As his parents’ voices grew and twisted, the dancers twirled faster, their ankles flexing on top of cruelly pointed toes. The women’s gloved hands on the men’s shoulders crept toward their throats. Once, when his mother’s voice reached a new crescendo, James lifted the clock’s glass dome to stop the dancers from hurting each other. He wanted them to go back to the flash of their feet, the heat of their embrace. It was James that got hurt though; his mother said she didn’t like animals playing with her things. It didn’t matter that James wasn’t playing at all. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t an animal, not outside of her imagination…he knew he was a little boy.
And later, when his father was gone and James was thirteen and his mother melted into a sleeping cat on the floor, even the clock didn’t matter to her. It sat, unwound and unwatched, unadmired on her dressing table. James took the clock, stole it away, and set it on his own desk. He missed the mirrored reflection, but once he wound the clock, the dancers spun away while he did his homework. The ticking soothed him and he missed it the most on those days and nights when his mother locked him in the root cellar. He wanted the clock to be happy; it needed someone to pay attention. Once the clock was used to his room, out of the limelight of the sparkling ballroom, but the center of James’ attention, the pendulum moved a little more slowly, a little more smoothly, and the dancers relaxed from an anxious jitterbug to a waltz. His mother never mentioned the clock’s disappearance, though James imagined she knew where it was.
Sixty years later, seated on the edge of his bed, James watched the clock and admired the same dancers as they followed the same path, day after day after day, to the left, to the right, to the left again, still every fifteen seconds, and their joints were as smooth as when he was thirteen or ten or six or four. That clock never broke, James made sure of that, and he kept it behind the closed door of his bedroom, out of the public’s eye. The clock sang and danced through his father’s disappearance and death and then his mother’s, and James’ own journey from the root cellar to the Home for Wayward Clocks. When James wound that clock every November twelfth, he thought of his father, the soft voice, the gentle hand, telling an eight-year old boy that he’d be back soon, to take care, I love you. And James thought of his mother, during her beautiful moments, when she was curled on the floor, asleep, her blonde hair awash in rainbow sunlight refracted through the front window. James thanked them for the only thing they ever gave him, this life, this path of time and ticking and tucked-away memories.
James watched the clock every night and when he was eased into sleep, he spun with the dancers, slipping from one woman to the next, hand to hand, chest to breast, danced to oblivion where time finally stopped.
Oh, if only.
In the Home for Wayward Clocks, James imagined he was never alone; he was never in silence. There was such comfort in that.
P
atty knew that Ben would interrupt her. She could count his footsteps from the time the lawnmower stopped to when the back door swung open, banging as it always did against the refrigerator. The metallic bang, the heavy thump of Ben’s grass-stained sneakers hitting the floor would cause her to pause in her rhythm, her ritual of following whatever came next on her list, her organization that allowed her to get everything done the way it should be. And at the right price, even when she was being extravagant.
He smacked the back door just as she spilled her two grocery bags of Halloween-special orange Oreos over the counter. She didn’t acknowledge him, she just turned her back, feeling the cold breeze from the yard stroke the most vulnerable exposed skin on her inclined neck. She began to organize her Oreos into their departments; two packages for the cupboard, left of the sink, top shelf, because the first would go swiftly, and twenty-two more packages for the freezer. These Oreos had to stay fresh for the duration, for the year until Halloween came around again and orange Oreos replaced the traditional white crème on the shelves. The orange Oreos were the best the year offered, better than the garish red Christmas variety, the green for St. Patrick’s Day, the fresh-washed spring-sky blue for Easter.
Behind her, she heard Ben sigh and she swore she felt the hungry heat of his breath, drawn from the stale base of his lungs, replace the cold on her neck. “Patty,” he said. “They’re all the same. They all taste the same.”
“No, they don’t.” Her response was automatic, delivered in a flat, I-don’t-care-what-you-think voice. As automatic as waking up every morning beside Ben, kissing him goodbye with her eyes closed, the kiss gone by so fast, she never even tasted his lips. She stopped for a second and stared at her piles of packages. What did Ben taste like?
