly enough, I felt as though it were staring back.

  I wondered if Alex were right. Maybe it could take me back. But what would happen then? Would there be two versions of me living at one time? Or would I replace my past self? And if just pausing time did all of this to my hand, I flexed my fingers, what would traveling through time do to me?

  The watch shone in the low light that came from my nightstand lamp. I reached over and opened the cover, revealing the face. 10:50 pm. I exhaled. My interview’s tomorrow; I can wait on this. I looked down at the face, and I felt it once again. An energy emanating from the watch. A feeling of animation, an anomaly of sentience from an inanimate collection of gears and parts. I examined the dial, and after a bit of hesitation, I pulled it out. In that moment, I realized I hadn’t even considered the future. I tried to rotate the dial forward, to display a future time. It didn’t even budge. I wrapped my fingers around it. I guess that answers that question.

  I twirled the dial in the other direction, and the number on the display went back. My heart jumped. I quickly set it back to the current time and put the dial down. The fact that it could turn back but not forward said something. What if I could really do it? I squeezed the watch. What if I could change the past?

  A noise from behind caused me to jump a bit.

  I looked back. A picture frame had fallen off of my dresser. I walked over to pick it up and set it back. Now, I was standing there, looking at my family in the picture. In my hand sat the pocket watch. I’ll just do two minutes, I said to myself. Just two minutes back. I gripped the dial between my thumb and forefinger and pulled it back out. Twisting it ever so slightly, I pulled the minute hand back from 10:52 to 10:50. I closed my eyes and pushed the knob down.

  It all hit me. The flash. The ringing. The pain. And this time, another memory. A vivid, almost lifelike, re-experiencing of the past. One that reminded me of something.

  My parents’ death wasn’t the only thing I wanted to change.

  ∞

  June, 2037. I stood in a dark alley, next to a bar, “Rigby’s.” I waited for Hunter.

  Hunter Calhoun was a skinny, pasty, troublemaker. But he was a friend. And he always had a smile on his face, albeit a crooked, often devious one.

  I paced back and forth, my hands shaking. The moon sat in the middle of the sky, surrounded by clouds that shrouded the stars.

  He finally showed up, rounding the corner from the sidewalk.

  “Where were you?” I whispered to him viciously.

  He raised an eyebrow and smiled. “Why are you whispering?”

  I made a glance over my shoulder. “Just tell me he’s here.”

  “You’re looking a little anxious. You okay?”

  My phone rang, and I jumped.

  Hunter smirked.

  I checked the phone. “Alex Nelson.” I let it go to voicemail and put it back in my pocket.

  “So, are we doing this thing?” Hunter asked.

  I looked him in the eye. “Tell me he’s here,” I repeated.

  He rolled his eyes. “I’m positive he’s here.” He bared a toothy grin, nodding his head at the building to my right. “Rigby’s every Friday. Drinks an apple martini.” He spat to the side and scoffed. “Wimp.”

  “Wait,” I said, “How do you know what he’s been drinking?”

  He just kept his grin and picked at his teeth with his nail.

  “Have you been going inside?”

  “What? I thought I was helping you!” He put his hands up. “Track down the guy who killed your dad, right? Justice and all that.”

  “No, I mean how have you been getting into this bar?” I pointed. “They ask for ID at the door.”

  My phone rang again. I pressed the button to send it to voicemail once more.

  Another smile crept up on his face. “Yes, they ask for ID at the door.” He held up a fake driver’s license.

  “That doesn’t matter, they scan your Mark-”

  He raised his left hand and pulled the sleeve down, showing his Mark. “You mean this one?”

  I stared at his wrist. “A fake Mark?” I looked at Hunter. “How did you-”

  “My cousin got into this business a little while ago.” He rubbed his fingers across the code. “You just need the right type of ink.”

  I rubbed my temples. “Wow, okay…”

  “I’m working for them, too, now,” he said, excitement in his eyes. “Jon, you would not believe-”

  “What kind of ‘business’ makes false ID?”

  Hunter’s lips curled into a devious grin. “How do you think I’ve been getting all these leads, Jon?” He glanced back the street, “Eclipse covers a broad range.”

  “Eclipse?”

  He took a business card out of his jacket. “If we’re going to talk about this anymore,” he handed it to me, “then you can’t call me on my personal number.”

  I looked at the card. Printed on one side was a phone number I didn’t recognize. I turned the card over, reading the other side. There in bold letters was the name that Hunter had said. “Eclipse.”

  “Eclipse,” I read aloud.

  “That’s right.”

  “What kind of
name is that?”

  He held his hands out and shrugged. “I got you to your guy, didn’t I?”

  “We’ll see.”

  Hunter smiled. “I’m here to help you, remember?” He leaned in. “So I don’t think I’d give any of that away if I were you.”

  “Not that I’ve even seen much to give away.” What was this Eclipse business supposed to be, anyway? Fake Marks? Name Databases? What was Hunter into?

  I put the card in my wallet, right above the slot that contained a single index card reading “Peter Simmons.” I never wanted to forget that name. I still believed he was an accomplice to the murder.

  “You still carry one of those?” Hunter chuckled, looking at the wallet.

  “Just focus.” I put my hand on his shoulder and the wallet in my back pocket. “Did you get that picture of him?”

  “I tried, but it’s always too dark in there.”

  I scratched my head.

  “He fits your description perfectly. Scar across the face. Caucasian.”

  “How old?”

  “Looks in his thirties.”

  I nodded. “That would be about right. Okay, that sounds like it could be him.”

  “What’d I tell you?” Hunter crossed his arms, satisfied.

  I reached down into the back of my pants and pulled out my father’s gun.

  “Whoa, whoa, man.” He lowered my arms.

  “What?” I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out a bullet. My fingers shook, and I dropped it.

  “I thought you wanted to catch this guy, not kill him.” Hunter reached down and picked up the round.

  “Well, that’s what I meant by ‘catch,’ Hunter.” I pulled out another one and tried to load it into the gun. But my hands wouldn’t stop trembling. “Once I see his face, I’ll know if he’s the guy.”

  “Jon, you can’t just walk in and do this.”

  “That’s why we’re waiting for him to come out.” The bullet slipped out of my hand and dropped onto the ground just like the first.

  Hunter and I watched it bounce onto the pavement, echoing across the alley.

  He looked up at me. “You’ve never handled one of these, have you?”

  “I know what I’m doing, Hunter.” I watched the bullet roll to a stop.