Blood splattered on the tarmac, wine stains on linen, and shattered glass on the side of the road. But it was the little All-Star sneaker that still brought tears to his eyes as he reminisced about the past.

Joseph wanted many things, but nothing so much as to bring his family back.

So he turned the short arm of the clock as far back as he could. The world turned with him and he found himself in a room devoid of light. He searched in vain to find the clock. He stood puzzled, bare handed.

“It does not exist here,” said a voice as hollow as an abandoned church.

Joseph let out a startled gasp. Then, “Who are you? What do you want from me?” he replied apprehensively.

The room seemed to be growing lighter, like the dawn was slowly creeping up on the darkness.

“I am simple, I am wise. I am a friend, an enemy in disguise,” the voice grew louder until a man stood in front of him.

The man towered over him, his eyes like the clouds before a storm. Beautiful, but frightening all the same.

“You are the clock!” Joe said.

The man shook his head methodically in disagreement.

“I am the beginning, and I am the end. I traverse eternity, hearts I mend. No human can escape, or hide from my wrath. I may be out of sight, but never out of mind. I am the inevitable, I am Time.”

Joseph stood with his mouth agape; stern disbelief washed over him. What he saw before him, had always been myth, been legend. Nothing but folk stories from books.

“Why is it that you appeared now and not the first time I turned back the clock, a few minutes ago?” he asked.

The man seemed to glide as he moved about. “Time,” he said, “like most of life, requires order and balance. You did not run before you could walk, nor did you walk before you crawled. Everything in life is sequential, Joseph.”

“I see,” Joseph replied, thinking back to what his uncle told him about the order of things.

The man called Time walked with his hands clasped behind his back. His face was inscrutable, bereft of any emotion.

“So, if you want to go back, you start from the last memory that you want in a series of so many others?” Joseph asked.

“That is correct.”

Joseph knew what it was. He could still see the shadow dangling like a pendulum. The thumping against the wall like a clock waiting to strike 12. The memory was still new in his mind.

The man called Time’s voice pulled him back from his memory. “Shall we then, Joseph?”

The clock appeared in front of Joseph, but it looked different. A date now appeared before him. August 3^rd, 2018. Joseph knew what it meant. He turned the short arm and the world dissipated.

Tell us: What do you think will be revealed? Can time be an enemy, and a friend?