Author's Note:
I still appear to be deciding whether these little shorts should be in chronological order or not.
I imagine learning to be a responsible timekeeper is hard.
Mental Tick
(or: The Boy Who Leaped)
A fanfic by Pseudinymous
Therapy
"You know this isn't normal, don't you?"
Jane the therapist was looking at Clockwork with bug-eyed curiosity, flicking her irises as she scanned the small child. But he looked back at her with utmost innocence, wearing his very best whatever-are-you-talking-about face, taunting what they both knew.
"It's just a tick," said Clockwork. "I don't mind it."
She pursed her lips at him, and sat forward. "Just because you don't mind it, doesn't mean it's not serious. Did your doctor check you out for hearing problems?"
"It's not something you hear."
"So, it comes from inside your head?"
"Not really."
"Then where?"
Clockwork looked pensively for a moment, and then ran his eyes around the room, which was infinitely more interesting than the therapist could ever hope to be. There was a potted plant that could probably use a drink. An air conditioner that barely worked. And an old, chunky computer that looked like it had been taken straight out of the Cretaceous period.
"Adam?"
"What…?" said Clockwork.
"Adam, you need to answer my question."
"About, uhh…"
"About where that ticking noise comes from."
This therapist had the patience of a stone. She was staring at him levelly, still sitting forward now, and trying to lock eyes so that he couldn't direct his gaze away. The technique worked surprisingly well. Clockwork tried to twist his head to face something else, but it felt as if permanently directed at her, stuck in position by imaginary bounds. Meanwhile, the ticking went on inside, and as much as he was tempted to let himself be taken away by it, he couldn't do that now.
"It's just a part of me, I don't know. I said it doesn't matter."
Jane sat backwards, eyebrows furrowing. Was she becoming perhaps a hint decomposed?
"Sometimes, Adam, symptoms like this can be indicative of the early onset of a few different mental disorders. Doesn't that worry you?"
But Clockwork was rather sure he didn't have any mental disorders. Maybe he was crazy and didn't really know it, but the ticking seemed more like a special kind of gift that he didn't really know how to use, just yet — not something that was deserving of being squinted at by a shrink. After all, he still functioned like a normal human being, for the most part…
"Doesn't dying of cancer worry you?" said Clockwork, all too suddenly.
Wait, something was wrong. Those words weren't even in his head, so how had they managed to get out of his mouth? And why was she looking at him with white-faced shock?
The therapy session with Jane didn't last too much longer.
"Don't you dare ever say that to anyone!"
Clockwork looked up at his mother shyly, as she dragged him across the road towards the carpark.
"I can't believe you did that! This is just… ugh, she was trying to help you, Adam!"
"It's not my fault I was right," Clockwork protested, but his mother was giving him a sharp look with narrowed eyes when they reached the pavement on the other side, and he decided quickly to be quiet.
She shook her head. "What am I going to do with you? You're eight. You shouldn't act like this."
Clockwork didn't know what to say, so he just kept walking, which seemed like the safest option. Maybe he should pretend that the incessant ticking wasn't there anymore, just so she would calm down and stop trying to send him to therapy.
"I can't believe it turned out she really did have cancer…" his mother continued. "You're such a complete sod, sometimes."
Clockwork wasn't quite sure what being a complete sod meant, although it seemed like something not particularly positive, given the context in which it was used. So he did what he did best as a child; he ignored it. His mother gave a strangled expression of frustration at his indifference, and decided that the solution was to keep going.
"Aren't you worried at all about what might happen if you don't get this ticking thing addressed?"
"No." said Clockwork.
At this, she finally rolled her eyes and gave up.
"I'm getting you referred to a proper psychologist. And no more cheek, next time!"
"No more cheek, next time." Clockwork mimicked.
"I mean it! Nothing like that tone you're taking with me now! I'm not just some authority figure for you to blindly ignore, I'm your mother! Believe it or not, I do want what's best for you."
"I know you do."
Clockwork's mother opened the car door for him, a concerned expression spread across her face, but she gestured to the seat. "Good, get in."
He didn't bother to say thanks. His mind was already lost in too many other things.
"Time isn't constant…" said Clockwork, thoughtfully. "It's like… like, all over the place. If you took time and thought about it in your head, it would be kind of like, uhh, getting a piece of paper, screwing it all up, and throwing it on the table. That's what it'd look like."
Jane sat forward again, looking into Clockwork's eyes and sorely wishing she was subject to any other patient. But no one was able to see him as quickly as his mother wished him to be seen, because the referral process just took too long. And - well, admittedly there was a bit of a cash incentive, too.
"Why do you think it looks like that?"
"Because that's the way it is," said Clockwork, very sure of himself for someone who hadn't the faintest trace of evidence. He tore a piece of paper from his notebook while he waited for the therapist's response, and he scrunched it up and threw it on the table.
"You seem very certain." said Jane.
Clockwork nodded. He had thought about that slip of his tongue a lot since their last visit, and somehow, somewhere, he had come up with this model. "It looks like this," he reassured her, as he began to tap at the little folds. "And if this piece of paper was the part about you, you getting cancer would be here, you getting better would be here, and you dying would be here."
Jane usually gave confectionary to children at the end of a session, but Clockwork never found out about that.