He started toward the living room, toward the right side of the sofa that reclined and let him stare at the ceiling, his hands folded on his chest as if he was in an overstuffed naugahyde casket, and he didn’t say anything else. It wasn’t worth it, she knew. They had this argument every year and there was never a winner. Though Patty always bought all the orange Oreos she wanted. She supposed there was some victory in that.
When she heard the neat squeak-chunk of the recliner popping free, she nearly called to him, to ask him if his Saturday chores were done, just for something to say. But she stopped herself. Of course they were. They always were. Nothing was more important to Ben than mowing the lawn in October, making sure that when the snow finally came, the grass beneath was short and crisp, allowing frosty moisture through to the hidden dark soil below. But she did wait to see if his thoughts would turn to this particular day, if he would give voice to what she knew was circled in red on the calendar.
Their twenty-third anniversary.
She put a pot of coffee on. Orange Oreos were especially good with a cup of good, hot, fresh coffee. While the coffee dripped steadily, filling the kitchen with its rich scent of French vanilla, she carried the twenty-two packages to their basement freezer. The cookies were on sale that week, a buy-two-get-one-free deal, plus she had an entire year’s worth of Oreo coupons saved up. Between those and the special, she’d only spent a few dollars. Well, nine. That, she figured, would make the cookies taste even better. Though if necessary, she would have paid full price.
As she closed the freezer, she heard the anniversary clock go off upstairs. It played
The Anniversary Waltz
and she waited for and heard the deep grumble of Ben’s hum. He always sang along with it. Always. And always off-key. She always asked him not to and he never listened.
She remembered when he used to listen. She thought he couldn’t help it, his ears stuck out so, like sweet danish beneath the burr of a buzz-cut. She remembered the first time she told him about the orange Oreos. She was a freshman in college, he was a junior, and she was in hot-steamed giggle over being in love with an older man, an older man who paid her every attention. They were in the campus grocery store when she squealed over the Oreos and he laughed with her and joined her on the walk home, ripping open the package and stuffing the cookies in his mouth, in hers, their teeth changing to the color of cartoon pumpkins. She wished for a cup of coffee then, but because he was with her, she ate them without and enjoyed every bite.
She went upstairs now, to fill her special mug, thick glass, a melancholy yet warm amber that always reminded her of autumn, her favorite season, even in the heat of a heavy July midnight.
On campus that first orange night, she met Ben after hours in his dorm room and when he pulled back his beaten-up bedspread, she saw an entire twin-sized mattress full of orange Oreos. He made love to her there, her bare body crushing the cookies, sending the crème in smears up her thighs and across her back and she thought for a moment, her eyes closed, that it was a waste of perfectly good Oreos, why couldn’t he have chosen the plain variety? But when he began to lick the crumbs off her, and the crumbs were everywhere, in every crevice and fold and rise, she began to think differently. The orange creme spread on his erect penis made it look like a squash and at times, they laughed so hard, they had to stop their lovemaking. There just wasn’t breath for it.
After pouring herself an amber mug of coffee, she brought one of the unopened packages of cookies over to the table. She opened it, relishing the whoosh of released air, the chocolate and crème entering the kitchen with a force that made her mouth water. She stacked five of the cookies there, just to the right of her cup, admiring the tower of black-orange-black-orange, neat and straight without a single lean.
She wondered if he would remember. She wondered why she did.
Twenty-three years. So it wasn’t the big two-five. But still. October first had no other meaning for her now. Once, it was the more official start of fall, despite what the calendar said. It was the month when the leaves not only turned, they fell, and the clocks had to be set backwards. The nights were buried in black, speckled with stars that suddenly hung loosely from the sky, the morning air so sharp, it felt like it would shatter when she opened the front door to get the newspaper. And for twenty-three years, October first marked the day she changed her life. The day she swore in front of a whole church full of friends and family and God Himself that she would love this man forever. They served orange Oreos at the reception.
