The attic smelled of dust, old wood and dried apples. Rain tapped on the roof like a curious woodpecker. Zosia and Philip were climbing the ladder, followed by Piksel the cat, cautious as ever but with his tail in an exclamation mark. - Just don't knock anything over! - cried Mum from the kitchen. - And remember, the attic is not a playground. - We'll just look for the button box - replied Filip, although he wasn't at all sure where the button box was. He preferred to sound very adult. Zosia squeezed between the shoe boxes that housed the non-shoe treasures: coloured strings, envelopes, buttons and postcards of the beach where the sun was always halfway to setting. The attic was like a bookshelf, only the books were boxes, and instead of letters, dust crunched silently. - Fil, look! - whispered Zosia suddenly. - There's a casket with stars in it. At the very end, covered by a soft handkerchief with silver dots, stood a small wooden casket. The lock wasn't closed, it was just waiting. Philip leaned in, cautious as a cat, although he had no whiskers at all. - 'Shall we open it? - Zosia asked. - 'We're opening,' said Filip. - But slowly. The lid lifted with a quiet sigh. Inside lay a pocket clock. It was not an ordinary one. It had a smooth, shiny case, and a tiny blue star-shaped button on the side. An extra, thinner blue pointer circled on the dial next to the hours, like a thread from the rain. - And what is this inscription? - Zosia turned the clock over. On the back were engraved the words: "Take your time. Time likes to play hide and seek." - 'I think it's something from my grandfather's dad,' muttered Philip, who liked to speak wisely, although he didn't always know what to talk about. - Maybe it's a family treasure. Pixel slipped his muzzle into the casket, sniffed the clock and murmured quietly. Then he licked his paw, as if to say, "This is something very important." Zosia put the clock to her ear. - Tick... yes... tick... - but the "tick" was like a breath, which hesitated, and the "yes" dragged on a little longer, like stretching a jumping rubber. - 'Look here,' said Philip, pointing to the middle part of the dial. - There are little words! 'Today', 'Yesterday', 'The day before yesterday' and... 'A very long time ago'. - It's like a calendar that has a spring - whispered Zosia. - Or like a map without streets - added Filip. - But with time instead of streets. Zosia slipped her finger under the chain. It was as cold as the morning. - I wonder what that blue button is for? - 'Don't touch it,' warned Philip, because that's what older brothers say. - Let's check that it works habitually first. - OK - agreed Zosia. - I count to three and gently move the pointer to 'Yesterday'. One... two... - 'Meow,' said Pixel and, as Pixel does, he did something catty. He just nudged that blue button. The button clicked. The clock fluttered its hands. The blue thread twitched and began to flow to the left, very slowly, and then faster and faster, like a stream after the rain. The air in the attic trembled. Dust rose and danced like swarms of tiny fairies. The pages of the old calendar on the nail moved - one, two, three - as if they had first fallen and then returned to their place, only in reverse order. The rain outside the window began to tap differently, as if it were retracting its drops back into the clouds. - Fil... - Zosia squeezed her brother's sleeve. - Do you hear? The clock wasn't just ticking. He was humming. Quietly, lowly, like a lullaby for the clouds. And each sound formed a word: "Yesterday... the day before yesterday... a long time ago... a very long time ago...". - Maybe it's just... the wind? - suggested Philip, but the wind can't speak like a clock. Nor does it make the world suddenly smell of wet earth, moss and something green and fresh that doesn't live in the attic. In the box next door, paperclips trembled. Feathers from a great-grandmother's hat danced in the air. A scarf with silver dots rose and braided a ribbon around the clock's chain, as if she wanted not to lose it. - 'You've got to stop it,' Philip said, but his voice rang out from around the corner. He reached for the clock, and it was now warmer than his hand. - 'Maybe... just for a moment we'll see,' suggested Zosia. Her eyes lit up almost like a button. - Just for 'Yesterday'. The blue pointer passed "Yesterday" and "The day before yesterday", as if she had seen no stop sign. It stopped at "A very long time ago" and made a tiny "beep". Everything trembled. The floorboards sighed, the walls hushed their whisper, and the roof, instead of rain, made the sound of... cicadas? No, not in the attic. There are no cicadas in the attic. - 'Oh dear,' said Zosia, but the 'oh dear' stuck in her throat. The world around her began to untangle like wool from a ball. First the cobweb in the corner disappeared. Then the cardboard boxes became transparent, and then it was as if someone had turned them into smoke. The walls became as thin as carbon paper. A green ray of light broke through the floorboards. - 'Hold my hand,' said Philip, already without pretending anything was happening. - And hold Pixel's hand. The cat snorted. His whiskers moved like antennae and his tail wagged even more. Zosia grabbed Pixel under his arms, Philip grabbed Zosia, and the clock - no, the clock grabbed them, it felt like. As if someone kindly guided them through the crowd of time, saying: "Attention, here's the step." It got very quiet, and then very loud. Quiet because everything around them had disappeared. Loud, because the new world had a noise of its own: the buzzing of great dragonflies, the rustling of leaves bigger than umbrellas, the splash of water somewhere close by. And the smell - juicy, green, so intense that Zosia sneezed all the way. The attic was no longer an attic. Instead of beams overhead, ferns grew as tall as towers. Instead of a window there was a sky, huge and bright. Instead of a box of buttons - a stone overgrown with moss. Only the clock remained in their hands, warm and tinkling. - Where do we... - Philip began, but did not finish. The ground beneath their feet twitched. Gently, as if someone had tapped a finger on the table. Then a second time, harder. The leaves of the ferns trembled, a bird with three feathers on its tail took flight, Pixel turned into a black, soft hedgehog. - Can you feel it? - Zosia looked up. A shadowy, long cloud flew lazily across the sky. And then... the shadow was not from a cloud. At the edge of the clearing, a wall of green moved. Something huge spread the leaves, like a man's curtain. First a rustling sound, then a heavy, deep STEP. The air trembled and drops of dew fell from the ferns. - Hold the clock! - hissed Philip. The blue hand twitched, as if it too was afraid. STEP. Even closer. Susan heard her own heart beating: knock-knock, like a little drum. The green leaves right in front of them swung open like a door....