Hands Of Time [part 7-8]

The young woman inched her body towards the open window until her legs were pressed

against its ledge. I again screamed for her not to do what she was about to do.

But my pleas evaporated into the vacuum of expanse that lay between us. The girl

looked down to the child, one last look, and one last goodbye. Her arms

hesitatingly moved towards the open window, but move they did. Soon the baby was

hanging in the black night air, its only support, was mothers’ trembling

arms. “Drop it” I heard some voices call up, in unison, from the ground

below. “Please don’t!” I again yelled to her. I looked at the boy and wanted to

shake him for his unshakable selfishness. All he cared about was his pleasure,

freedom, and future. It was obvious that no other player then himself, in this sad

scene, was consuming his now so focused thoughts. As I watched what happened next I

wished that the young girl’s arms were as faithful to their task as this blasted

wire was that bound me. The wire would not let me go for any reason. In the blink

of an eye the three became two, the girl stood at the window silently weeping, head

down looking at the bundle below. Finally sensing that it was now safe to come to

the girl’s side the boy pulled himself away from his lonely corner and moved toward

her by the window. He spoke to her in an assuring tone, trying to convince the

young woman that what they had just done was all for the best. I could not keep my

mouth closed and barked insults at him. “What do you mean what ‘we’ just did”, I

heckled. “You hid in your corner and made her do it alone”, I hissed with venomous

contempt towards him. As I was about to open my mouth and let another torrent of

hateful verbal abuse pour out, I noticed something that caused me to press my lips

tight together.

Part 8

As the young man stood at the window he was closer to me now then he had been

earlier. With this closer position I could see his face more clearly now. Why did he

seem so familiar to me? I was sure that I had never crossed paths before with this

young stranger, who was now intruding my attic. So why then was there this fleeting

thought in my head that I knew him, that I had seen his face somewhere or at

sometime before? The answer to this question would eventually come to me but for the

time being it would remain out of my mind’s grasp, like the proverbial carrot

hanging before the working horse. In an instant another reality, one that was much

more concrete and urgent, replaced this allusive thought. “The child”! I cried aloud

to myself. The melodrama in my attic had reached its climax, I had been prevented

from joining the earlier acts of this play but maybe, just maybe, I could be an

actor in the last scene of this performance. Maybe I could prevent this play from

truly being, from what up to this point was classic tragedy. Once again I bolted

down the stairs, this time with a driving focus that fueled my body to move like it

has never moved before. In a flash I had hit the bottom of the stairs and continued

to propel past the grandfather clock, turned around the corner and dashed towards

the front door of my house. I was moving in such a fast paced frenzy that I did not

even have the chance to look into the face of Father time to see what he announced.

All I could think of was reaching my front yard and rescuing that child. I would

tell them that the child was not un-wanted, because I wanted it, and hopefully they

would listen and understand. My forward motion was halted, only momentarily, as what

I thought was my last obstacle to reaching the child stood before me. I quickly had

to apply the brakes to my legs to prevent me from slamming face first into the

inside of my front door. Once at the door my hands moved with lightening fast speed

to unlatch the two locks so as to remove that seemingly one last hindrance to my

final goal. Once the door was flung open, I shot out of it like a speeding bullet.

The four men were slowly making their way back to the van; they must have taken a

few last moments to finish their cigarettes and conversations before getting back

into the van with the sole reason for their little visit, in hand. I saw the object

of my hearts’ desire being held in the arms of one of these monsters and this only

enhanced my bodies’ speed and my heart’s determination to rescue the baby. As I flew

off my front porch I had only one thought coursing through my brain and that was the

all consuming conviction that I needed to save that child. Within a blink of an eye

I was upon my target, I was within a few feet of the soldier who was carrying the

child. I stretched out my arms to grab the child, thoughts of victory pulsing

through my mind, when all of a sudden disaster struck, and defeat was my only

consolation prize.

From an onlookers point of view I must have looked like a guard dog in hot pursuit

of its mark, reaching the length of its leash before it had a chance to sink in its

teeth. Instantaneously I went from what seemed like a hundred miles an hour down to

absolute zero. For one moment I could almost feel the warmth of the baby in my

arms, but in the next, everything went dark and silent.