“Out of time?” The silky female voice wafted over the office speakers like overpowering perfume, breaking Garrett’s concentration. “Why not buy some?” Her syrupy pitch continued, motivational music beginning to gear up. “At the Department of Time, we know how busy a day can get—”
“Sure you do.” Garrett jabbed at his delete key. He smirked across the shared desk as his coworker Damien lip-synced to the all-too-familiar ad.
“…so why not add a little leverage to your game? Think of what ten minutes, an hour, or even half a day could do for your goals!” Damien began batting his eyelashes as a “grateful recipient of DOT’s services” shared her testimonial. “I was able to cram for my finals with the extra hour I bought,” Damien flapped his hands as he mouthed, “and I ACED my test! Thank you, DOT!” The closing jingle bounced off beige and white walls like a frenetic June bug, and several coworkers groaned in unison.
Garrett sipped his latte and pulled the corners of his mouth back in a grimace. “What college student has that kind of money?”
“The entitled ones, Garrett!” Damien quipped, his voice squealing like a teenage girl’s. Returning to his normal tone, he shrugged. “Her daddy prob’ly bought it for her.”
Garrett rubbed his temples and tipped his swivel chair toward Damien as the four o’clock news began to buzz.
“I mean, it’s just criminal what they’re charging for time these days!” Garrett tipped the latte back and gulped down the remaining liquid.
“And payin’ for it.” Damien mumbled, and his grin went out like a birthday candle. He leaned in and spoke under his breath, eyes tracking the steel-gray area carpet. “Yuri…sold a week last month.”
“What?!” Garrett’s voice cracked and he shoved his chair out and away from his monitor. “I told him if things got tight to hit me up!”
“Man,” Damien raised his hands up, “the dude’s a husband. And a dad. Can you see him beggin’ for cash from you? You realize how humiliatin’—?”
“Better that than time selling!” Garrett threw himself back in his chair, eyes glazed with pained frustration. He toyed with his mouse, lips taut. He pointed at Damien. “A whole week, Damien! What could he have done with that? Taken his family on a camping trip, started that novel he’s been planning on writing for years—”
“Man, I know all that,” Damien interjected softly, glancing up at the pathetic excuse of a skylight before reaching over to clasp a hand on Garrett’s shoulder. “He had mentioned things were tight, but I thought…” Damien shrugged, releasing his hold. “If I had known, I would have stopped him. Kira let me in on it…she broke down in the middle of the store.” He sighed and spun around in a slow circle. “Thinks it’s her fault with her postpartum problems and unpaid work leave…”
Garrett clenched his armrest. He felt a neck muscle twitch, like a guitar string wound too tightly and ready to snap. The mental image of Kira crying burned like a brand on his mind, and he lost any desire to comply with HR rules of office etiquette. He kicked his leg out, dress shoe slamming into the desk leg with a bang. His monitor rattled, Damien’s vibrating like an alarm clock. His female coworkers gasped behind him, but Garrett just clenched his jaw and shook his head. “This blasted economy!” Garrett spat out with a savage growl. “Yuri will get a pittance for that week, and then the bureaucrats at DOT will turn around and make a fortune on it. And they know,” he continued with an agonizing look at Damien. “They’ll find someone desperate enough to make them that fortune! It’s just twisted!” Garrett’s gut felt just as warped. “It’s a scam,” he muttered, playing with the watch on his wrist. “And we all buy into it.”
He heard Damien take a breath, then give up on whatever he was going to say and hunch over their desk again, his Afro bobbing like a tumbleweed in a breeze. Garrett exhaled and eased back in his chair, glancing at the reflection on his screen. His face was nearly as red as his hair, but he couldn’t tell which emotion was contributing to the skin tone; rage or embarrassment. He took a covert glance around the office, but his other coworkers were studiously avoiding eye contact and sat in their chairs like mute soldiers.
Shaking his head slightly, Garrett thudded out a line of code on his keyboard. He heard a chirp from his DOT watch and he glared at the timepiece. A system update again. The oblong screen swirled with blue and green spirals, before revealing the grand total of time in his bank: Zero Hours. What a genius idea, he stewed inwardly. Invent a watch that doesn’t tell the time, just reminds you of the time you could have, but don’t. He twisted the cold chain link strap around his wrist and snuck a look at the clock on the wall, then back at his watch. Just you wait, you freak tool of corruption. You’ll stop mocking me after today.
Damien suddenly chuckled, and Garrett shifted his gaze to his monitor with a guilty jerk. “Man,” Damien snickered, “my cousin bought a half hour last week, planned to use it at the beach—”
“I can see where this is going.” Garrett cracked his knuckles and sighed in relief that he hadn’t been caught daydreaming.
