They Kept on Eating                                                               

And then, t’ memember of a day years back in a room which might have been swimming with clocks, since, the topic of how clock’s hands move was under discussion by two sitting eating in the common room. They’d be eating inside for the next ninety days, in a long hall of others, all sat rank’d row’d eating at the same designated eating time; eating the exact same designated meals they’d be eating every day, for the remaining designated number of days they’d sit in this hall, eating. 

See that clock on the wall over there?

Sure. It’s there every day.

It’s funny how it gets when you’re watching a clock’s hands.

How’s that?

If you watch a clock’s hands, and try to see them moving, you can’t see them moving. Once in a while, I say to myself, I’m going to stare at them long enough to actually see them move, but—I at least always have to give up and look away. I can’t concentrate that hard and that long. I got to stop. But I always feel like trying again. Funny, isn’t it?

I suppose—hey—feel your roll. Mine’s hard as a rock. Is yours?

I—oh. It is hard. I wouldn’t say hard as a rock.

Almost though, hey? 

I—sure—but hey.

What?

What if the hands don’t move around smooth? What if they jump around?

Jump around? How?

Here’s how. Let’s say, I look at the minute hand, and see it says eight. Then, when I come back later, it says ten. How do I know it didn’t stay at eight the whole time I wasn’t looking, then jumped to ten when I looked at it again?

Come on. How can that be?

Oh, it can be. It very well can be. And, to go even further—let’s say we’re both in here to look at the clock. First you look at it, and it says seven. You look away, then I look up, and it says eight. Then you look up later, and it says ten. It very well may be that it jumped from your seven to my eight, and then, from there to your ten and will keep on jumping forward that way, according to when we decide to look. Don’t you think? 

No. Because it doesn’t jump that way.

Really? How do you know? 

Because it’s not like that. How it works is—

No! Never mind that! Just never mind! And, you know what? There’s even more. Say somebody’s sitting across the room watching us and the clock, all at the same time. They might see the hands jumping all over like that—and, if there’s three, or four—or ten or twenty people in the room looking up at the clock randomly, the hands might be jumping around the clock dial all crazy, like—like until what might happen happens, and, until you know what might happen. And you know what that actually might happen ‘n might actually be?

Uh, maybe, but—hold it. Come down, please.

Come down? What? What’s that supposed to mean?

Nothing, but—you said somebody’s watching all this from across the room?

Yes, I did. Why?

That person has to be someone for which there is no time.

What? How can that be?

That must be God who’s watching. 

God? 

Right. God. 

God?

Yah. God. God’s watching. But—come on. We got to keep eating.

Eating! Oh, yes! Oh. Okay! 

They kept on eating.

Jim Meirose is a Somerville, New Jersey author. His short works have appeared in leading literary magazines and journals, including Collier's Magazine, Alaska Quarterly Review, New Orleans review, South Carolina Review, Phoebe, Baltimore Review, and Witness. His stories have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, the Shirley Jackson Award, and one was runner up for the O.Henry Awards. Two collections of his short work have been published and his novels, "Claire, Monkey," and "Freddie Mason's Wake" are available here on Amazon.com and from other fine literary outlets.