Hands of the wall clock tick, the sound forever tugs at the sense of detachment nightfall provides; it does so vehemently when the lights are turned off, people have begun to lay beds, a mild swoosh of autumnal wind is flourishing through the broken attic window knocking one's mind off the track drawn up by an alliance of warm mattress, sheep-skin blanket, the sluggish flow of blood through limbs, settled rhythm of a beat inside one's chest.
You have grown weary of the sound from wall clock over years, asking your mother when you were still in upper kindergarten: Can't we let go of the sound, what does this tick-tick stand for?
"It stands for time, gobuer," her reply rings in your head.
You recall, many a times with smile, when you made a note after your mother's remark in a diary – "I don't like the sound of time in my ears". You stare for hours, sitting at the window or by the edge of the gate or from verandah next to our classroom, at the whiteness engulfing some winter mornings when snow has equipped nature with an expansive embrace gathering every object under the sky in it, the overpowering green of kitchen garden in the advancing spring, the blazing Chinar leaves in autumn crackling under a hurrying passerby's feet cheering you to ask your father, "What changes the color of Chinar leaves from that to this?" "It's time's changing appearance for us," his reply is buoyed up by a kiss on your forehead.