The Tiny Silver Cricket

       Ticka-ticka-tok, ticka-ticka-tok, ticka-ticka-tok, Clang!

           A tiny wind-up toy dog made of gears and scrap metal clumsily struts down a floor littered with other gears, metal wires and scraps. It falls down on the ground when it runs out of wind-up power.

“Do it again Papa! Do it again!” A little girl with cute brown bubble braids and caramel skin shouts at her loving grandfather as she gazes at the tiny scrap metal dog scamper across the floor. She always loved visiting her dear Papa at his little workshop filled to the brim with all his creations.

           His name is Gerald Hadley, a seventy year old man with curly salt and pepper hair with a matching scruffy beard. He wears a simple grey button-up shirt tucked into worn out blue jeans, all covered with his tan worker’s apron.  His skin a gorgeous chocolate brown, but age has caught up to it with its wrinkles and liver spots. He has owned his little tinker’s shop for the past fifty years. On the books it was a general repair shop for watches and other mechanical devices, but Gerald’s real passion was creating tiny wind-up toys.

           Some were animals, others little people, or sometimes they were fantastical creatures from his own imagination. Each made up of tiny watch gears, welded scrap metal and thin gangly metal wires, but they all had that signature GH welded onto their back.

           It started as a hobby to pass the time between repair jobs, and then one day it became an obsession. Now the repair jobs got in the way of his art. Even more so when his precious granddaughter, Penelope, visited him after school. He always made sure he was finishing up a creation around the time she would drop by. Penelope had that special way all children have of bringing his art to life when she played with the toys.

           She loved to arrange the tiny wind-up toys so that when they were released they would look like they are playing together. They would make up voices and other non-sense sounds for each toy until it was supper time. Penelope would get picked up by her mom and go home with a new toy every time she visited.

           Today, Gerald has made something special for Penelope. He walked back into his storage room, grabs a box labeled “Peter’s stuff” with dust about half an inch thick coated on it, and walked the box into his workshop. As he sets the box down on his large, metal work bench the dust kicks up in a big “POOOF” and he sneezes.

           It has been almost five years since his son, Penelope’s father, Peter died from sickness. It didn’t surprise him, Gerald, or his wife at the time. He was always in and out of the hospital since he was Penelope’s age. When he was born the doctors told Gerald and his wife that Peter wouldn’t live to twenty at the rate his disease was attacking his muscles and vital organs. But that never stopped Peter from clinging to life. He always met each day with a smile and plucky attitude, and his most precious possession was a silver pocket watch Gerald gave him on his twentieth birthday. It has an engraving from Gerald to Peter saying “My son, you determine how much time you have on this Earth. Keep fighting for yourself and your new family. Love, Dad”

           Gerald reached into the box and rummaged through all of the keepsakes he has been clinging to for a decade until he finds the silver pocket watch. He flicks it open and can feel the sting of tears welling up in his eyes as he reads the inscription he wrote fifteen years ago. The small watch rests daintily in the palm of his hand as his thumb caresses the smooth metal. This watch only means something to him now, but it belongs to Penelope. She doesn’t care for watches though, so there is only one thing left do in his mind. Time to get to work. No time for tears.

           The hours tick away as Gerald takes apart the pocket watch down to the last miniscule pin. He takes the main silver shell and with one final gentle kiss goodbye Gerald puts the case in the mini furnace. The silver begins to bubble then melt into the little bowl inside the furnace. Gerald then takes out some sketching paper and begins to draw out the many possibilities for his gift to Penelope.

           He starts off with a simple sketch of stick figure, then tries to make it resemble Peter but quickly abandons that idea when he realizes he’ll need far more parts for it. Next, he tries to draw Penelope’s favorite animal, a giraffe, but again has to crumble up the paper and toss it into the wastebasket. He couldn’t figure out how to make such an awkwardly proportioned animal move with tiny watch gears.

           Finally, he thought about Penelope’s favorite story, Pinocchio. While a human puppet would be even more work, he thought about Jiminy Cricket and how much Penelope loved that little cricket. She would tell Gerald how she wishes she had cricket to tell her right from wrong and so she would never be lonely when her mom had to work late at home.

           So Gerald drew out a cute little sketch of a tiny wind-up cricket that would hop three times once wound up. Its powerful little back legs made up of wires, the biggest gears in the watch, and some scraps from his last project. Then he took the silver from the casing and formed it into the head and body with some little wire wings on top. Its eyes the two halves of the watch’s face. Finally, the finishing touch was a signature, but instead of his initials Gerald used his son’s PH.

           Penelope burst through the doors with a loud THUD as she exclaimed “Papa! I’m here! What new toy do you have for me!?”

           Gerald chuckles as Penelope runs into his arms and embraces him the only way a child knows how, full of love and happiness. He raises her up while he still can manage it, and gives her a big raspberry on her warm, flush cheek.

           Penelope giggles and says teasingly “Papa! Stop it! It tickles!”

           Gerald sets her down as he says “I have a special treat for you today, dear!” He motions towards his work bench where the tiny wind-up silver cricket rests. “That is a very special cricket. Can you guess why?”

