The rhythmic click of a clock. Is there anything more unsettling? The predictability of a clock I believe is the most unnerving thing about it. Every second it clicks and every hour it lets out its warning to the world that another hour of your miserable life has passed and it begins anew, the cycle. In reality it is a cycle of life where every minute is a day and every hour is a year. Now this may seem pointless to you, but if you had been through what I have you would understand, but I am sure you haven’t.

It all started nearly a decade ago when I was first feeling the hard effects of aging. My wife walked out on me, took the kids, took the car, took all I had from my life. I was left with an empty house aside from a mattress and my favorite pieces of furniture, which didn’t amount to much. Few understand the repercussions that can occur after one event. The problems the divorce cause me seemed to escalate.

My usually habits of keeping myself and the house clean were worn down. I became a slob. That in turn affected my job. Being a salesman, it was important to keep up my image, after all who is going to buy lingerie from a fat greasy pig? Pretty sweet gig huh? Yeah, I know it sounds great, but when you begin to see beautiful women looking at you with disgust, lets face it, you feel like a sack of shit. That was just the beginning.

I walked along the endless cubicles that were part of the sales department of my department store, though I guess you could say I didn’t walk at all since my feet barely lifted from the ground. I had no energy left, restless and dirty I sat down at my small desk in my small cubicle and looked at my small computer. Was this where I wanted to be for the rest of my life, sitting down at a job that meant nothing? Of course I knew the answer, but what was I to do, quit my job? I was already left with almost nothing from the divorce and being unemployed was not an option. My phone rang, the red light flashed; it meant only one thing, Mr. James.

Reluctantly I picked up the phone.

“Hello, Mr. James,” I answered.

“Derrick, could you report to my office,” he said quickly and I could hear his receiver hit the phone rather quickly.

What now? Did I upset a prissy housewife who thought I offended her when I told her that the lingerie she tried on made her look fat? I paced down the long corridor to Mr. James’s room and couldn’t help but smile. Was this what hell was going to be like? Working a job that seemed like torture and reporting to the devil when ever he bids.

I let out a deep breath and opened the door to his office. Mr. James was perhaps the one department manager who made his office reflect his personality. It was a room packed with modern art and furniture. Many of the things I wasn’t even able to discern whether it was a coffee table or chair. I guess he wanted to show his sophisticated life, but if you ever saw the man you would have second-guessed it.

“You called?” I asked.

“Yes, sit down please,” he said offering a chair across from his desk.

He looked at me and smiled with that stupid grin. He was much younger than me, coming straight from college to work at his father’s department store. What a punk. Stupid skinny son of bitch thought he was better than all those around him. If he only knew.

“What do u you need?” I asked already annoyed of this kid’s attitude.

“Have you been okay?” he questioned, and if I wasn’t able to see through his bullshit I could have sensed some concern.

“Yeah, just fine,” I replied quickly.

“I think it would be in the best interest of both the company and yourself if you took a leave of absence,” James said.

I looked at him closely for awhile, my hands gripping the handles of the expensive modern chair.

“How long?” I asked bluntly.

“Indefinitely,” he said hesitantly.

I couldn’t believe it. For nearly fifteen years I busted my ass for these blue collar assholes and they decide to get rid of me. I tried to keep my rage in but it was too much to control, before I knew it I was over top , pounding his face mercilessly. I can still hear his screams of agony as shattered his nose and knocked out his teeth.

It went on for nearly five minutes before his screams reached my fellow employees, but I am sure they had heard his first scream. I was handcuffed by security guards and escorted out of the building, the silent praises from my coworkers evident.

I went to court but was convicted of rage induced assault and nothing more. I paid the fine served my community service and of course was forced to take and anger management course. Personally, I felt that there was no need for it, after all I had went through I doubt anyone else would have acted differently. I went to the anger course for two weeks and just found myself more pissed off then ever.

I hated my life, I hated the way it turned out for me. We all have false perceptions of how our lives are going to turn out. I for one dreamed of being a writer, having millions read my books and hunger for ever word I type on my canvas. It didn’t work out though and I was nearly fifty years old. My imagination was gone, I had no kids around me to help spark those forgotten memories to fill my stories.

I laid in bed, staring up at my drab ceilings. I stared off into nothingness until the wail of my grandfather clock took me away from my suicidal thoughts. I looked at the great wood clock and eyed it carefully. I got up from my stained mattress and moved to the clock. While looking at it memories of H.G. Well’s The Time Machine and Back to the Future made me think. Was it possible to turn back the strands of time?

There was no conceivable way of going around it. Both were fictional works that held no truth to reality, but at that point in time nothing seemed like a reality to me. I ran my hands along the face of the clock and felt each number. They were cool under my warm and calloused hands, but they too felt strangely warm, as if heated by some unseen force. The hands of the clocks also were warm. I took a deep breathe I moved the hands of the clock backwards, each tick echoing throughout my small room.

Nothing happened, everything remained the same and I laughed at myself for believing in such stories. I went back to bed pulled my thing white sheets over my body and drifted to sleep.

I awoke startled in the night. I opened my eyes to a bright flash of orange followed by a deep swirl of green. It hovered over me, it center like the eye of a tornado. It whirled around my sending what hair I had atop my bald head scattering to all sides. Within the twirling tumult a face appeared, its appearance haggard and decrepit. It opened it‘s mouth wide and jumped for me. With a loud crack it dissipated and left nothing but a green fog. I closed my eyes and wished it all to go away and soon saw nothing but black.

The next morning I found that my surroundings had changed, I slept on my old bed. I though I had lost my mind, boxes were piled high about the room, each one labeled with a black permanent marker. I rolled on my side to get out of bed when I hit something. I looked to my side to find Kayla, my wife. She looked so young, her beautiful blond hair was cut short, and her skin was tan and smooth like the day I first met her in high school.

“What’s the matter honey?” she asked, rubbing her hands along my chest.

“Nothing nothing, I just uh, have to go to the bathroom.”

I ran off to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. My hair was all there! I was myself, though a much younger one. I decided right then and there to make my life that one I wished for the night previous.

My luck had changed, my life was anew, everything was perfect. I moved out to the unfurnished living room and eyed the tall structure in the corner. Without even seeing beneath its sheet I knew what it was, my portal to my new life. Carefully I pulled the sheet and looked on with admiration. I started to place the sheet on when something caught my eye. The door that hid the chains and the tumblers of the clock begin to shake. In a sudden move, it swung open and pulled me in. I screamed for help but nothing was heard. I was shrouded in blackness except for a small hole of yellow light. I peaked through and saw my living room.

“What is this?” I screamed.

“Your prison,” came an unexpected reply.

“Who said that?”

“Your former self.”

I felt as if my world was crashing around me.

“I don’t understand,” I cried.

“This scene has been replayed over and over through the ages it is an endless cycle. Now it is your turn to wait for yourself to make the same mistake you did all those years in the future.”

“Wait, what mistake?”

“Disturbing the strands of time.”

I dropped to my knees on the hard floor and wept, wept until my eyes were dried up and I had no tears left to shed. It was at that point that I learned my lesson. How ever many times we wish we could turn back the ages and change a decision we have made whether it had been bad or good, in the end its all the same. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------