The old man used tweezers to pick up the gear, being careful to steady his breath and focus on keeping his hands from shaking. He placed the brass gear into the mechanism and wound the spring. There was a satisfying ticking noise and he sat back in his chair, proud of how steady the watch ticking was. He placed the face of the watch over his work and went to grab his polishing things, so he could make the outside of the watch shine. His chair made a soft creaking noise as he stood up, and surveyed his ancient workshop.

He had learned about clock making from his father, and the workshop was still laid out in much the same way as it was fifty years ago. He remembered when he would sit in a small chair in a corner of the room and watch his father assemble tall, elegant grandfather clocks. Of course today all the money was in pocket watches, but the watchmaker still prided himself on the small clock on his desk. It ran slow and needed winding often but it was the first clock he had made entirely by himself, so he still used it every day. As he went to select a clean cloth, he was interrupted by the sound of his front door opening.

“I’m sorry! We’re not taking new orders right now, please come back during business hours!” He yelled into the front room, wiping his hands on the cloth and rushing towards the door.

“I’m not here for a watch, I’m afraid,” said a voice from his foyer. The old man walked into the foyer, and recognized the intruder. This was a lawyer from the local shipping company, who had bought one of his watches last year.

“I’m afraid I have bad news about your son.” Said the lawyer in a voice that while pained, was clearly not a stranger to this.

“No.” said the watchmaker worriedly.

    “He’s not dead” said the lawyer hurriedly, not wanting to give the wrong impression.

“But there was an accident at the docks. A chain wasn’t secured and a crate fell on your son.”

    “Is he alright?” asked the old man, sudenly feeling the weight of his age.

    “The surgeons say that he will live, but his spine was crushed, and they are not hopeful about him walking again. If you will come with me I can show you to the hospital.”

    “Alright...” said the watchmaker. “Let me lock up and I’ll be right along.”

    The hospital room was dim, lit only by a few lamps and the few stray rays of light that fell through the closed blinds. It had been a few days since the accident, but the old man was worried. He hadn’t been able to focus on his work, and spent enough of his time in the hospital that he barely even noticed the distinct smell of the place.

    “Please dad, go back to work. You won’t feel any better spending so much time here.” said the son, who was still worried about his father's wavering health.

    “No.” Said the old man. “I don’t want you be alone in here”

    “I’ll be fine,” the son said, “The nurses here care for me, even if I can’t.”

    Their conversation was interrupted by a knock at the door, then an entering nurse.

“Hello,” she said, “I hope you’re feeling better. However, we do need to bring up the matter of the bill.”

“What?” said the watchmaker, outraged. “Why isn’t the company paying for this?”

“They say that incident was the fault of the workers, so they are not liable.” Said the nurse, handing him a piece of paper.

“I don’t think we can afford this.” The watchmaker said, his face whitening.

“We will figure something out, I have savings.” Replied the son, characteristically unconcerned.

“No. You’re going to need those. I will pay it.” The watchmaker said.

“But how? You always put the profit from your watchmaking directly back into your tools and materials. You don’t have to worry about me, I can just take out a loan from the bank.”

This worried the matchmaker, he knew better than to trust the bank to make a loan that was worthwhile.

“No. I will sell all my clock making things. There is a shop in the west country that has been trying to expand to our town, and has been asking about buying my business out.”

“No! You can’t just give up on clockmaking! Not for my sake.”

The old man was sad but he knew that the bill had to be paid soon, and that he couldn’t allow his son to ruin himself just so he could keep making clocks, even if that was his passion.

The old man picked up the pen, being careful not to betray the pain that this put him in. He signed the contract, and shook his associates hand. There was a certain satisfaction to knowing that his son would at least be able to keep what he had already. But he also couldn’t help but feel sad as his things disappeared off his workbenches and into boxes. His chair made a soft creaking noise as he stood up and surveyed his ancient workshop, knowing it would never be the same.