           Penelope looks at the cricket with child-like wonder and awe. She could swear that the cricket was looking into her very soul, and it made her feel comforted as she gently caressed its smooth silver head.

           After a few more seconds of contemplations she says “I don’t know, but I can feel something warm in my heart. What is it?”

           Gerald smiled widely and says “This very special cricket is made from the watch your dad used to carry around with him everywhere. It was with him the day you were born, and it was with him the day he died.”

           Penelope’s smile went from ecstatic to melancholic as her dad was brought up. She doesn’t remember too much of him. Penelope was only three when he died, but she can remember how much they laughed together. Just like her and Papa. She looks harder at the cricket and it looks back at her. She swears it was begging her to wind it up.

           She says “Daddy?” as she picks up the tiny cricket. She finds the wind-up gear hidden between the wire wings and gives it a Crank, Crank, Crank!

           She sets it down on the work bench and it hops three times like Gerald designed it to do, but then something else happened he was not expecting. It kept hopping until it hopped right into Penelope’s outstretched hands on the edge of the work bench.

           A total of seven hops. Far more than his design intended, but Gerald’s own creations tend to surprise him. However, something felt different in the room. Gerald could also feel what Penelope described as a warm feeling in his heart.

           He looked around and his other creations were as still as statues. The clock on the wall read four O’clock. Penelope’s mom would be there soon to pick her up.

           Gerald stands up and begins to tidy up the workshop as he knows Penelope’s mom doesn’t like how dangerous it looks with all his materials and tools strewn about the place. As he picks up he can hear Penelope winding up the toy cricket and have it hop to her. Every time it was only the three Crank, Crank, Crank sounds, and every time Penelope would stand a little farther away.

Gerald would count the number of hops it took. Seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve. Then Penelope wound up the toy and began walking ahead of it. The tiny silver cricket sprung to life and hopped right behind Penelope. Loyally following her only a few hops behind, the tiny silver cricket almost seemed to have determination to reach Penelope.

Penelope says “Look, Papa! Daddy’s little cricket follows me!”

Gerald stops his tidying up and watches the tiny silver cricket follow Penelope around his workshop. Even he knows that wind-up toys have to have their limit, and yet this special gift he made for Penelope seemed enchanted.

Gerald picks up the tiny silver cricket and shows Penelope the signature he put on its belly. The welded ‘PH’ seemed to glow as they both stared at it.

Penelope asks “Why is it a ‘P’ instead of ‘G’ now, Papa?”

Gerald says “Well sweetie, your dad’s name was Peter and yours is Penelope. Both start with a ‘P’ and so I thought it would make the gift that much more special if this little guy bared the initials of the two people who would love it the most.”

He caresses the silver head and continues “Your dad loved you so much, Penelope. I know he wanted to spend so much more time with you. And I think this little cricket made out of his precious silver pocket watch inherited his will.”

Penelope looks at her grandpa inquisitively as she says “What does ‘inherited his will’ mean, Papa?”

Gerald can feel the sting of tears welling up in his eyes again, but this time he lets them leak out as he tells Penelope about the pocket watch.

He says “When this little guy was still a watch, it had an engraving on it from me to your dad. Your dad, as I’m sure your mother has told you, was a very sick man most of his life. Doctors told your mom and me many times he wouldn’t make it to the next year, and every New Year’s Day he surprised us all by continuing to live life to the fullest.” Penelope was engrossed in her Papa’s story.

She nestled on his lap as he continued.  “You see Penelope, a person’s will what gives them the determination to keep living their lives. One day, before you were born, I asked Peter ‘Why are you still pushing your body so much? I hope it’s not for our sake. We will be okay, I promise.’ And he looked at me with a bit of a shocked expression, but then said ‘Because you told me that I determine how long I am on this earth and I for one am going to keep fighting until I can pass on the lessons you taught me and the ones I’ve learned myself to my kid!’ Then he pulled out his silver pocket watch and tossed it to me and said ‘Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten your own words?’ We both laughed at that.” Gerald can feel the tears gently flowing down his cheeks.

Penelope reaches up and wipes one away. She says “So Daddy lived so he could meet me? That’s his will?”

Gerald pulls Penelope into a warm embrace and says “Yes dear. That’s his will, and this little guy seems to have what’s left of it.” He motions towards the cricket.

Penelope climbs down from her Papa’s lap and rushes over to the cricket. She picks it up and says “Hi! You may not be my dad, but I’ll love you just as much, Petey!” A fitting name for the tiny silver cricket.

Penelope continues “But Papa, I don’t want to take him home. I want to leave Petey here with you!”

Gerald is surprised by this and asks “Why, sweetie? He is your toy.”

Penelope grins as she says “Because I don’t want you to miss having Daddy’s will near you. And this way we can both visit with Daddy’s will every time we play together with Petey!” The tiny silver cricket hops, but not towards Penelope this time. Instead it took fifteen hops to make its way to Gerald’s hands.

Gerald picks up the tiny silver cricket and says “Thank you, Penelope.” His sad tears now transformed to happy tears as the two of them play with Petey until Penelope’s mom comes to pick her up.

A father’s and child’s love can inhabit the smallest of creatures, and for Gerald and Penelope that love has found its way back into them.