The Cost of Counting

The window had a habit.

It would let in drafts from other rooms. Other houses. Other valleys where different winds lived. The clock would feel the cold air cross its face and know that the breeze had touched other clocks first. Had wrapped around other hands. Had whispered through other windows before arriving here. The clock knew this. The clock always knew. But knowing is not the same as leaving. Knowing is standing in the wind and choosing to stay. Even when the wind does not choose you back.

The clock stood.

For seasons that the dust counted in layers, the clock stood. The window would rattle with excitement when a new breeze came through. A strong wind from the north. A warm current from the coast. The window would sing with the wind and the clock would tick louder, trying to be heard over the sound of the window rejoicing in air that was not the clock's.

But clocks are not wind. Clocks do not blow. Clocks sit and they count and they endure. This is their nature. And nature, the dust would whisper, is the thing that breaks us in the end.

The silence grew.

Silence is not the absence of sound. Silence is a creature. It has weight. It has hands. It sits on your chest when you are alone and it presses until your ribs learn the shape of quiet. The silence in the room grew because the clock was ticking softer now. Its springs were nearly gone. Its gears were grinding against nothing. And the window was looking outward, always outward, at skies that belonged to other rooms.