The Things We Cherished Read Online Free PDF

ear.
    “Did you eat?” she mumbled.
    “Yes,” he lied, tightening his suspenders. In truth, he had been so anxious he’d forgotten about the piece of
Butterbrot
she left for him each evening.
    “Check the calf.” She was referring to the two-week-old that had struggled to learn to suckle. Rebecca had spent hours each day feeding the animal from a bottle with a gentleness and patience that made Johann’s heart swell.
    At the doorway, he took one last look back at his wife and was flooded with longing. A twinge of anxiety rose in him unexpectedly and he fought the urge to return and kiss her good-bye once more.
    Turning away reluctantly, he walked to the door, donning his boots with the cracked soles, the brimmed hat that had been hisfather’s. The smell of manure grew stronger as he made his way to the barn. There he noted that the calf slept soundly, nestled at its mother’s breast.
    Then he walked to the clock shop at the back of the barn. It was nothing more than a large closet, a bench with some tools, a crude furnace for warmth. Johann’s father had started working there as a hobby, making clocks as a way to earn extra money in the harsh winter months. He taught Johann to help from the earliest years, first handing him bits of wood or letting him hold a piece in place while he fastened it. Later, Johann would make his first clumsy attempt at building his own clock, his skills growing over the years under his father’s wordless tutelage. And after his father died from an unfortunate kick by a horse, Johann continued to build clocks, the smell of the oil beneath the flickering lamplight a kind of mourning and tribute all at once. He sometimes imagined he heard his father working beside him still.
    Then one day last summer when he was in town he met the American who showed him the drawing of the clock. He had gone to Teitelbaum’s, the lone mercantile shop in town, to see if the proprietor had any work for him, as he sometimes did when he had a clock that required a particularly difficult repair. Herr Teitelbaum did not pay him in cash; rather Johann bartered his skills for the coffee and other practical items they needed, and sometimes when the job was a bit more involved, some white sugar to satisfy Rebecca’s sweet tooth. There was a young man at the counter soliciting orders for various clocks and watches and other gift items from abroad that he hoped the shop might consider stocking.
    “I’m afraid these are too dear for my customers,” Johann overheard Herr Teitelbaum say.
    Dejected, the salesman started to put away the papers containingimages of his wares and it was then that Johann had glimpsed the anniversary clock for the first time. “May I?” he asked. The salesman shrugged and slid the paper down the counter in his direction. As he studied the intricate mechanisms and fine glass dome, Johann was instantly captivated. He asked the man dozens of questions about the timepiece, memorizing his answers, before the man seemed to grow weary of the conversation and left.
    For weeks afterward, the image of the clock stayed with him. Could he replicate it? It would be extremely difficult and time-consuming, but if it was possible, it would bring in the money they needed to leave. He summoned up his courage and approached Herr Hoffel, one of the few men in town with the resources to purchase the clock, and price was discussed and agreed upon. And so he had begun to work.
    Johann pulled the clock from beneath the floorboards and set it on the workbench, appraising it anew. His hand traced the shape of the dome, hovering just above the glass as he resisted the urge to touch it and leave the smudge marks that would necessitate polishing it once more. He had built the clock from memory, adding his own modest touches where he dared to try and improve the end result. This was not the simple cuckoo clock that had been made in the region for centuries, with its basic wood design and crude mechanics. The