Page 63 of Finding Love at the Magical Curiosity Shop
‘Anyone who buys that amount of tea and cake is a good ’un at heart. Emotions are high at the moment. Don’t take it personally.’
How many times have I said the same to Ren this summer? I never expected to have someone saying that to me when it all went wrong. Because ithasall gone wrong, hasn’t it?
Ava will never forgive me, and Ren… never wanted to get involved in the first place, and this is his perfect excuse to shut himself off again.
Cleo rubs my back and lets me cry into her shoulder while I try to come to terms with how quickly this all went south. With the way I’ve been feeling about Ren, I expected them both to be in my life forevermore, but somehow, we didn’t even make it to the end of the summer holidays, and I suddenly wish we’d thrown that diary into the fathoms below as soon as we found it, and stayed well and trulynota part of each other’s worlds.
20
‘That was totally unfair and out of line, you know that, right?’ It’s a couple of mornings later, and Lissa has come to check on me for what is probably the seventieth time this week. ‘If he hadn’t been dealing with a messy teenager, I’d have thumped him for talking about my best friend like that.’
She punches a fist into the open palm of her opposite hand, making me laugh despite myself, as only a best friend can. ‘He was angry. He’s a protective father and his daughter was upset. Emotions were magnified and Ididtell her she could keep that diary when I had no way of knowing that.’
‘Youdidn’t upset Ava – the situation did. Kids of that age aren’t always mature enough to separate the two. She’d attached an importance to the diary that was unrealistic and it shocked her when she realised it belonged to someone. Children have no idea how to regulate their emotions and meltdowns like that are common. We’re notthatold – you must remember being that age. Everything feels bigger than it is and every situation makes you feel like you’re the only person who’s ever had to face horrible things happening. You want to be treated like an adult but also indulged like a child, and those emotions conflict and try to outshine each other at every opportunity. It’s not something you’ll never be able to move past, but in the moment, she didn’t know how else to react.’
Lissa has a load of little sisters, I’m going to have to trust her judgement on that one. ‘Was she okay? When you went after her?’
‘No,’ Lissa says honestly. ‘But she took the photocopied page and I promised I’d keep the rest for her. She’s a lovely kid – I think she’ll realise, in time, that it was the right thing to do.’
‘I hope so.’ And in the meantime, I can go back to missing them both, and actually being really annoyed with Ren over how he handled that on Sunday. Both of us have made mistakes this summer, but the one thing I’m certain of is that letting each other in wasnotone of them.
Lissa carries on trying to make me feel better. ‘She loves you. She basicallyisyou in smaller, louder, more excitable form. I’ve never seen such a Mini Me. You’ll get past this.’
‘It’s not that simple. Even if Ava does forgive me, Ren never will. He isnotthe kind of man to let himself make the same mistake twice, and I’m not sure I’m the kind of woman to forgive someone for such cruel words so easily, for that matter.’
‘No one calls my best friend a mistake. He’ll be lucky if I don’t punch him in the nose when I see him next.’ She makes an ‘I’m watching you’ gesture towards the door, even though Ren is not likely to see it, and she manages to make me laugh again, even though laughing is the last thing I feel like doing.
‘That’s the spirit. And talking of spirits and lifting them, it’s the second of September and Cleo’s got an early-autumn special on pumpkin spice lattes, are you in?’
‘Aren’t you supposed to be working?’
‘The museum can manage itself for a while. I’ve left my Lumière statue in charge, he’s great at covering for me.’ She waves a nonchalant hand and then laughs and heads for the door. ‘I closed up, Mick. It was so quiet this morning and hanging out with you seemed more important.’
‘One day we’ll get to fight a cause for you and pay you back for all this cheerleading you do,’ I call after her.
Lissa is the most supportive person on Ever After Street and always the first to help anyone in need of assistance and the first to stand up for any injustice, and I’m proud to call her my best friend.
* * *
The days of the week pass like wading through treacle. I hadn’t realised how much of my time had been occupied by Ren and Ava, and the diary. We’ve all spent so much time reading it, researching it, hunting for clues, searching the shop for other things that might’ve come from the same house clearance, and now all those questions are answered, and I’m left wondering how I filled my hours before that day, six weeks ago, when that grouchy man and his cheerful daughter walked into my shop.
And it’s not just time, but headspace too. I’ve spent so many weeks with them. If not with them, then thinking about them. Thinking of things to do with them. Things to show them. Things to tell one or both of them. Ava had sent me social media memes every day, and links to websites she’d found about mermaid sightings in Britain. Imissher.
And then there’s Ren. Not the grouchy, angry Ren, but the soft, gentle, tipsy Ren who was the most gorgeous man I’d ever seen, the best kisser I’ve ever kissed, and the best hugger I’ve ever hugged. I didn’t know it was possible to grow so close to someone in only a few weeks, but when someone lets you in after shutting everyone out for years, it’s been impossible not to let him in too, and open myself up to a relationship when I thought I’d be closed off in that department until the end of time itself. I didn’t expect it to end so sharply and with such cutting, undeserved comments.
Lissa’s been spending extra time with me, but she’s got her own business to run, and the fairytale artefacts in the Colours of the Wind museum don’t look after themselves. And even though my shop has been busier than ever since the antiques fair, the only thing it feels without Ren and Ava is dull and empty.
I haven’t bothered doing my hair or putting on any sea-punned T-shirts. The only thing that remains of my Ariel costume is Ursula’s shell necklace, mainly because Lissa had it made for me and she’d be upset if I stopped wearing it for no good reason.
Since the weekend, curiosity collectors and antiques hunters have been coming and going with regularity. The shop is much better organised now, and Witt, bless his soul, made sure that all the publicity surrounding the Philip Teasdale Antiques Fair mentioned The Mermaid’s Treasure Trove, and so many new customers have now added it to their regular round of antiquing that I can barely keep up with the comings and goings, never mind the sales and ringing money into the till. I even had a queue last week. I’d never had a queue before, and I’m so grateful to Ren for his sharp, blunt honesty, because without him being a catalyst, I’d probably still be buried under masses of junk with no customers and Victorian-style birdcages that leap forth and attack unsuspecting passersby.
I look up as a man comes in and looks around.
‘Can I help you with anything specific?’ I ask, because some customers want to know if you’ve got certain collectibles, and others just want to browse and see what they find.
He seems like one of the latter as he takes in the wide paths through sensibly positioned furniture, displaying trinkets with plenty of space around them to fully showcase their qualities, rather than a hundred things all rammed together, hoping someone would rescue them. For a moment, he looks like he’s going to ask for something, and then changes his mind. ‘I’m looking for… Well, I think this is the kind of place where I’ll know it when I see it.’
Amazingly, he’s not the only customer browsing, and I lose track of him as I serve a lady buying a tulip-shaped candle holder, and a few minutes later, from the second half of the shop, there’s an exclamation of, ‘Ah, this is it! Exactly the thing that I’ve needed all my life without ever knowing I needed it!’
