1
There are two types of people in the world – people who appreciate the value ofstuff, and minimalists. I’m the former. An unfortunate number of my customers are the latter.
‘Oh my God, this place is ah-maze-zing!’
I hadn’t heard a customer come in, and I shriek in surprise at the unexpected voice behind me. I was on my hands and knees, trying to grapple a butterfly-shaped side table into a space in the window display after a customer had ransacked it, and I push myself onto my feet and pop out from behind a canvas painting of a fox dressed up like a Tudor king. My movement dislodges a bucket containing stems of dried flowers, and they go crashing down. The giant sunflower hits the floor with such force that the flowerhead explodes, sending seeds skittering noisily across the shop.
The customer is a young girl, probably teenage-ish, and her hands are clasped over her mouth to cover a gasp as she spins on the spot, looking around in awe as her eyes flit from the rainbow mosaic horse’s head on the wall, to the drapes of vintage fabrics hanging from the ceiling, to the vast array of unusual ornaments and oddities that cover every available surface.
Nowthatis the reaction I want my customers to have. Maybe business would be better if more of them did.
The girl’s eyes flick from me to the scattered sunflower seeds still pinging across the floor. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you jump.’
‘It’s okay, I should know my way around without bumping into things by now.’ I wave towards the rest of the shop, slightly perturbed by a young girl coming in alone. Most of my customers are antique collectors and curiosity hunters, and the only youngsters I usually see are bored ones, being dragged along by parents and complaining all the way. ‘Feel free to look around while I clear this up.’
She glances at the door behind her, almost like she’s waiting for someone to come after her.
I grab the dustpan and brush from behind the counter and start sweeping, trying to keep a furtive eye on my visitor because there’s something off about this, I’m sure of it.
‘I’ll help.’ She crouches down and starts gathering the dried sunflower seeds with her hands, and I can’t help noticing that she’s sort of backing behind a display table, and she keeps glancing at the window, almost like she’s trying to hide.
‘Are you waiting for someone?’
‘No.’ She says it quickly and when I continue looking at her expectantly, she huffs with a typical teenage eye roll. ‘Just my dad. He’ssoooboring, he’d hate a place like this. He said I could come in on my own. He doesn’t mind.’
There’s something in her tone that makes me wonder if that’s the whole truth, but before I can work out what to do about it, the door suddenly flies open with such force that it nearly tears off its hinges and a man rushes in. ‘Have you seen a—ow!’
He’s in such a flap that he doesn’t see my hanging birdcage candle holders and crashes smack-bang into one, and I cringe as the sound of metal connecting with his very handsome face reverberates through the shop.
He lets out a yelp and a hand flies up to his forehead at the point of impact. His eyes scan the shop and fall on my young visitor. ‘Ava! Thank God! Don’t youeverdo that again! You can’t just disappear like that! I didn’t know where you were.’
Iknewshe wasn’t telling the whole truth there, and underneath the hand he’s still holding to his injured forehead, her dad looks so flustered and panicked that he must have been racing around Ever After Street, frantically searching for her.
‘We were watching the carousel and I turned around and you were gone!’
‘I didn’t want to go on the carousel! It’s for babies!’
‘You can’t sneak off like that! I thought something had happened to you! Andyou!’ He turns to me. ‘Why are you harbouring a young girl on her own? You must’ve known she’d run off!’
‘Me? How would I know something like that?’ I feel myself bristling instantly. ‘She told me you’d said she could come in by herself.’
‘Oh, she did, did she?’ He goes to raise an eyebrow and then winces when it obviously hurts the head injury.
‘I don’t want to hang out with you!’ Ava gets to her feet and folds her arms. ‘You’re boring! And this place issooocool!’
‘This place is a hellhole!Wholeaves hanging things right in the doorway?’
‘Oi! That’s my shop you’re talking about! And it’s notinthe doorway, it’s to the side of the doorway –youweren’t looking where you were going.’
‘I panicked, okay?’ He twists around to glance back at the doorway and the birdcage candle holdersbesideit. ‘I thought my daughter had been kidnapped! I didn’t know if I was ever going to find her again! Anything could’ve happened!’
He puts a hand on his chest, forcing himself to take deep, calming breaths as he looks around. ‘And now I see she’s been swallowed up by the local junk shop, so I was right to be concerned.’
‘It’s a curiosity shop. It’s not junk, they’re curiosities, see?’ I resist the urge to poke my tongue out at him. He’s not the first customer who doesn’t understand the concept of a curiosity shop, he undoubtedly won’t be the last.
‘Dad, shut up! It’s a Treasure Trove!’
‘The clue is in the name. Treasure wouldn’t be treasure if you didn’t have to hunt for it.’ I point to the sign behind the counter where, admittedly a little bit obscured by all the other things hanging on the wall, The Mermaid’s Treasure Trove shop sign is displayed, and I trill a line I’ve said to many customers who complain about the… well, they call it clutter, I call it beloved items just waiting for their new owner to find them and give them the home they deserve.
