Time Lifts the Light

I swallowed hard. There had been a large lump growing in my throat since I'd woken up this morning and pulled D.B. Hawkins' pocket watch out of my drawer.

The hands were frozen. I listened for whirring or ticking, but there was only sterile silence. It was eerie... There was something almost magical about it; a gentle vibration that didn't seem to come from within the watch, but rather from within my heart whenever I was holding it. It buzzed with secrets that were close to being revealed.

"D.B." I said out of the corner of my mouth.

He was painting. He had unintentionally smeared a dollop of blue paint onto his sleeve. Ms. Perry was up at the front of the classroom, working at her desk. Tiny rectangular glasses were perched on the tip of her nose; they made her look quite old.

Daniel jumped, clutching his heart. He looked over at me, surprise and confusion in his face.

"What?"

I worked up what little courage I had at the moment.

"I need to talk to you."
He sighed and cast a longing glance down at his work, the picture of Kim and Mikey in dress-clothes on top of an old car. "Can't it wait?"
"No. It's about..." I tried to phrase it in a way that would be vague and meaningful at the same time. "It's about your pocket watch," I whispered.

The eyebrow with the scar in it cocked up a notch.

"What do you know about my watch?" he asked, turning back to his painting and pretending to be amused.

But behind the weak smile, there was something new. Fear welled up in his eyes.

"I... I need to talk to you," I repeated, well aware that the girls in front of us had stopped chatting to listen in on our hushed conversation.

Suddenly, D.B. swirled his paintbrush in the red paint near his elbow and swiftly wiped it on my upper lip. I gasped and raised my fingers to my nose. The turpentine smell hit my head like a sledgehammer. Wincing, I gasped and accidentally snorted some of the watery paint up my nose. I sputtered and nearly coughed up the contents of my stomach.

"Oh, shit!" D.B. yelled over my choking. "Aw, Ms. Perry, India's got a nosebleed!"

He'd gotten my name wrong.

The entire class turned around to look at me. My eyes were watering from the coughing and from the smell of the paint. I guess I looked pretty miserable, because Ms. Perry had a mildly disgusted look on her face. D.B. caught me around the waist and tugged me out of the room.

"I'll take her to the nurse!" he called over his shoulder as we sped out into the hallway.

Once we'd gotten around the corner, D.B. pulled his shirtsleeve over his hand and made a fist. He carefully wiped the paint from my upper lip and tried not to laugh at me. Then, he reached into his pocket and tugged out three candies wrapped in gold crinkly paper.

"Want one?" he offered casually as I sniffed and continued to wipe at my nose. The strong smell just wouldn't go away. I shook my head.

"Let's walk," he said quietly.

We began walking aimlessly though the expansive Art Wing. We passed by classrooms for numerous creative activities that only rich schools could afford to fund. Jewelry Making. Interior Design. Abstract Photography.

D.B. pulled the shiny paper off one of the candies he was holding and held the creamy brown butterscotch in his teeth. He tucked the paper in the edge of a framed portrait of James Monroe.

"I think the old bastard is sort of creepy." He nodded to the painting, speaking thickly around the candy in his mouth. "I don't see why we've got to have his portrait in every hallway. I mean, I know our school's named after him, but..."
"D.B.," I said quietly, trying to remind him that we'd just ditched class to discuss the watch.

"Now, if our school was named after Brad Pitt, we'd have a whole different story."
"D.B.," I said again. It felt awkward using his name for some reason.

He smiled and skipped a bit ahead of me, turning around so that he was walking backwards, facing me. He clearly knew what I was talking about... He just wanted to stall.

"I know what you're thinking," he teased with a knowing smile. The hard candy clicked against his teeth as he talked. "You're thinking, now why does that silly boy like Brad Pitt? Everyone knows that Brad Pitt is for girls. Well, Iris, you are very rude." He'd gotten my name wrong. Again. "You should have seen him in Fight Club. He was the epitome-"
"D.B., I really need to talk to you about the-"

He suddenly bit through the butterscotch. It made a hideous crunching noise that forcefully reminded me of a breaking bone. It sent an unexplained shiver up my spine and I immediately felt very intimidated.

"About... about th-the -- the..." I stumbled.

When I looked up, D.B. was gone. He had pushed his way through the double doors at the end of the hallway. I followed close behind and only struggled slightly with the weight of the heavy wooden doors that smelled like rich oak.

James Monroe Private High was separated into Wings. Each Wing was a separate building, and each building was connected by a small, decorative gravel path lined with carefully placed flowers and sculptures.

D.B. was walking up ahead on the path, scuffing his feet and kicking up the fine white dust that clung to the gravel.

"You were in my room, you know," I called out to him wildly, hanging back by the door.

He stopped moving. But his spine straightened a fraction of an inch. He had heard me.

"You knew me. You recognized me," I continued, quieter.

The watch was warm from being in my pocket all day. I took it out and rubbed my thumb over the "D.B.H." inscribed on the front.

He turned around, his head inclined to the ground. It was clear that he was very uncomfortable; he began shifting back and forth on his feet.

"Just come here and look at it," I pleaded, trying to keep the desperate edge out of my voice.

Slowly, hesitantly, he started walking. His fingers fiddled with the frayed hem on his button-up shirt. The blob of blue paint had mixed with the red that he'd wiped off my nose. It had molded into a sickly looking purple-ish brown. When he reached me, he took the watch from me, looked it over quickly, and blinked heavily.

"Nope. Not mine," he said, out of breath.
"What?"
"Never seen this."
I squinted at him, anger welling up in my stomach. "What's the big idea?" I demanded.
"There's no big idea." He raised his hands, palms out. "No small ones, either. Absolutely no ideas here. If you don't believe me, just ask my mother. I'm entirely devoid of-"
"If it's not yours, then why are you putting it in your pocket?"

He sighed and scuffed his toe on the ground.

"It's got your initials on it!" I protested rather loudly. "And I saw you take one that looked exactly like it out of your pocket the other day!"
"They look the same because they are the same," he mumbled.

My mouth felt dry. I wanted to cough, but I couldn't gather enough air.

"Well, fundamentally the same," he said, avoiding my eyes. "Chronologically, though... Now, that's a different story."

"Daniel," I said slowly. I had nothing to say afterward. It was an impulse, used to fill the stretch of confused space between by brain and my tongue.

He reached into his jacket pocket and removed another watch, holding it up to my face. I could smell the copper sting of the metal. My shallow breath fogged up the smoothly polished surface.

"This watch," he said slowly. "Is the same as this watch."

He held up the other, frozen watch. My watch.

"Except this watch," he shook his own, the original. "Is four months younger."

He held them up, side-by-side, and softly smiled.