Patty listened to the hum of the television and she looked at the stack of Oreos. She wondered when the charm changed to annoyance.
Ben brought orange Oreos to her in the hospital after the births of their three children. Two of them, born in late October and early November, made it easy. But the youngest was born in early April, the season for sky-blue Oreos. Ben had shaved the crème of plain Oreos, played with food coloring until he got something close to orange (by his estimation; to Patty, it looked like a very painful yellow), then put the crème back between the cookies. Oreos for Christmas, tucked-away Oreos for Valentine’s Day (offered as a repeat in the bedsheets during the first five years of their marriage), frozen Oreos on her birthday in July. It was Ben that gave her the idea to buy a multitude of packages and freeze enough for the year.
It was when the stockpile began to appear in the freezer every October that the Oreo gifts stopped. And then one October, about ten years ago, Ben stood and watched her organize her cookies and he said, “They all taste the same, you know.” She’d been speechless. The next year, she offered her feeble, “No, they don’t.” And that’s where they left it. But then other things happened.
She began to wear nightgowns to bed. So Ben began to sleep in boxers and T-shirts. They argued about money. When they went out to dinner, it was usually with the kids, but if it wasn’t, they talked about the kids, then stared at their plates. He began going out for drinks and ball games with the guys from work, guys she only knew by name, never by face. She started working out at the Y and she swapped stories with the other sweaty women. They ate salads after class, except once a month, they went out for burgers and fries and shakes and onion rings so big, they could have been dog collars. And she began telling these women things she never told Ben.
Now, she looked at the Oreos. Her coffee was cold. The weight of her elbows on the table, growing heavier with her thoughts, brought the tower to a slight lean. And she wasn’t hungry at all.
Carefully, she lowered the tower, spread it out into a straight line like a hard chocolate centipede, and then she put the cookies back into the package. She rolled it shut and clipped it with a clothespin.
The anniversary clock was just going off when she went into the living room. It began to chime
The Anniversary Waltz
and she saw Ben’s foot, high up on the couch recliner, begin to tap, a pointless swaying in the air, a conductor’s baton clothed in brown argyle. Aone-two-three. And he started to hum.
Patty crossed to the clock and lifted the dome. With one finger, she stopped the pendulum and the song stopped between the two and three. Ben’s hum hung in the air for a moment more, then guttered down into his chest.
“Hey,” he said.
“I hate when you sing,” she said. She stood there, facing the newly dead clock, unable to move forward without the rhythm of time, its voice struck numb in its throat. She decided that when Ben left the room, she would start the clock, let it finish its song, then stop it again. And then it would go out to the storage shelf in the garage. She heard the clunk of the couch’s recliner handle, then the swoosh as the footrest slid back to its hidden place in the couch’s base. A creak and a muffled pop of a knee joint told her that Ben was leaning forward.
“You used to love it when I sang,” he said.
She remembered hearing him. Singing the three-toned “Na-bisco” as they hurried down the street with their first shared package of cookies. His voice nestled in her ear as they danced at their wedding. Commercial jingles as he tried to divert her during labors. Humming along with whatever was on the radio as he made love to her.
That humming disappeared when the lovemaking grew shorter, then shorter still, until there were no words, no sighs, no laughter, just restrained grunts. And finally, silence.
“I don’t like it anymore,” she said to the clock.
He stood, she heard his quick exhalation. “And orange Oreos taste just the same, Patty,” he said and he left the room.
She hoped, to pack. If not, she would.
Nudging the clock, she set it in motion and it resumed singing. From the bedroom, she thought she heard Ben’s low, guarded hum. Then she stopped the clock and brought it to the garage. She set it on the shelf, then pushed it toward the back, to protect it from unforeseen falls.
After returning to the kitchen, Patty stuck her mug in the microwave and unclipped the package, sending that orange Oreo scent into the air. To blend with the coffee, her thoughts, the new silence. She was surprised to find herself afraid; she wondered if Oreos could change too.