Pocket watch and rose on the neck

The watch is going again, though I still don't know how. Mr Okafor on the fourth floor had it open on his kitchen table when I came up with the bin bags, the little brass innards laid out on a tea towel like a surgeon's tray. He said the mainspring was the trouble and that Roman numerals always look older than they are, which I think was his way of telling me the thing had belonged to his father and he would not sell it. Nine days he worked on it, with a magnifier screwed into one eye.

Mrs Dhillon at number twelve keeps a rose bush in a Quality Street tin on her balcony, grey-looking in this light, and she brings cuttings down to the bins as if they were letters. She says the rose only comes up after the frost, which is nonsense, but I keep thinking about it when I pass the lift.

Last Thursday the lift was out again and I climbed all fourteen floors with the watch in my coat pocket. Halfway up it began to tick against my ribs, steady as a knock on a door, and I stopped on the landing and let it count for a while. Nobody came out to see who was there.

Mr Okafor says he will give it back on Sunday. I have told him to keep it until I know what time it is. Write when you can. The post room has a new lock but the view is the same.

Love, Ada