The Price of the Clock

You hear the soft click of a polished clock. Its gleaming golden hands mark yet another minute as the sound echoes faintly in the dim room. Strange how this antique, resting above the fireplace, represents far more than just time. It holds your secret. It ticks for both your worlds.

It begins now, in the present, as your work uniform itches against your skin. The cafe’s busy clatter surrounds you, orders shouted, counters wiped, coins clinking into cash registers. Yet, amid this din, your worries don’t focus on the impatient queue. You’re thinking about the evening ahead, when your life shifts into a quieter but more demanding rhythm.

Two years earlier, your family had moved into the crowded Rowell estate. The glossy magazine covers in the convenience store down the road contrasted deeply with the weed-choked playgrounds and peeling wall paint of your neighbourhood. But you couldn’t stay trapped in comparisons. Tomorrow’s meal depended on today’s hard labour, and your parents needed your extra income—a grim reality you accepted far too quickly.

But they never suspected that the tired teenager leaving for work in the morning slipped into grand mansions every evening as a violin teacher. At fourteen, your double life began by chance and became necessity. There, in hushed halls under crystal chandeliers, children with names longer than your grocery lists squirmed through your lessons. Their parents sat in adjoining rooms, discussing vacations you could scarcely imagine. You nodded along as if your reality mirrored theirs, the violin acting as your bridge between the worlds.

“Lift your bow higher,” you’d correct gently to a distracted pupil. Yet in those instructions, you often spotted your own reflection: reaching, aspiring, yearning. You clung to those moments of guiding others to feel hopeful. By the time your single lesson ended, your legs ached from standing after a full day earlier, but your mind hummed with an odd satisfaction—the sustenance your soul needed beyond physical exhaustion.

The violin, though beautiful, was heavy. With each note you played, you felt guilt pressing you further down. How could you enjoy even these glimpses of elegance when at home, your younger siblings waited for you in the dim light, their laughter subdued and cheeks pallid? The weight of dual responsibility often robbed your thoughts of peace—and yet, quitting this work wasn’t an option.

Yesterday, the child you taught abruptly asked, “Why do you wear the same shoes all the time?” While you managed a vague reply, her question lingered. Did they see through your facade? Or were those words harmless, the spontaneous musings of a child unshackled by tact? Regardless, they tugged at you—reminding you how fragile a lie could be.

Your current shift in the cafe feels like an eternal clock ticking. Each customer resembles an image from a photo album placed upside-down—familiar yet distant. Sunlight filters through the glass panes, only to sharpen your awareness of inequality. The light mocks you, so achingly bright it strikes like a silent question: Who deserves this warmth? It pierces like the strings that hum beneath your fingers by night, as if the day and night were conspiring against you together.

And yet today, something subtle changes. A letter stuffed under your welcome mat this morning still sits untouched in your bag. The envelope, adorned with your name, didn’t originate from a utility company or overdue payment reminder. This time, it carried an embossed insignia from a local arts conservatory. Somehow, someone had noticed—not the waitress nor the quiet teacher but the musician beneath. In your moments of solitude, those precious hours whisper of hope.

Later, inside the living room back home, your mother folds laundry silently. You finally unfold that letter, and as you carefully read its words, warmth spreads across your chest. “Scholarship opportunity” glows under the light above you. Your heart threatens to leap while fear anchors it. Could you, a secret violinist who juggled such roles, ever belong on this grander stage? Would the clock ticking above the fireplace, grown too familiar, finally tell a time worth cherishing?