Timekeepers

They came with clocks, faces so bright they promised a future without shadows. They said our heartbeats were inefficient, a messy, organic rhythm, a wasted resource.

Their proposal was simple: a small, silent port installed just above our ribs. In exchange for our surplus beats, the frantic ones from running for the bus, the slow ones from a long sleep, they would give us Time. Real time. Accurate, clean, and universal.

Our mayor, a man whose own heart beats like a nervous bird, called it progress, a chance to finally synchronize our village with the pulse of the modern world. He signed the contract that said our heartwood was now their property.

We don’t really feel the loss. Just a quiet hum where the feeling used to be.

But this morning I saw my father holding his new clock to his ear, eyes closed, listening, as if trying to remember the sound of a song he wrote himself.