Annoy -

Toby stopped mid-whistle, his cleaning rag frozen. "Uh, like when my sister hides my phone?"

"Toby," Elias called out, his voice a low vibration of restrained irritation. "The solvent. Is it applied?"

Elias lived for silence. As a professional watchmaker, his world was measured in microns and the nearly imperceptible snick-snick of escapement wheels. He was currently in the final hour of restoring a 19th-century Breguet, a piece of mechanical poetry so delicate that a heavy sneeze could ruin a week's work. Then came the whistling. Toby stopped mid-whistle, his cleaning rag frozen

"Toby," Elias said, turning slowly in his swivel chair. "Do you know what 'annoy' means?"

"Almost, Mr. E!" Toby chirped, followed by a wet, clicking sound as he popped a piece of gum. "Just making sure I get into the nooks. And the crannies. Can't forget the crannies." Snap. Is it applied

He had only been searching for five minutes when a small, rhythmic sound started up from the street outside. A car was idling, its bass-heavy music thumping a single, repetitive note that shook the very glass of his storefront.

The hairspring, a coil thinner than a human eyelash, had Ping-Ponged out of the tweezers and vanished into the shag carpet. Elias sat frozen. The annoyance he had been carefully tamping down suddenly flared into a cold, white heat. Then came the whistling

Toby looked at the floor, then back at Elias, his eyes wide. "I... I can help find it? I have a magnet!"