The Time Keeper Part 12

He leaned forward and stared in disbelief. There, on a skysc.r.a.per just across the street, was a man, sitting on the ledge, his feet dangling. He was cradling something in his arms.

"What is it?" one of the lawyers asked.

"Some lunatic with a death wish," Victor said.

Still, he couldn't turn away. It wasn't concern over the man falling. It was the fact that he seemed to be looking straight into Victor's window.

"So. Should we start with the commodities portfolio?" one lawyer said.

"Huh? ... Oh. Yes."

Victor lowered the shade and returned to the business of how much he could take with him when he died.

46.

Sarah stood outside the clock shop, looking at the sun and moon that were carved into the door.

She figured this must be the place, even though there was no name on the front.

She stepped inside and felt as if she'd entered a museum. Oh, G.o.d, they won't have it, she told herself. Look at this old stuff.

"Can I help you?"

The proprietor reminded her of a chemistry teacher she'd had soph.o.m.ore year, with white hair and narrow gla.s.ses. He'd worn vests, too.

"Do you carry-you probably don't-but there's this watch, I think. I don't even know if they make it, but ..."

The old man held up a palm.

"Let me get someone who will know," he said.

He returned from the back with a serious-looking guy, mussed brown hair, a black turtleneck. Kind of handsome, Sarah thought.

"Hi," Sarah said.

He nodded, wordlessly.

"It's a watch from a movie. You probably don't have it ..."

Ten minutes later, she was still explaining.

Not so much about the watch, but about Ethan and why she thought this would make a good gift. The guy behind the counter was easy to talk to; he listened with a patience that made it seem as if he had forever (his boss must be pretty lenient, she thought), and since she didn't talk to her mother about Ethan, and she couldn't confide in anyone at school (Ethan hadn't told anyone, so she followed his lead), it was a relief, almost fun, to let someone in on the relations.h.i.+p.

"He's kind of quiet sometimes," she said, "and he doesn't always text back."

The man nodded.

"But I know he likes this movie. And the watch was like, a triangle, I think? I want to surprise him."

The man nodded again. A cuckoo clock sounded. Because it was five o'clock, it went on for five chimes.

"Ooohh, enough," Sarah said, putting her hands to her ears. "Make it stop."

The man flashed a look as if she were in danger.

"What?" Sarah said.

The cuckoo finished.

Make it stop.

There was an awkward silence.

"Um ...," Sarah offered, "if you show me some watches, maybe I can tell you if it's the right one?"

"Good idea," the proprietor interjected.

The man went to the back. Sarah drummed her fingers on the counter. She saw an open jeweled case near the cash register, with an old pocket watch inside, painted on the exterior. It looked expensive.

The man reemerged, holding a box. On the cover was a photo from the Men in Black movie.

"OhmiG.o.d, you have it?" Sarah said excitedly.

He handed her the box and she opened it. Inside was a sleek black watch in the shape of a triangle.

"Yes! I am so happy."

The man tilted his head. "Then why are you so sad?"

"Huh?" Sarah squinted. "What do you mean?"

She looked to the proprietor, who seemed embarra.s.sed.

"He's very good at what he does," he whispered, apologetically.

Sarah tried to shake off the question. Who said she was sad? It was none of his business how she felt.

She looked down and saw a price on the box. Two hundred and forty-nine dollars. She felt suddenly uncomfortable and wanted to get out of there.

"All right, I'll buy it," she said.

The man looked at her sympathetically.

"Ethan," he said.

"What about him?"

"Is he your husband?"

"What?" she squealed. She found herself smiling. "No! G.o.d. I'm a senior in high school."

She brushed back her hair. Her mood suddenly lightened. "I mean, we might get married one day, I guess. But now he's just ... my boyfriend."

She had never used that word before, and she felt a bit self-conscious, as if walking out of a fitting room in a short skirt. But the man smiled, too, and she forgave him that weird comment about her being sad, because it fit beautifully, that word, "boyfriend," and she wanted to say it again.

47.

Every evening, when the sun set in New York City, Dor ascended to the top of skysc.r.a.pers and sat on their ledges.

He would turn the hourgla.s.s and hold the metropolis in a creeping moment, silencing the traffic noise into a single blaring hum. With the darkening sky behind the countless tall buildings, he'd imagine Alli at his side, the way they used to sit watching the day come to a close. Dor had no need for sleep or food. He seemed to be living on a different time grid altogether. But his thoughts were as they always had been, and when he finally let the darkness fall, he pictured Alli again, wearing her veil, and the quarter moon of the night they wed.

She is my wife.

