15 seconds

Eliza sat hunched over her work table, tools in her hand and before her was another fiddly timepiece that needed repair. It was one of those modern soulless watches that everyone seems to wear nowadays; no one appreciates a good old classic. She does though. The watches with the open faces, beautiful finish, and smoothly running hands. Watches that needed constant vigilance and care; that's probably why only the most ardent ever own them.

Yesterday, she found one such watch– or more like– it found her. He had been hidden in the attic under several of her dad's old journals.

An original Patek Philippe Officer 1923 no. 124,824. Such a beauty was hidden under old books, and wrapped in newspaper.

Eliza set her current project aside in favor of the Patek, this was an heirloom watch. It must have belonged to her father at some point. When she had uncovered it, it had not been running, most likely that way for several years. She hadn't her equipment at the time to fix it. In the bright fluorescent glow of her lamps, she set to restoring the watch to its glory days.

It didn't take much time for Eliza to have the Patek telling time again, it was even more beautiful when it worked like it should. In her euphoria at a job well done, she knocked over her neglected cup of cold coffee. The brown liquid crept towards her workstation threatening to submerge the watch.

"No no no no!" She didn't have anything to clean up the mess nearby, this meant relocating to the back room. Eliza grabbed the watch but it fumbled out of her hand, tumbling to the linoleum floor with a loud smack instead. Today really wasn't her day.

"Ah dammit." The hands where frozen at 1:24pm and 15 seconds. Maybe the fall had knocked something out of place. Eliza carefully wound the clock back to 1:24pm and 00 seconds. What an an unusual watch, it only had 15 second markers on the face and not the usual five second marks. When she next looked at her work space, the cup of coffee stood in its place unbothered. No coffee spill in sight. She looked back down at the watch, then at the digital analogue clock on the wall, the time was now 13:24 and three, four, five seconds.

Impossible.

Eliza knocked the coffee cup to the floor then stared down at the Patek 1:24pm 30 seconds this time. The second hand continued merrily on and the puddle of congealed coffee spread.

"Imposible" she whispered to herself, she must be crazy for contemplating the idea.

She didn't live inside a fantasy novel, this was the real world. But her hands inched towards the dial to wind the second hand back, one 15 second notch, then another. Then she let it run again.

The cup was undisturbed on her table, the time on the analogue 13:24:16. One of her table lamps flickered and blinked out.

Eliza sat down in a daze, taking a steading breath and clutching the Patek before setting it down with caution.

So it was real, she had a magic watch device. Suddenly all the moments she regretted, replayed in a loop in her head; obnoxiously loud and in technicolour. But how far back could she rewind to? What could she undo? She would have to start small.

The following day Eliza turned to the Patek in mind to cause some deliberate destruction and semi groundhog her way out of it. She turned things over, broke a mug, and knocked innocent objects off the walls to satisfy the urge. Each time she rewound back by fifteen, thirty, forty five then sixty seconds and beyond but found she was limited to upto sixty seconds. So much for rewinding her embarrassing verbal diarrhoea moment two days ago, with when an unbelievably handsome customer walked in. His antique pendulum wall clock was currently nestled carefully to the far side.

However, it wasn't safe enough. She watched in horror as it slid out of its perch crashing onto the ground, the fragile glass cracking and the pendulum broken. For a long moment she stared in shock, thinking of how she would have to grovel in apology and humiliation…. Except not, just rewind the Patek, it will be as good as new.

And it was, new again, but she removed it from the stand and lay it carefully on the floor, unwilling to tempt fate.

The next time Eliza used the watch was the very same day, when she watched a little boy trip over an empty coke can outside her store threshold. The child froze in shock before crying fat tears and presenting a scuffed knee to his mother. An elderly gentleman carefully walked by aided by his cane.

Out of a sense of pity and human empathy, Eliza decided to turn back time. One whole minute, she wound back the hands, getting up and clearing the litter away before starting time again.

Time snapped back to its normal flow. Eliza watched through her shop window as the boy skipped past the now-clean patch of sidewalk, his mother chasing after him. A smile tugged at her lips—her small act of kindness accomplished.

Except, the elderly man with the cane approached the same spot, his steps measured and careful. His foot caught on something—a crack in the pavement?—and he pitched forward with a startled cry.

Eliza's breath caught in her throat.

The boy and his mother rushed to help, the woman supporting the old man's arm, while he struggled to right himself.

Eliza burst through her shop door. "Is he okay? Let me help."

The old man's face was ashen, his thin hand trembling against his cane. "Just a stumble, nothing serious."

"You should sit down," Eliza insisted. "Please, come inside."

With the mother's help, they guided him into the shop. Eliza cleared a space on her worn leather couch, pushing aside catalogs and boxes of parts.

"I'll make you some tea." She hurried to the electric kettle in her back room. Her hands shook as she filled it.

This wasn't right. She'd prevented one accident only to cause another. The Patek Philippe sat heavy in her pocket, ticking away as if nothing unusual had happened.

Eliza's hands trembled as she prepared the tea. The elderly man's pained expression haunted her thoughts. Of course there would be a price to pay. How naive she'd been to think otherwise.

She carried the steaming mug back to the front of the shop, where the old man sat rubbing his knee. The boy and his mother had left after making sure he was settled.

"I hope you don't mind a PG with honey," Eliza said, placing the mug on the small table beside him.

"Very kind of you," His weathered hand wrapped around the warm ceramic.

