55: Chapter 55 "Speed ​​Depends on the Heart"

Old Zhou's watch stall glowed with a hazy light in the dusk, like a piece of black jade submerged in water. Chen Jie squatted in front of the counter, the coolness of touching the desk clock just now still lingering on his fingertips—after that green mist dissipated, a very thin layer of ice had actually condensed on the glass display case. Scraping it with a fingernail, he could hear a faint "crackling" sound, like the echo of shattering time.

"This stone," Old Zhou suddenly spoke, his withered fingers lightly tapping on the counter, copper green from years of work embedded in his fingernails, "can bend time, but it cannot make it turn around." He fished a brass pocket watch out of a drawer, a blurry chrysanthemum engraved on the inside of the cover. "Just like this watch, if the hairspring breaks, it can be repaired, but the seconds that have ticked by incorrectly can never return."

Chen Jie's canvas backpack started to heat up again, but this time it wasn't a scorching heat; instead, it felt like holding a cup of warm tea. He remembered the stream at Suiyu Slope freezing as it flowed backward under the influence of the jade stone, and Su Rui's scanner returning jammed paper to an unjammed state. Those reversed moments were like paper that had been crumpled and then flattened out—they still left creases after all. "Uncle Zhou, how do you know the background of this stone? Grandma Zhang said the stones at Suiyu Slope move on their own. Could it be..."

"My grandfather's ledger records a strange occurrence." Old Zhou held the pocket watch to his ear, and an extremely faint buzzing sound came from the empty case,

like a small insect flapping its wings. "On the day of the Awakening of Insects in the twenty-third year of the republic of china, Shopkeeper Zhang repaired a church clock. The bell was supposed to be rung at noon that day, but the bell ringer mistakenly turned the hour hand to midnight. The shadow of the entire bell tower moved backward on the ground for half a burn of an incense stick—the startled pigeons crashed through and shattered the stained-glass windows, and the priest's Bible flipped backward page by page, finally stopping at Genesis, Chapter Three." He paused, his finger tracing the chrysanthemum pattern on the watch cover. "That day, Shopkeeper Zhang had a dark green stone in his pocket. He said when the stone got hot, he could see 'time ash' clinging to the gears, like unburnt embers in an old stove."

Chen Jie touched the zipper of his backpack. The blue light of the jade stone shone through the canvas, casting a flickering spot of light on the counter. "Then why... can it sometimes turn back, and sometimes it can't?" He remembered when he repaired the fan for Brother Li, the fan blades he had intentionally left unflattened actually produced more wind. Those "imperfections" he had deliberately kept seemed to secretly align with some kind of resilience of time.

Old Zhou suddenly smiled, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes squeezing into a dried chrysanthemum. "You should understand this principle from when you repair bicycles." He picked up a piece of rusty hairspring from his toolbox, waving it under the desk lamp to create a silver-bright arc. "If the chain is loose, it can be tightened; if it's broken, it can be joined. But can you make a flywheel with worn-out teeth grow new teeth again?" The hairspring trembled slightly between his fingers. "Time is like this hairspring. The stone can make it swing slower or faster, but the worn-out teeth have to be replaced with new parts you find yourself. Back in the republic of china era, Shopkeeper Zhang said he saw a line of words float up inside the stone—'Fast or slow depends on the heart; it has nothing to do with the stone.'"

"Depends on the heart?" Chen Jie stared at the blue light dancing on the counter, remembering how Grandma Zhang squinted her eyes when listening to opera, and the aroma of meat wafting from Wang Leis Braised Food Stall. Within those quietly elongated moments, what was hidden was actually the neighbors' desire to live their lives steadily.

"Shopkeeper Zhang later drew a diagram in his ledger." Old Zhou pulled out a leather notebook from deep within the counter, its pages as brittle as dry leaves. "Look at this stone," he pointed at the dark green stone on the yellowed page, surrounded by a circle of dashed lines. "Outside the dashed line is the life we live, and inside the solid line is the boundary the stone can affect. It's just like the rubber pad you used when repairing the bench; it can cushion, but it can't make the steel bars bend on their own—you have to use your own hands to turn the wrench."

When Chen Jie stood up, the temperature of the backpack had just faded back to the coolness of the jade stone itself. The twilight had already washed over the wooden shelves of the stall, and the distant locust tree leaves swayed in the wind, casting shadows on the ground that grew long and short, as if pulled by an invisible hand. He suddenly understood that the jade stone was never some Dominator of time, but merely an honest mirror reflecting his thoughts hidden within his mending and repairing—his care for his neighbors and his pity for old things were the real reasons the world became gentle.

"Thanks, Uncle Zhou." He walked toward the alley entrance, his canvas backpack swaying gently behind him. "Tomorrow I'll help you fix the hinges on the counter; they're a bit stuck."

Old Zhou shouted from behind, "Don't use your stone to slack off! Hinges need machine oil. Just like being a person, you need real lubrication!"

Chen Jie smiled and waved his hand. The evening breeze was mixed with the scent of wild chrysanthemums and the rich aroma of braised food. He looked down at his palm, where the coolness of turpentine still lingered, like a quietly remembered piece of advice. It turned out that time was never meant to be fought against; just like the objects he repaired, they bore imperfect patches, yet lived steadily amidst the hustle and bustle of daily life.