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"The Clockmaker’s Promise"

In a quiet corner of an old town nestled between green hills and winding rivers, there stood a tiny clock shop called Timeless. The shop was old—its wooden beams creaked in the morning sun, and the sign above the door had faded to near invisibility. But within, magic ticked and tocked in perfect rhythm.

Julian was the owner, a reserved man in his early thirties with delicate hands and eyes the color of old silver. He had inherited Timeless from his grandfather, a master clockmaker who had once said, “Time is not just measured, Julian. It is felt.” Julian had spent his life surrounded by gears, springs, and pendulums, content in his solitude.

Until the day she walked in.

Her name was Elara, and she arrived on a rainy afternoon, the kind of rain that clung to the skin and made the world smell of earth and longing. She entered the shop with a soaked shawl and a broken pocket watch in hand.

“It was my grandmother’s,” she said, her voice soft like the first page of a book you know you’ll never forget. “It stopped ticking yesterday.”

Julian took the watch gently, turning it over in his palm. It was a delicate thing, more sentimental than valuable. “I can fix it,” he said.

Elara smiled, and for a fleeting moment, the tiny shop seemed brighter.

She returned two days later, and then again the week after. Each visit came with a different timepiece—a clock that had stopped, a wristwatch that ticked too quickly, a cuckoo that had forgotten how to sing. Julian suspected she had bought them all at a flea market just to have a reason to come back.

And yet, he never minded.

She would linger, watching him work. Sometimes she brought pastries. Sometimes books. Once, she brought a tiny music box that played a lullaby so sad Julian had to blink away something in his eye.

“I love broken things,” Elara once confessed. “Because they still carry their story. Even when they’ve stopped, they were once alive.”

Julian didn’t know how to tell her that he had felt broken for a long time—that grief had carved him hollow after his grandfather passed, that time had felt less like a friend and more like a slow erosion.

But with her, it shifted.

Their friendship unfolded quietly, like the turning of gears. No declarations, no fireworks. Just shared silences, laughter tucked between seconds, and small moments that felt bigger than time.

Winter came, and snow curled against the windowpanes. One evening, as Julian walked Elara to her cottage just beyond the woods, she paused beneath a streetlamp and turned to him.

“Have you ever wanted to pause time?” she asked.

Julian looked at her. Snow gathered in her hair like stardust. “Only once,” he said. “Right now.”

She looked away, but he saw the smile tugging at her lips.

---

Months passed, and the town thawed into spring. Timeless blossomed too, its once-quiet corners now filled with flowers Elara brought each week. But something began to shift. Elara’s visits grew shorter, her smiles dimmer.

One rainy evening, she came with no clock in hand.

“I’m leaving,” she said.

Julian froze. “Leaving?”

“I got a fellowship. Art restoration. In Vienna.”

A thousand gears stopped turning in Julian’s chest.

“When?” he asked.

“Next week.”

The shop filled with silence. Not the warm, gentle kind they had shared. This one was cold and final.

He wanted to ask her to stay. He wanted to say that the hands of his heart now beat to her rhythm. But instead, he nodded.

“I’ll fix your grandmother’s watch again,” he said quietly. “It’s ticking slow.”

She smiled sadly. “Thank you.”

---

The day she left, he stood at the station with the watch in hand, now perfect. She hugged him tightly, whispering, “You made time feel beautiful again.”

Then she was gone, and with her went the warmth of the world.

Julian returned to Timeless, but time passed differently now. The clocks still ticked, but each chime echoed with memory.

Years passed.

Letters came, then fewer. Elara’s life had become museums and exhibits and foreign cities. Julian remained where the hours still hung like ivy from the walls.

But he never stopped fixing broken things.

Then, one day—on the anniversary of her first visit—he found a small package on his doorstep. Inside was a familiar music box and a note:

“It still plays that sad lullaby. But maybe you can make it sing again.”

It was unsigned, but he knew the handwriting like he knew the sound of her laughter.

And so he repaired it, winding the spring gently. The tune played—still sad, but sweeter now.

A week later, she walked through the door.

Older. More radiant.

“I missed the tick of this place,” she said.

Julian stepped around the counter, unsure if this was still a dream.

“I missed you,” he said.

She smiled, eyes glistening. “I’ve spent years restoring old masterpieces. But I think I forgot how to restore my own heart.”

“I never stopped hoping,” Julian whispered. “That you'd return.”

She took his hand.

“I’m here. If you’ll have me.”

He kissed her then, for the first time—an embrace long overdue, as gentle and certain as the ticking of a clock that finally found its rhythm.

And time, for once, stood still.

Lamin

@Muhamed

36

It's about the clockmaker's promise

Muhamed