Eliza perched on the stool across from him, the Patek Philippe burning a hole in her pocket. She'd been a fool. A complete and utter fool.

Time wasn't something to be trifled with. It wasn't clay to be molded at will. For every action, a reaction—wasn't that basic physics? She should have known better.

The man sipped his tea, color slowly returning to his face. "Nasty crack in your paving there."

"I'm so sorry," Eliza murmured, guilt swallowing her whole.

She'd caused this. In her arrogance, in her desire to play hero, she'd simply redirected misfortune. The universe demanded balance. The watch wasn't a gift—it was a curse disguised as a miracle.

"Nothing to be sorry for," the man replied, oblivious to her internal crisis. "These old bones have taken worse tumbles."

Eliza nodded absently, her mind racing. How many other consequences had she created? The coffee cup, the broken mug, the customer's clock—had something else suffered when she'd rewound those moments?

The watch ticked in her pocket, mocking her. She'd been playing with fire, thinking herself clever for cheating time's natural flow. There would always be a price. Always.

"I should report that crack to the council," she said, more to herself than to the man. No more shortcuts. No more manipulations.

The elderly gentleman finished his tea and struggled to his feet. "Thank you for the hospitality."

Eliza helped him to the door, her decision crystallizing with each step. The watch was too dangerous. Its power too tempting. She couldn't trust herself with it.

Eliza closed the shop door behind the man, leaning her forehead against the cool glass. The Patek Philippe weighed heavy in her pocket, its weight a constant reminder of her folly. She slipped it out, cradling the antique timepiece in her palm.

Her father had owned this watch. Had he known what it could do? Is that why it had been hidden away, wrapped in newspaper and buried beneath journals?

Eliza returned to her workbench, setting the watch down under the bright lamp. Its golden case gleamed, innocent and beautiful. Such craftsmanship, such artistry—yet containing a power that shouldn't exist.

"Dad must have known," she whispered to the empty shop. "He must have discovered what it could do."

But why hadn't he destroyed it? If he'd recognized its danger—the way it played with the fabric of reality, the way it demanded balance for every change—why preserve it at all?

Eliza traced her finger along the watch's edge. Perhaps he couldn't bring himself to destroy something so exquisite. The Patek was a masterpiece, regardless of its supernatural properties. To smash it would be sacrilege to a watchmaker.

"But I can't keep using it," she murmured. "And I can't risk anyone else finding it."

The solution came to her with perfect clarity. She didn't need to destroy the watch entirely, just render it powerless. Disable its magic while preserving its beauty.

With practiced hands, Eliza gathered her tools. She knew every jewel, every gear, every spring that made this timepiece function. She'd disable it in a way that would preserve its outward appearance while ensuring it could never again bend time to anyone's will.

Carefully, she opened the case, exposing the intricate mechanism within. The rubies glinted under her lamp, tiny red stars nestled among golden gears.

One by one, Eliza extracted the jewels with her finest tweezers, placing each tiny ruby in a small velvet pouch. The watch's ticking slowed, became irregular, then stopped altogether.

"There," she whispered, feeling both relief and a strange sense of loss. "Now you're just a beautiful watch again."

Eliza closed the watch case with a soft click. The Patek Philippe lay silent now, beautiful but powerless. She placed it in a velvet-lined box and tucked it away in her desk drawer.

Life resumed its predictable rhythm, customers with their broken timepieces, quiet evenings alone in her apartment above the shop, and the occasional call from Amy that she let go to voicemail.

Two weeks passed before Eliza remembered the journals. They'd been stacked in the attic beside where she'd found the watch, her father's neat handwriting filling page after page. She hadn't given them much thought at the time, too captivated by the Patek's gleaming case.

On a rainy Sunday with the shop closed, Eliza climbed the narrow stairs to the attic. Dust motes danced in the weak light from the single bulb overhead. The journals sat where she'd left them, leather-bound and waiting.

She carried them downstairs to her apartment kitchen, made a cup of tea, and opened the earliest volume. Her father's familiar handwriting filled her with unexpected longing. It had been five years since his passing.

The first journal contained mundane notes about watch repairs and family events. The second was similar. But the third—dated 10 years ago—made her tea grow cold beside her.

"Used the Patek again today. Just fifteen seconds, but enough to prevent a customer from dropping a rare Cartier. The headache afterward was worse this time. Something always balances out."

Eliza's hands trembled as she flipped through more pages. Her father had known. He'd discovered the watch's power and used it repeatedly.

"Jules nearly caught me rewinding after Tommy broke his arm falling from the tree. Couldn't bear to see him in pain. Broke my thumb on a fall and set myself back with orders."

Page after page documented small changes—preventing accidents, avoiding embarrassments, saving precious objects from destruction. Then she reached an entry that made her blood freeze.

June 17th. The date was burned into her memory. The day of the accident.

"I've gone too far. The car crash. Rewound sixty seconds, the maximum. Enough to swerve, enough that the impact hit the drivers side instead of the passenger’s. Enough that Jules and Eliza survived. But Time extracted its price from me instead. The doctors don't understand why my heart is failing so rapidly. I do. A life for a life. Time always balances its books."

Eliza's teacup clattered to the floor. The accident that had left her in physical therapy for a year, relearning to walk while her mother recovered from her own injuries.

Her father died two years

later.

He had traded his life for theirs.

Time always balances its books.