A Moment's Price (Incomplete)

A Moment's Price

It had taken Thomas a couple hours of pacing up and down the street before he finally found the shop he was looking for. He's already tried to cheat Death and bargain with Fate. And now he was getting desperate. And if there was a word to describe him, it was desperate. Honestly though, he might have been able to find it in half the time if he didn't need to spend every ten minutes hiding in an alley or ducking behind a car as he avoided the sirens. This was his final chance to save her, to put everything right. He couldn't spend that time behind bars.

Inside, the Timekeeper's store looked exactly how he thought it would: clocks of all sizes, shapes, and ages lined the walls and shelves. Timepieces made of wood, or brass, or glass, or steel or a combination of a bunch of different materials. Clocks from the size of gigantic sundials to the tiniest wristwatch. And all of it with a slight layer of settled dust. since it was basically the only setting of the story, you should've put more effort into describing the shop, I think.

"Do you sell time?" Thomas asked the old man behind the counter with desperation in his voice.

Father Time laughed. "Do I sell time?" he asked rhetorically. He gestured to the collection of clocks and watches around the shop. "It is literally my business. I sell it. I buy it. Hell, I'll even trade for it if you've got a particularly interesting piece." The elderly man smiled his best salesman smile, the kind of smile that curves the mouth but never reaches the eyes. This was honestly my favorite part. I liked his salesman spiel so much that no matter what, I refused to cut it.

Thomas slammed his palms on the glass countertop, rattling a couple of the clocks housed inside. "I don't give a shit about your clocks. I need time. Just enough to change one moment. To make everything right. Now, can you sell me some or not?!" Though he was visibly shaking and breathing heavy, Thomas managed to lock eyes with the other man. If he couldn't provide what Thomas needed, he didn't have the time to be wasting with him. Especially when he could still see the black-and-white's still patrolling up and down the street. In the original outline, this scene was a lot longer, with one point of action and a ton of dialogue. Unfortunately, cutting the dialogue meant cutting the action.

Father Time took a step closer to the glass counter and drew his elderly form to its full height. "Ahh, another mortal trying to cheat Death. Well, if it's a deal you want to make, then let's make a deal." He eyed Thomas, looking him up and down as if trying to assess his value from his disheveled appearance, his impatient demeanor. The old man snapped his fingers. "One moment in time in exchange for the rest of your time." Father Time extended a hand. "Deal?"

"No deal," Thomas said, angrily, "How am I supposed to live after I've changed everything if I've given you all my time?"

The old man gave a raspy laugh. "No, no. That isn't what I meant. I meant your remaining time in this timeline is what I want. When you go into the Moment, you'll enter a whole new timeline. It's just for continuity's sake. After all, I can't have someone living two different timelines, that would be cheating." Father Time kept his hand extended, the same smile Thomas saw when he walked into the shop was still on his face.

"Just to be clear, the deal is that I give you the rest of my current time so I can't return to it after I take your deal. When I get to the Moment, I want to stay in it as long as it takes until I can make the changes I want before continuing on the timeline." He glared Father Time. "That's the deal."

Father Time continued to smile. "That sounds okay to me. We just need to shake on it." He nodded toward his outstretched hand. I didn't like all this dialogue. Poor writing, or just lazy. I feel like I should've wrote more regarding the deal.

And Thomas took it. "Deal," he said and everything flashed white.

Thomas walked through his front door. I'm back, he thought, slamming the door behind him. He stumbled down the hallway, his movements sloppy and sluggish until he remembered he'd come from a bar that night. I don't even remember how much I had to drink that night. Tonight, he corrected himself as he finally got into the living room.

Crystal walked out of the their baby's room. She'd just put Isaac down in his crib, he remembered. "Shh," she said, putting a finger to her mouth. "I just got him to sleep." And right on cue, Isaac's screams tore through the house. After the night he had, Thomas had just wanted to come home and sleep.

"Shut the fuck up!" Thomas shouted. No, he didn't mean to say that. I'm hoping that surprised you. Yeah, it probably would've been better if Thomas was better described early on as an asshole. And he was but there was a lot to cut out from the original before posting it here. At the least, it would've made you suspicious (I'm hoping the cop cars did that)

Crystal moved back toward Isaac's room. "Hey, don't yell at him like that. He's just a baby."

