stop the clock

I

Leila

I'm not big on people, never have been. I've never liked their bothersome questions, their apparent need to fill silence with sound. It's especially the sound I dislike, but so many human habits annoy me in so many ways. The psychiatrists and their fellow brain-researchers have taken a crack at me but why should I speak to them? I don't need help, I'm perfectly fine the way I am.

Maybe my dislike of people was enhanced upon the discovery that I could stop them. Stop them from talking, Stop them from moving, stop them from thinking, from feeling, from bothering me or anyone else whenever I feel like it. I'm not referring to murder, I'm not that screwed up, though the thought has crossed my mind maybe too many times. No, I have some sort of power, I've got no clue where it came from or when I got it, but I can stop time. That's it. Just freezing everyone but myself, I could travel the world that way, taking in the frozen life of everything on the planet. Leaves trapped mid-fall, people permanently turning a page, dogs barking motionlessly. Things don't move unless I move them and it can stretch for however long I wish. I think that makes me older than normal aging would have you believe, but I choose not to consider such silly things as age and the passage of time in my private, perfect world.

I remember the first time it happened: it was late September, I was around fifteen and I'd already exhausted my tolerance for people though it was early in the school day. Needless to say, I had few friends. The math teacher was going on about something or another and my classmates, my ever talkative classmates, were jabbering to each other as if unconcerned by the school setting. I dropped my head onto my desk and willed them to stop. I wanted the birds outside to stop their tuneless and ear-piercing calls, the teacher to end her boring drivel and, most of all, my classmates to cease their constant conversation. and suddenly, poof! It happened. Everyone fell silent. I remember being confused: the teacher hadn't shouted and my class wasn't the type to fall silent without motive. I looked up and was shocked by what I saw. Mouths frozen half open, clouds still as a painting across the blue sky, a bird trapped alighting a branch. And I laughed. I'm no idiot, I knew this wasn't just some practical joke from my dull-humored classmates. No, I had done something. I had willed it to stop and... it had! I went all over town that day, looked everywhere and tested the limits of this newfound motionless universe. Finally, when I'd done everything I felt I could legally do (not that I could get caught) I headed back to my school and sat down at my desk, dropping my head back onto the wooden surface. I was elated, but I managed to calm my racing mind and focus on the usual roaring chatter and argument, on the teacher's useless cries, on the birds' loud squawking. I pictured it, I told myself it was there and it was. I got the hang of it immediately. That one time was all it took. I barely go a day without pausing time now.

I'm sitting on a swing at a near-abandoned playground, listening to music as loud and tasteless as I wish. None of the children or their parents will ever know I came here and therefore I see no point not coming. I have a sandwich and a juicebox in hand, enjoying my alone time. I take a bit of my sandwich and rock back and forth on my swing. I've never gotten bored of it. In the twenty years since my discovery of this little trick of mine, not once have I tired of its wonder. I let go of my sandwich and grin as it hangs in place. Things only move as long as I'm doing it, the second I stop physically moving an object, it freezes wherever I happen to have left it. This law applies to everything I've tested so far. I can't drive cars because of their complicated engines, but I can ride a bike for as long as I wish and the tires would never go flat. As the swing moves back towards the sandwich I grab it and take another bite. When I've had my fill, I get off the swing, grab my speaker and place the remains of my meal in the trash can, careful that they shouldn't just hang there. It's not that it would make a difference, they'd fall the second I restarted time, I just don't like leaving things floating about. You never know. I walk down the crowded street and climb up onto the hood of a motionless car. I walk over the cars, careful not to step on any convertibles or roofs that seem like they may not enjoy my weight upon them and make my way to my workplace. But I don't want to. I don't want to leave my peace, my silent, motionless, compliant world. The only sound is my own footsteps and my music, things I can control at will. I've never tried stopping myself, I'm worried my thoughts may stop and I may never be able to restart the world and myself. I also don't mind myself, I'm my favorite type of company, my favorite person. I see no point stopping myself, if I'm the only person I actually like.

I climb off a minivan and walk down the block, not particularly careful to avoid people. They'll simply think they've tripped. I find myself walking past my dull office building and farther down the street, towards the large park. I'm going to my talking buddy. I didn't make the conscious decision, but I agree with my body: I need some practise communicating. My talking buddy is a statue at the center of the park. I like sitting beside it and talking, testing out words and phrases and things that might be said in real conversation. I try to memorize everything that seems correct so I can use it in conversation and not be out on a limb, scrabbling for words. It has a very nice face, despite being tinged green by age and rubbed golden by other people. Stupid people.
Next thing I know, I'm beside my buddy, leaning against it and speaking. I don't pour out my feelings, those are for me alone, I simply go over moments where I've been caught off guard by a demand or topic of conversation and fix the issues on my side, trying to plan for any situation so I will never be at sea when communicating. It's a skill I lack: frozen is what I think of as normal.
I'm talking, correcting myself, revising my words and perfecting my sentences until they're just right, prepared for conversation. I can do this for a while. I have no way of knowing what 'a while' is, whether it's a few hours or a few weeks, and I like that. Time isn't a concept I've ever properly wrapped my head around, why a certain amount of moments should be long whereas another not, and in my world I'm ruled by my own instinct. I sleep when I'm tired, I eat when I'm hungry, not clocks telling me when I should be doing what, just telling me what time I will be returning to.
After enough time I stand up, stretch, and walk back down the street to the raucous life I'm forced to lead outside of my quiet. I suppose I find something pleasant in it, or I'd never return. Maybe a little human contact does me some good. I suppose that makes sense, homo sapiens are social animals and, though I dislike it, conversation is possible only when there are people to converse with. So I trudge back to my office. I head up the stairs and go sit at my desk, turn off my music and prepare myself for the sudden sound that will surround me.
The sound. I focus on the lack of it, I focus on where it would be.

One.
Two.
Three.

It's like someone turned on a faucet and noise and movement rushed back into the world. I flinch, inevitably startled by the return of noise other than my own. It's not much, my office is rather quiet at this instant, but it's enough to shock me for a second or two. The ticking of clocks, the clicking of keys, the tapping of feet and the hushed conversation. I'm used to it. I'm used to returning to it. But I do miss my silence. I miss it greatly. My beloved, peaceful silence.