By Rachel Grieves

George first realised that something was up when the chime sounded a pitch higher than usual. He remembered it very well. It was Sunday teatime and Margaret had just brought in buttered crumpets when the seventh hour struck. George got up out of his chair and walked over to the mantelpiece. “There’s something not quite right there,” he said squinting at the glass clock face.

By Wednesday morning, the second hand had fallen behind by two minutes. “That clock is late,” he said to his wife, checking his wrist watch.

A face balancing spectacles on the end of a nose appeared above her newspaper. “Maybe the batteries need changing dear.”

Come Friday, the clock had fallen behind by over an hour. Raking around in the kitchen drawer beneath the tea towels, George rolled two fresh batteries between his fingers. “This should do it.” He put his reading glasses on and carefully unscrewed the back of the clock. With patient fingers, he fitted the batteries snugly into the crevice and placed it back on the mantelpiece.

George’s face fell when he came down the following morning and the clock was over four hours late. “It was a very old clock dear, it was a wedding gift from my grandmother,” Margaret said, sensing his disappointment. George grunted and sullenly sat down in his chair, hiding his face behind a large gardening book.

Slowly the clock grew later and later but still it battled on, not wanting to give up, not wanting to accept defeat. Finally, on Sunday night all of its strength was spent and all hope was lost. No longer could the ticking heartbeat be heard and the clock grew silent.

Amongst the delicately handcrafted mechanics deep inside the clock, a thought stirred and a shadow passed through its classic golden interior. A chime echoed from within. There was one way that it could survive, a way that it could relive its time. Instead of reeling towards inevitable decay it could languish in its renaissance, taking everyone back with it.

In the darkness, on the mantelpiece, the ticking heartbeat started once more – this time in an anti-clockwise direction.