The Day the Clocks Ran Backward

As the day that the clocks run backwards keeps unspooling, or perhaps—spooling—and the sun dances its merry, selfish way back into the middle of the sky, the housekeeper re-prepares dinner. After a life of riding the Metro, crossing the bridges, praying in each Cathedral in the city; after a life of exposure to every face of Paris, she is the type of woman who listens to the heartbeat of the city, and considers things about the world that others cast aside. And while the Fontaines are caught up in their enclosed little world between the walls of Pere-Lachaise Cemetery, the housekeeper is wondering what the evening is like in the houses across the city, as the people walk backwards down the stairs and out of bed and along the streets. She has not spoken backwards, or eaten backwards, or thought backwards. It is almost a ritual, almost, almost…something like that, as if cooperating with the sky and the clocks. Less like a film reel being turned back and more like a dance. Were the cars driving backwards, too? She will not know until she leaves to do the shopping after—or, before, now—the scene in the drawing room after the terrible letter that Damien receives. 

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Dessert is set; Saint-Germain almond cake. Letitia and Damien and Angèle eat in silence, taking sips of water before bites of cake. The housekeeper brings out steaming pork chops. Angèle only has the stomach for half of hers, the rest of her intestines digesting her anger. Hot and bright and expectant. All that was lost would return. Damien eats two to fill the cavern of gaping, gnawing emptiness that will eat him whole, the more and more he tries to convince himself it is not there. Letitia wipes her mouth and finishes hers, a single tear rolling down her cheek. The starting course is stuffed mushrooms.

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The gardener, having had a rather confusing evening, returns backwards to the cemetery through the back gate, passing from a cobble lane of houses into a gravel lane of headstones. The forest curls in pristine, golden evening light, all around him, drawing him in like it always does, appearing as if a song could paint. But it is never for his pleasure. It is never for anyone’s enjoyment, though he tames it, to deceive visitors into thinking it might be. As he creeps through the crosshatched light, he says his farewells to the thrushes and tawny owls, the flycatchers and robins, and particularly to the crows, whom he has a fond affection for. He says his farewells to the foxes, although he can not see them, and knows he will not. 

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Damien meets him out back to have their typical evening chat about the grounds, things that needed keeping and things that needed trimming, the headstone to be cleaned or the mausoleum that might be purged of rats—the latter was the gardener’s least favorite part of his job. 

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Letitia stands outside her son’s bedroom. She pushes open the door and steps inside. She runs her fingers over the dustless windowsills, removes the fresh flowers from their vase. She does not want to do these things, but she does them, as if strings were attached to her joints.

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