'Tick Tock' by Jody Moller

Tick. Tock. My heart pounded out a congruent rhythm.

‘The watch is the clue.’ Those had been his words. But I couldn’t see it. To me it looked like an ordinary pocket watch. Ornate, old, tarnished. I turned it over in my hand.

Tick. Tock.

The hands were moving too fast. Time was running out.

How did it come to this? Here in this square, white room, the stench of disinfectant almost overpowering.

Rhetorical question. I knew how I got here. The sins of my past were a series of stepping stones leading to this inevitable end.

‘The watch is the clue.’

I resigned myself to the fact that I would never know the answer, closed my eyes and listened to the last few minutes of my life ticking away.

No wait, that was it!

Time. Time was the clue. Not the watch.

To be more precise, the passing of time.

Time heals all wounds. That’s what he’d meant. He was telling me that he forgave me my sins. Unforgivable as my sins were. He forgave me.

Another tick.

With an audible beep the plungers on all four syringes began their automated journey. Apple green liquid snaked its way toward my manacled hand.

I looked down at the watch, given to me by the father of my victim. A final absolution of my sins. Somehow its presence provided me with strength, quenched my fear.

Another tock.

I tightened my fingers around the pocket watch. It would all be over soon.