“The minute she activates her DOT watch, it starts pourin’!”
“Oww!”
“Yeah, spent her precious minutes inside, cryin’ on her socials.” Damien snickered again but shuddered at the same time. “Last I heard, half an hour gonna cost you a month’s wages.”
“And an hour is nearly two months’,” Garrett murmured.
“Yeahhh, good math there, bud,” Damien drawled.
Garrett heard the tone deflection, the slight lilt upwards that signaled Damien was on his case. Psychoanalyzing him again. Biting his lower lip, Garrett started typing gibberish into a command prompt. Was he sweating through his shirt? He half reached to check, then stopped. Best to not give Damien any more ammo. But Damien didn’t know, right? About the…you know? The room was getting way too hot. Garrett popped a button loose from his collar, giving a weak grin to Damien. The smile did it. The fatal slip up. Damien yelped and banged their desk with an open palm and Garrett jumped like a jack-in-the-box. “Sweet Georgia Brown, you bought an hour, didn’t you?! An hour?! You ain’t gonna spend an hour on that girl, are ya?!”
Garrett extended his arms like a falcon in attack mode, fingers curled. “Lower your voice! IT’s around the corner!!” That was all he needed at this point. One of those coffee chugging sycophants trundling in, glued to his headset, ready to add their two cents with painstaking detail.
Damien rolled his eyes and tilted forward in his seat. “How much time do you need, man?”
Garrett exhaled like a breaching whale. “How am I supposed to know? How’d it go the first time you talked to Brynley?”
Damien grinned and flexed his eyebrows.
“Thanks, that look says it all,” Garrett growled, fiddling with his DOT watch.
“Boy, you shoulda been there!” Damien chortled. “I walked up to her while she was printin’ invoices and served her a compliment ‘bout her dress. Told her it went well with her eyes.”
Garrett’s brow creased. “Bold move.”
“Fortune favors the brave, Gar!” Damien rolled his shoulders back and struck a pose. “It took all of ten minutes to convince her we should hang out more often.” He smiled dreamily. “It’s been six glorious months.”
“Well, I’m sorry Mr. Silver Tongue, but I don’t have your talents.” Garrett felt for his watch and glared at the clock. It was nearly time… “And Brynley works in this department. Reese is stuck in customer service purgatory, never takes lunch at her desk, and gets picked up by her sister. You ever tried to make the first move when your girl’s sibling is within earshot? It’s third wheeling before she’s even an official third wheel! Not to mention her sister is never late. It leaves me no room…”
“Intercept her man!” Damien exclaimed, eyes wide. “Scratch DOT, ya don’t need it! Walk up to her as she’s leaving to eat and tell her you know of a charmin’ little cafe where—”
“Damien, please! You make it sound like I’m Cary Grant! You know what I’d come off as if I said that? Like a charming Walmart greeter dude, I can’t pull that act off.” Garrett straightened and held up a hand to fend off any more suggestions. “No, I’ve got it all figured out. I can talk, but I need time to warm up. I’ll fill up my DOT watch at the ATM outside the building and activate it as Reese comes out.”
“Make sure she’s in your watch’s Range of Influence,” Damien warned. “She moves before you start your time and you’ll be spendin’ that sweet hour alone.”
“You think I haven’t gone over every angle?” Garrett shot back and shoved Damien’s chair under the desk with a foot. “I’ll be waiting there ten minutes early right by the door.”
Damien’s grin expanded till he looked like a caffeinated Great White, his head bobbing up and down. “Most Romantic Man of the Year, y’all!”
“What part of quiet do you not understand?” Garrett hissed, sneaking a harried look at the region of the IT department. Nobody stirred, and he sighed. “Yeah well, fingers crossed I’m not the Most Romantic Fool of the Year by the end of today.”
***
The stiff spring breeze tumbled around the edge of Garrett’s company building, cutting through his jacket and making him shiver. He jogged down the steps, replaying the plan like a favorite movie in his head. Ten minutes early, hit the button, talk. Should he have bought a rose or something? Nope, Reese wasn’t the flower type. He continued his light jog a half block away to the ATM machine. His DOT watch numbed the wrist it was on like he was wearing an ice pack, its individual metal links sliding up and down like a metallic snake’s chilly scales. He felt it thrum with impatience as he came to a halt and began punching in banking information. He tried not to look at the grand total as it flashed before him, and sighed in relief when the transaction went through with a spine-tingling chime.
“Position your DOT watch to the transfer screen to receive your time deposit,” the machine intoned. With a flash, a shining green square appeared with the words “HOLD HERE” blazing inside it.
“Alllrighhhty, now, you’ve got this,” Garrett whispered. Reese was worth this and more. All he wanted was to give her his time for the rest of his life, if he could only be sure she wanted it. Garrett blinked hard and then extended his right arm to the screen, keeping his eyes glued to the square and praying he didn’t miss and tick off the system.
