He did not need to see the clock to hear its tick.

Seated in the reception of the probation office, John Smith waited patiently
for his appointment with his officer. It was the first of many such visits he 
was expected to make as a condition of his early release from prison, or so he had been told.
His fingers, with their chewed nails, tapped on the seat's plastic armrests. 
The waiting area was much like any other except for an unusual odour.
"Mould" the receptionist had explained to him upon checking in, but looking around he could not see any. 
He glanced occassionally between the receptionist, whose face was a mixture of concentration
and bordem, and the collection of gossip magazines on the coffee table before him. 
After a couple of minutes a wooden door with a fresnel window pane opened; "John Smith" a woman's voice cried from within. 
He had not expected a woman. 
Smith started up and began to walk towards the door. As he drew closer he could see more of the office within. 
The room was sparse; a vinyl desk held a computer monitor atop, with a blue office chair behind it.
And in front, a small wooden stool. 
Smith entered the office and was greeted by the face of an elderly woman.
One lined with deep creases and heavy bags underneath tired eyes.
Raven black hair hung from her head in thin strands crested at their ends by loose grey threads.
He stopped at the cusp and felt a wave of consternation pass through him. 
"Smith, I presume" her hoarse voice croaked. 
He nodded in compliance.
"Come in". She gestured to the wooden stool before sitting down in the comfortable office chair.
Smith closed the door behind him and moved towards the stool before pointing at it meekly. 
"Yes there" her voice cracked "Our last chair broke and we don't have the budget for a new one".
Smith pulled it towards him and sat on it as best he could; the stool wobbled beneath his weight. 

Staring at the monitor she addressed him:
"I can see here that you've just been released, and that right now you're staying at the Princeton Halfway-House, correct?"
He nodded, watching as the woman before him made a series of silent clicks with a mouse.
Finally, she turned to him. 
"My name is Debrah Logan, I will be your probation officer".
Her eyes settled onto his.
Smith clenched his hands, hiding them in his lap. 
She sat staring at him in silence. For a brief period neither of them said anything.
"Do you know why you are here?" she asked him, breaking the silence.
Smith unclenched his hands and began rubbing them together.
A faint sweat grew across his brow.
"Do I know why I'm here?" he stuttered.
He could feel her gaze piercing him and a knot growing in his stomach. 
Finally he replied: "I committed a crime"
The woman behind the desk paused for a moment before scoffing and tightening her expression. 
She turned back to the monitor. 

John loosened his hands, and began to think of his ex-wife.
She had been dead twenty three years now, and it would be twenty four this October.
He had in his pocket a photo of her, faded and creased along its folds, as well as one of their two daughters aged nine and eleven.
He touched the pocket, making sure they were still there.
The probataion officer hacked a smoker's cough before addressing: 
"I want to make something crystal clear to you, John Smith. So that we are exactly level" she swallowed.
"To you, I am god".
She turned back to look at him this time with narrowed eyes.
The words rang out as if from a tomb. 
"It is me who decides if you are sent back to that miserable little cell you have crawled from" she said.
She paused and watched as Smith physically shrank before the growing awareness she knew dawned upon all who sat before her.
"All it would take is for me to type a few words and you will vanish back into oblivion.
You will be pulled from wherever you are, at home or at work, which is a point I shall come back to,
by police who will take nothing but delight in dragging you kicking and screaming".
She pressed on.
"I can save you from this fate. So long as I believe you are being truthful and you answer me honestly in these brief sessions of ours, your life will be spared".
"Now, have you begun to look for work?"
Smith sat stock still, dumbfounded.
"Take your time" she added.
After much pause he replied: "No".
"Then that is where you shall begin. By the end of next month you will be employed, if not deep in your search for a job".
The probation officer turned to her monitor before adding a series of clicks. 
Smith sat reflecting on what had just been said.
As the shock faded he felt his stomach clench.
His thoughts turned to his daughters, they would be grown women now.
"Next question" barked the probation officer. He flinched.
"Have you made contact with any family members since being released".
She turned back to look at John who was staring blankly at the wall behind her, unable to answer. 
"I can see here you have a sister. Have you communicated with her since being released?"
He recalled the last time he had seen his sister. He had not forgotten her final words to him. 
Tears began to form.
Choking, he answered: "No".
The probation officer smirked.
"Perhaps in your journey to make amends for what you have done" she intoned "this is also where you should start".

John Smith closed his eyes and tried his hardest to think of nothing. 


After the meeting he exited the building through its large brick facade, clutching in one hand a leaflet.
He stopped to look at it. In large printed letters a title read: "Work! Become A Hero". Beneath was the image
of a male and female, perhaps in their twenties Smith guessed, wearing blue overalls and hi-vis uniforms smiling 
back at him. At the bottom of the leaflet were pictures he could not identify, logos of some sort. 
He stuffed it into a pocket. The probation officer had insisted he would need it.

Walking back along the main road to the centre of town, he watched as cars of makes and models he did not recognise
drifted past him, their drivers carefully ensconced from the January cold.
Each one faded in a dull procession, the rumble of their engines rattling in his ears. 
It took twenty minutes of walking before he reached the centre, passing various storefronts that in years prior
had been empty fields and vacant lots. Roads, freshly tarmaced, appeared as if from nowhere with row upon row of newly built housing estates. 


In town he made his way between the busy crowds, forcing himself through the endless mass of bodies heaving to and fro.
Clothes shops, beauticians, and cafes flanked the narrow channel through the heart of the centre.
Upon passing a stationers he caught his reflection in the window and stopped to look at himself.
He was old.
Lines set deep into his face, as though etched into marble, scored skin that had begun to sag.
His hair had thinned and greyed, receding from his temple where once in his youth it had been flush.
He could not remember the last time he had seen his own reflection. 

Turning to continue walking he stopped again suddenly.
An advert in the window caught his eye. 
It was the picture of a man and a woman on the deck of a cruise ship, holding one another in each others arms. 
Both wore exaggerated expressions. Smith's eyes sank to the caption below, which read:
#YouDeserveThis
He stared at it, puzzled.

Lingering for a moment he tried to imagine such a life. 
He could see the dark oak of the ship's bannisters in his mind, behind which hid an infinite horizon.
The sound of happy couples laughing, enjoying one another's company mixing with the ocean breeze and rising
up, up into the air. The warmth of the sun bathing his pale flesh like a balm.
Bewitched by the thought he glanced back up at the reflection in the window.
He felt his blood turn to ice.
Behind him was a woman much older than he, hunchbacked and gripping in withered hands a tartan stroller.
She was staring directly at him.   
For a moment the two looked at each other through the dark shadow of the glass before Smith
finally pulled away and began to walk once more, panicked.

She had recognised him.


Rain fell as he arrived back at the halfway-house. 
Slipping through its entrance, a large black door, he made his way down one of the many corridors to his room.
Stopping before door number 7 he prised a key from his pocket and inserted it into the lock.
At first try it refused to budge, but with a second attempt the lock gave way and the door opened.
He closed the door behind him and checked to see if his roomate had returned.
He was alone. 
Leaning with his back to the door he stopped to try and catch his breath.
Slackening his shoulders and relaxing his body he climbed onto one of the beds, its coarse woolen cloth beneath him.
On it he lay, staring at the chipped plaster of the bare wall opposite. 
And all at once the aches of his body rang out.
His heart beat inside his chest like a tambourine.
He laboured for breath.
His head swam.

He felt as if he were dying.