Thomas felt his body lurch forward and grab Crystal by the shoulders. "Shut him up now, bitch!" he shouted as he shook her. No, he didn't mean it. She begged him to let her go. He begged his body to let her go. It wouldn't respond. He tried to say he was sorry, that it wasn't him, but couldn't get the words passed the constant string of profanities gushing from his mouth.

Looking to the mirror on his right, Thomas could see the fear quickly spreading on Crystal's face, a fear he'd seen dozens of times before. His face was crazed, manic. And a third face behind his, an old man smiling.

"Don't try to talk. You can't. Just listen," said Father Time as if standing right behind him, close enough that Thomas swore he could feel his breath on his neck. "You're probably wondering why you can't change anything? It was in the deal. I said that I would send you to the Moment. I guess I should've mentioned that you can't change the past."

Then came the punch. Thomas tried and tried, but no matter how much he focused, he couldn't stop it. He couldn't stop anything. He felt his arm rear back. He felt it streak forward. He felt his knuckles connect. He heard something crack as she fell to the floor. He descended onto her. Thomas continued to watch his fists fall upon her, horrified at what he was doing, at what he'd done. You can save her! he screamed soundlessly, You can stop all of this!

Father Time stood stoically behind him. "Save her? She's already dead. Besides, you're the one who made the wrong deal.There was a reason Sister Fate and Brother Death did not wish to assist you. Did you think that changing one moment was going to forgive you for everything else?" The old man smiled. "Perhaps you're just not trying hard enough?" he said as he faded away, leaving Thomas alone. He willed himself to stop, but nothing could stop the blows from falling. The screams had stopped and now only intermittent rhythm of flesh pounding flesh resounded through the room.

Thomas fell backwards, his glistening hands sticky with blood. He started to cry as he had when he'd killed his love the first time. He knew there was nothing he could do now. She was dead. He killed her. Again. It would be another half hour before Thomas stopped crying and ran. Ran to find someone who could help him, find someplace to escape to. Maybe this time he wouldn't though. Maybe this time he'd face his punishment. He closed his eyes. Holy shit, did you just write about domestic violence? Yeah, I felt sick after writing it, too. Which is probably why I rushed through this and it's such a piece of shit story. And why I needed to flush my brain with an hour of Kpop afterwards.

There was a flash of white and Thomas was back outside, opening his front door. What the hell, he thought as he slammed the door shut.

"Oh, did you forget the deal you made?" said a voice as it trailed him down the hallway into the living room. Thomas watched in horror as Crystal entered the living room. Shouts were made. Thomas' body advanced. "You want to stay in the Moment as long as it takes until you're satisfied with the outcome." A fist was thrown. Crystal and Thomas begged for it to stop. Another fist. Another scream. Another fist. Another scream. Crystal fell and Thomas' body fell along with it. Thomas' head filled with screams as he watched again. With that, Father Time disappeared, leaving Thomas trapped. Ending feels rushed. As if you just don't want to spend anymore time on it.



Once again, I got this story from the Reddit writing prompts subreddit, "Do you sell time?". But I decided to do something different this week, because I'm such a shitty writer. I guess I've just spoiled myself because the last two stories took a week each and I assumed I could keep rolling along like that. But it's already Wednesday, meaning I've spent a week and a half on a story I'm already sick of writing. I hit a bunch of blocks, a lot more than I'm used to, probably the most I've hit all month. Plus I psyched myself out reading what other people wrote before I finished mine (oh, they are great. If you've got time, check it out).
So, anyways, this piece feels incomplete. And by incomplete, I mean it's crap. I put in a bunch of notes throughout the story just to show my thoughts after re-reading it. I mean, I know what needs work, but I'm such a shit writer that I can't save this (or at least not at this time). One of the things I hated was that half the story was two guys talking, and that's it. Originally, it was 3/4ths of the story so I needed to cut that shit. I hate when there's a lot of talking, but nothing happening, just two dudes explaining the situation. Which sucks, because one of the cool things I had was that Thomas had made a deal with Sister Fate for immortality so he could cheat Brother Death and he was actually going to buy time from Father Time so save Crystal (obviously it still wasn't going to work). But I cut all of that in favor of length, and because, as I said before, way too much dialogue for my taste.
But that's enough of this crap story (I didn't even bother to put a cover picture). Unfortunately, I've hit this point of frustration in writing before and it's usually where I give up again. Well, I'll see if I can continue with this writing next week. Fuck.