“Hon, please don’t cry, ‘kay? No no honey, please don’t.”
Garrett felt his neck flush as a lady’s quiet sobs glanced off his ears. Turning, he saw a woman bury her head in a young man’s chest, shoulders jerking like windtorn laundry on a clothesline. Her brown curls whipped in a contrary gust of wind, and her companion caught at them, winding them carefully through his fingers and holding them down against her red trench coat. Her coat stood out like a poppy against his military uniform, blotchy with mossy greens and grays.
Garrett sighed through his nose and stared at the solider’s watch. About as empty as his, more than likely, with the guy’s wife carrying on like that. How old were they even, early twenties? He gazed on the scene awkwardly, finding nothing else to slide his attention to.
The soldier laughed gently and caught another stray curl, and Garrett recalled Reese’s springy blonde ones. His neck went warm at the thought, and he rubbed at it like he could make it disappear.
“Isla, we knew I had to leave today, right?” the soldier pleaded in a hoarse murmur. Garrett couldn’t hear an answer. Just a fluttery inhale and exhale.
“Babe, we had such a beautiful weekend, let’s enjoy the last few minutes.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Garrett saw the man pull a tissue from his combat trousers and gently wipe his wife’s face, making her giggle shakily with his clumsy attempts.
Garrett’s heart raced; what he wouldn’t give to wipe Reese’s tears away, and keep them from ever coming back again.
“It’s gonna be alllright hon,” the soldier whispered, rubbing the small of his girl’s back and rocking her, keeping the tissue pressed to her cheek.
“Session expiration in five minutes,” a soulless voice warned. Garrett jumped, whipping his head back to the ATM screen. There went the countdown, a few minutes before the transaction was cancelled. Reflections of camo and leather mingled with the LCD glow of the transfer screen. Garrett’s hands shook as he raised his watch up again, eying the square. It was still flashing, almost in sync with the gentle love song Isla’s soldier was singing into her ear. The kind you might slow dance to. Slow dancing under the stars, wouldn’t that be heaven…
Garrett pulled his watch back and slowly exhaled. “Hey man,” he croaked out, turning around and tipping his chin at the soldier.
The man looked up and around before settling his gaze on Garrett.
“Yeah,” Garrett attempted a grin, though his face felt like putty. “Know how these things work? Could you help me out?”
“Oh, umm…” The soldier glanced at his wife, who raised her tearstained face and pursed her lips at Garrett, eyebrows cocked. “Yeah, sure,” he finished with a short nod and let her go before trotting over to Garrett. He peered at the screen and hummed. “It, it looks fine to me.” The solider lifted his hand to shield the ATM screen from the glare— Garrett snatched his arm and held his watch clad wrist to the transfer square.
Garrett flinched as the soldier threw up his other arm in a closed fist. But he kept his grip until he heard the transaction chime. There was a pulsating buzz, and the soldier quit resisting. He snapped his attention to his DOT watch, eyes wide. Slowly, he looked back at Garrett.
“Enjoy, ok?” Garrett urged with a flimsy smile, stuffing his hands into his jacket pockets.
The soldier peered into his face, mouth open and working to form a response. “Thank you,” he finally whispered, shock more than anything else filling his voice.
Garrett just nodded back curtly. He didn’t want the civil war of emotions to come tumbling out with a rush and the wrong words.
The soldier extended his hand.
Garrett shook it, nodding briskly. Then he shoved his hand back in his pocket and wheeled around, striding back to the office with a hurried step.
***
Garrett sat down on the curb, his stomach still free-falling from the height he felt he had just dived from. A white SUV idled nearby, its driver waiting. He stuck his hands in his jacket pockets and imagined Reese descending in the elevator, her golden curls bouncing in the slight draft as the doors slid open, heels clicking on the tiled lobby as she made her way to the entrance. She’d be wearing her wool cardigan, the one that always set off her blue eyes like they were sapphires.
She’d smile at Ricardo the security guard, who’d hold open the door for her, and then she’d be standing on the sidewalk.
Garrett jumped up from his position as she glided past. He cleared his throat, and Reese turned from the passenger door of her sister’s SUV with a half smile of surprise. “Hey,” Garrett began with a cough, eyes tracking her shoes before making it all the way to her face. “Do you— Do you have some time?”
Cover art by Levi Matthews
Connect on Instagram @levimatthews.artist or on his website, LeviMatthewsArtist.com.
This was such a fun story to write, and I’m so happy it’s found a permanent home on the Pearl!
Oh my goodness I loved that so much! Great story Hannah!
Thank you Emily! Glad you enjoyed it!