Passage: The old clockmaker did not look up when the boy entered, nor when the boy cleared his throat, nor even when he set the broken pocket watch on the counter with a deliberate clink. He continued threading a hairspring through a movement no larger than a thumbnail, his breath held, his hands as still as the dead. Only when the spring seated with a faint, satisfied click did he exhale, lay down his tweezers, and finally turn—as if the boy, and the rest of the waiting world, could not have existed until that single small thing was done right.