Like Clockwork by Patrick de Moss Page A

not going to be hurt. Or scared. That was her rule.
Not anymore.
    “Evie ....”
    “ Now,” she said, and she was
shaking, but firm, and she meant it. And it knew.
    “Evie,” it said. “I’m sorry.” It was the
only time, she would think later, that Adam had used the word “I,” and that
would undo her. But only later.
    At the time, she only said, “Get out,” and
he went.
    She heard him walk through the living room,
heard him open the front door. She bit her lip to keep from calling him back. Not anymore, that tough Evie voice said to her, the one that now kept her safe from
men-like-him. Not anymore. He closed the front door behind him and he
was gone, and it was only then that she started crying. For being stupid, for
wanting to believe. For him and for her and everything else besides.
     
    She would dry her eyes later, and work on
being happy that he was gone. ‘He had been so weird,’ she would say in telling people
the story of ‘The Bad Boyfriend,’ or ‘The Tale of the Fling.’ She should have
known it was never going to work. She could never tell what he’d been thinking.
She didn’t even think he cared about her, about anything. Honestly, she
didn’t even know him that well. He was a pompous jerk.
    And they would nod and say, “Yeah.” And
Adam the Jerk grew and grew.
    But what she didn’t say, what she didn’t
tell ....
    Three months after he was gone, in the
fall, Evie had a message on her phone. It was short. It was simple. It was
three sentences, and when she heard it, she found herself on the floor of her
kitchen crying and shaking and wishing only for him to be there with her,
holding her. Because in those three sentences, interspersed with whirs and
clicks, she heard the clearing. She heard the woods where she found him, how
she’d met him, and the key. The key. The fucking key.
     
    She saw it then, as she hadn’t seen it the
first time, under his foot. Under his foot in the mud and she knew he hadn’t been abandoned there, hadn’t been lost or left behind. In her mind’s eye she
could see it, the truth of it with heartbreaking clarity, how he must have
pulled the key from his own chest and stood atop it, waited until he had wound
down and out and away, until Evie found him and brought him back to life.
    She saw him out there somewhere now, in a
world that could take him apart if it wanted to, and she was here , and
everything was all wrong. All wrong. And maybe it couldn’t be fixed. Maybe
nothing could ever be fixed. And she cried and she cried.
    “Come home,” she said to the empty
apartment, in a voice made low by weeping. “Come home .”
     
    She would never tell anyone how a robot, a machine had made her cry so much. She did not open that box, play that song for anyone
after, ever. Once, and once only was enough, more than enough for anyone.
     
    ###

About the
Author
     
    Poet,
Playwright, Producer, Director, Gravedigger, Hotline Psychic (no really) Line
Cook, Writer Patrick de Moss lives in the Vancouver area with his wife, Tanya
who did a marvelous job of the cover for this story, outdoing herself (and him)
in the process. He shares his life with her , two very
large (but friendly) dogs and two cats , his ghosts,
his reveries, and his memories.
     
    Connect with
me Online
    Drop me a
line at [email protected]. I’ll write back whenever I can.
    Also, stay
tuned - somehow I ended up getting the idea of
making a website for all this madness. Hope to see you there. Cheers.