He missed her terribly, even after all this time, and he wished he could talk to her about this mysterious journey, ask her what fate awaited him at the end. He had found the two people he was sent to Earth to find-or they had found him-but he still did not understand why a man in a wheelchair and a lovestruck girl should be singled out from the ma.s.ses.

He held the hourgla.s.s close to his face to see the symbols he had carved during his purgatory, the symbols which had lifted from the walls and engraved the ring between the upper and lower bulbs. With his power over time, Dor could have taken anything he desired from this new world. But a man who can take anything will find most things unsatisfying. And a man without memories is just a sh.e.l.l.

And so, there, alone, high above the city, Father Time held the only possession he cared about, the hourgla.s.s with his story. And, once again, out loud, he recited his life: "This is when we ran up the hillside ... This is the stone Alli threw ... This is the day we were wed ..."

48.

Victor looked at the two needles. He exhaled.

He had been doing dialysis for nearly a year. He hated it more each time he went. From the day a graft was placed under his skin, and a half-inch tube protruded from his arm, he'd felt imprisoned, an animal in a net. Three visits a week. Four hours per visit. The same dull routine. Watch the blood exit and return.

He had fought them on the idea, fought them on the graft, and refused to be with other patients during his treatments, even though Grace agreed with the doctor who said, "It helps to talk with people facing the same challenge." To Victor, they were not facing the same challenge: They were staying alive for another month or year; he was plotting an entirely new life.

He paid for a private suite-equipped with computers and an entertainment center-and he paid for private nurses. With Roger only a few feet away, Victor used the four hours to work, keeping a remote keyboard propped above the blanket, his BlackBerry on the table, and his cell phone connected via a device on his ear.

A nurse entered now with her clipboard.

"How we doing today?" she asked Victor. She was red-haired and overweight and her outfit tugged in from the bust and waist.

"Just peachy," he mumbled.

"That's good," she said.

He looked past her, tired, and drifted into a dreamy state. Another week of this, he thought. After that, he would disengage and be on that boat to the new world by New Year's Eve.

He blinked at a shadow in the corner, the size of a man, but when he blinked again, it was gone.

The shadow was Dor.

He'd been exploring the building in his undetected way-wandering among the machines and the staff, trying to comprehend the process that, despite his prolonged observation, still mystified him. Somehow, this place healed the sick. That he understood. And he felt a familiar twinge of sadness he experienced whenever he witnessed modern medicine: Alli had died alone, on a blanket in the high plains. Had she been of this generation, might she not have lived a long life?

He wondered how it was fair that your dying should depend so much on when you were born.

Dor studied the large machine in the private suite, saw how blood made its way in and out of the body. He approached Victor, sitting in the large chair with a device in his ear-Victor, whose fate Dor would have to address to reach his own destiny.

How old was this Victor, who, like Nim, seemed to be treated better than other people? Based on the wrinkled flesh, thinned hair, and age spots on his arms, he seemed to have already been blessed with long years. Yet Dor noticed Victor's expression-his eyebrows furrowed, his lips pulled down at the sides.

Although a diseased man might be frightened-or even grateful-this one seemed ... angry.

Or a better word.

Impatient.

49.

Now that Sarah had Ethan's gift, she needed only a time and place to give it to him.

She kept texting him, but he didn't respond. Maybe his phone was broken. But how else to reach him? There were only a few school days before the Christmas break. Finding him in the crowded hallways was chancy. Besides, she followed his lead at school and never spoke to him. The relations.h.i.+p was their little secret.

She knew that after cla.s.ses he had indoor track practice. So she decided to wait outside the gym and "accidentally" b.u.mp into him. Standing in the hallway, holding the wrapped present, she looked away as the other kids pa.s.sed-the "hot" girls in their designer clothes; the thick, sculpted jocks; the hipsters in black-framed gla.s.ses and funky hats; the sour-faced, deeply emotional types in ragged black T-s.h.i.+rts and studded earrings. Some of them she had seen for four years without exchanging a word. But that was how high school worked; it issued a verdict and you behaved accordingly. The verdict on Sarah Lemon was too smart, too fat, too weird-so few kids bothered to talk to her. She had been counting down the months to graduation until Ethan came along. Ethan, amazing Ethan, who dared to defy her verdict. He wanted her. Someone wanted her. She felt so grown-up now, having him as a boyfriend. She wanted to brag.

She spotted two girls she had known since the third grade-Eva and Ashley-walking toward her in clingy striped tops and the kind of tight jeans Sarah could never squeeze into. They glanced her way and she reflexively looked at her feet. Inside she was yelling, Guess who I'm waiting for? But then her phone rang-the harsh, heavy-metal guitar riff, the ring tone signaling her mother-and as Sarah quickly flicked it silent, she heard Eva and Ashley laughing.