The Clock That Stopped at Midnight

The clock on the living room wall stopped at exactly 12:00 a.m. the night Anna died.

It was strange—eerie even. For twenty years, that clock had ticked steadily through laughter, arguments, celebrations, and sleepless nights. But the night the light left her eyes, time itself seemed to pause.

James noticed it the next morning. He was walking past the living room when he glanced up and frowned. Midnight. Still. He tapped it, shook it, even changed the batteries. Nothing. It remained frozen—like the world around him.

Anna had been his wife for thirty-four years. Their love wasn’t perfect, but it was real. They met in college when he spilled coffee on her books and she called him “an uncoordinated disaster.” He said her eyes were distracting. She rolled hers. A month later, they were inseparable.

When she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, it felt like the universe had punched him in the gut. But Anna, ever the fighter, smiled and said, “We’ve had more good years than most. Let’s not cry yet.”

They didn’t. Not at first. They cooked together, went on slow walks, watched old black-and-white films, and pretended the hospital visits were just annoying interruptions. But deep inside, they both knew.

The end came softly. No sirens, no panic—just a quiet exhale, and she was gone.

Now, James wandered through a house that felt unfamiliar. Her scarf still hung on the hallway hook. Her perfume still lingered on the pillow. Her laughter echoed in the corners of his mind. And the clock—still unmoving—mocked the stillness in his chest.

He couldn’t bring himself to move anything. The tea cup she last drank from remained on the kitchen counter. Her shoes sat by the door. Her knitting rested on the arm of her favorite chair, the yarn unfinished.

Friends visited. They brought casseroles and flowers, offered comforting words like “She’s in a better place,” and “Time heals all wounds.” James nodded politely, but inside he wanted to scream. Time hadn’t healed anything. In fact, it had stopped.

One day, he found himself staring at her old journal. He hadn’t touched it since she passed. Flipping through its pages, he saw pieces of her soul—poems, to-do lists, little notes about the garden, even sketches of random strangers from the park.

Then he found a page titled, “If I Go Before You.”

His hands trembled.

> If I go before you,
Don’t stop living.
Make tea in my favorite mug.
Play that silly song I hate but you love.
Water my lilies. Sing off-key in the shower.
And please, don’t let the clock on the wall stop.



James burst into tears.

That night, he went to the living room and took the clock off the wall. He replaced it with a painting Anna had once made of their first home—a crooked little cabin with red shutters. The clock, he packed gently into a box, wrapped in her favorite shawl.

And the next morning, for the first time in months, he took a walk.

The wind was crisp. The trees rustled like whispered blessings. A little girl rode her bike past him and waved. He smiled back.

When he returned home, he made tea in Anna’s mug and played the song she hated—the one he danced to like an idiot.

And at that moment, James realized something: time hadn’t stopped.

It had paused—for grief, for love, for memory—but it was ready to move again.

And so was he.
Startriting

death, love, grief, heartbreak, time, life, emotional, family, memory, storytelling