The Clockwork Vendetta

Title pretty much says it..a vendetta against clocks. The story explains the details. This is written for my creative writing class.

Damn clocks. Not just any clock- that one.
The towering grandfather clock in my grandparents' living room, looming over the rest of the furniture with its glossy mahogany surface. The face smug with its gold details along the rim, spiraling around the nose that splits in half. The numbers can't be any numbers, but roman numerals. Because it's a classy clock, d****t. The long torso stretches to the creme carpet and digs its legs into the plush floor, in the midst of its middle there's a pain of glass. It has no heart- why would it? Just a swinging gold pendulum with a matching gold cylinder weight on its end. Swinging carelessly to and fro within its body, as its low tick-tock echoes in the room. It sits nicely by the front door, the light shining on an angle only hitting the left side of its face. I could almost see a smile from the reflection that was presented on the glass that protected its gold infested face, with its arrow-headed noses.

It stood almost as if it was better than the rest of us. Better than the humans that could speak and move, better than the bed that aided people into dreaming. Better than all of them.

The low metronomic beat rang out, and I only stood in front of it- waiting. For I knew what would come from the small square doorway that was squeezed into the grandfather clock's neck. A little wooden song bird, with its black pain chipping where the wings spread from the body. The wooden bird was always trapped in that giant bully, only receiving brief light on each our, for only seconds.
The nose jumped forth, and gave a quiet clank as it hit its mark above the roman numeral for two o'clock. The bird fled from its prison, jumping out and squawking-
"Coo-coo. Coo-coo. Coo-coo." Its monotonous call drowning out the tocks and ticks of the clock's swaying pendulum.
In a matter of seconds it was tugged back inside and with a sharp snap, the door shut tight.

Dishes clanked together as my grandmother was cleaning up the kitchen after the Christmas meal, and low chatter could be heard from inside the dining room. Good byes- that's all I caught.
"Bye Cass!"
"Yea, see ya." The face I just said good bye to made no appearance, the uncle and aunt just left, leaving only my family in the house along with my grandmother. The home smelled of day old roast beef and cigarette smoke, despite the fact my grandparents stopped smoking indoors. The stench still hung heavy in the air from the decades and numerous stick that were smoked. My toes curled under as my eyes followed the sway of the organ of the clock, clicking, ticking, and toking with each full swing.
"Thief." I murmured to the clock when I was sure no one could hear me talking to the object. "Thief." Once more- just so it knew what it was.
A thieving, conniving thing; this clock was. Drinking up minutes and seconds without us knowing until its chimes the hour and then- oh! That moment of realization that you have somewhere to be, some person to visit, some funeral to attend. The time just was stolen from you, it never goes by that quickly. Just. Stolen. By these damn clocks. The grandfather clock before me was guilty, it stole time away from this house. The thief stole time from my grandfather. With each swing of that very pendulum, it stole one second of his life until he had none left to spare.

With just one final tone- tick!
And he was gone.
Stolen. By these damn clocks; these damn thieves.

Author's Note

Okay, so I don't usually put my best into writing assignments for school- horrible, I know. But I wrote this piece for an upcoming assignment. I'm suppose to use only images, so if you could tell me the parts that didn't give you any images- it'd be appreciated very much!

Reviews

[Distant horizons]

I really liked his sory. many an alarm clock has been given a death sentence by me and this made me smile, thinking of you calling it a thief. I'd say it was very imadinative and everything in his was very descriptive. i'll give you an A plus :)