The Curiosity Shop

Curious shops make for curious items, perhaps you shouldn’t trust the shopkeeper that smiles at you like that…     

By Alanna Skelly, age 12

The paint was covered in a spiderweb of cracks, the once vibrant red created a duller and less magical façade for the Curiosity Shop. I entered, my heavy boots making the doorstep creak dangerously. The place was filled to the brim with tiny alleyways and toppling shelves. It was as if a book of fairy tales had exploded leaving debris all over the shop. 

Toys smiled down from the shelves, leaving me wondering what life they had led and how they had ended up here. There was a huge world map on the wall, tears and creases snaked down it and I wondered if it had once adorned a ship wall. There was a small drawing of a woman doodled onto Spain on the map, her legs swinging high in the air as if she was dancing. A grin spread across my face, as I remembered the last time I went dancing with my wife. That was years agonow, long before all the cancer and chemotherapy. A fancy china plate caught my attention, swirls of green and blue paint mixed with yellow and blue, creating the effect of a sunset melting into the sea. My footsteps echoed loudly in the aisles of this quiet shop, and a shaky voice called out to me. I responded with a polite greeting before returning to my task. I needed to find a present for my wife, maybe a doll or small trinket, as today was her birthday and I was going to visit her.

After sometime, I walked up to the counter, looking for the owner of the voice. A small, wrinkled woman sat behind the counter. Her green eyes sparkled like marbles pushed deep into her doughy face. There was a small smile playing on her lips and it only got wider when she saw me.

“Michael, is it?” she said reading my name off my work namebadge I had been wearing on my suit. “What are you looking for? We have everything you could possibly want.”

After a brief conversation she brought me to rows upon rows of small bronze animal statues. The first thing that caught my attention was a scarab beetle. It was green and it glittered oddly in the dim light. I picked it up and felt the comforting weight of it in my hand, it was warm as if there was a source of heat within it. I knew that this was the present. I followed the lady back to the counter. She was half my size and even she could barely get through the tiny gap. I had to dodge and stoop to avoid collisions with all kinds of objects that lay on the floor or swung from the ceiling above my head. It would have been useful if they replaced some of the objects with alamp or light. It was quite dark and all I could see was the shadow of the old lady.

While I was in the shop, the weather worsened and as I stepped back outside, the heavens cracked open, sending torrents of rain falling onto Earth. Tears dribbled down my face as I thought of my wife, but nobody could tell because of the rain. Annie would have loved that shop, she would have been enthralled with all the stories that the trinkets and toys could have told and the worlds of imagination they opened. I held the scarab beetle in my hand imagining the Ancient Egyptian Pharos being buried with it. All the bloodshed and all the smiles and tears it had seen in its years in this cruel world. In the hands of fate, personally I had not been luckybut maybe it would bring luck to my wife. Before long I reached Annie. I entered the iron gate and it swung behind me groaning on its rusty hinges. An old woman sat on a bench and gave me a warm smile, which I returned even though the remains of the tears still sat stubbornly in the crinkles of my eyes. I could have sworn that it was the same woman from the shop.

I reached the grave and the tears came out once again. Seeing the grave in the pouring rain gave me flashbacks to when we had buried her: her pale face splattered with salty rain, her blue eyes staring listlessly at me, the bags beneath her eyes, the small cut on her cheek that no one bothered covering with makeup and the faintest smile on her lips. She was the prettiest woman that I had ever known and had always deserved to be on the cover of a magazine. I dropped to my knees, pain in my chest like I had been stabbed with a knife.  I struggled to breathe as the tears flooded my mouth and memories hacked at my patched-up heart. I was trying to get over the loss and pain but every time I came back to the graveit was as if it had just happened afresh. I was faintly aware of the wet mud on my knees, but I couldn’t have cared less. I picked up the wilting anthuriums and replaced them with the scarab beetle. The flowers were red and the same shade as Annie’s favourite dress. The one she had worn on our engagement day. It complimented her eyes so well.

Suddenly I was brought back to reality by the rain. It was in my shoes and my hair, steaming up my glasses and on my suit. MY SUIT… I stood up, trying to brush the mud away but it was as stubborn as I am and clung tightly to my linen trousers. The cold bit at my bare ankles and I desperately wished I could afford new trousers, but I still had hugemedical bills to pay; who knew cancer treatment and funerals could be so expensive? The American medical system was breaking me, but I couldn’t give up. Maybe one day I could move to Japan and fulfil Annie’s dream. However, in reality, Iknew it probably wasn’t ever going to happen.

Even though I had only been in the graveyard for fifteen minutes, I turned my back on her and walked away. There was a group of drunken jeering teens lounging in one corner of the graveyard.

“AWWW YOU’RE SUCH A CRYBABY” one boy said to me, taunting me to respond to his teasing.

“Look mate, I lost my wife not even 4 months ago... I don’t need you to tell me that I can’t cry. She was the best thing that happened to me and now she is gone… so shut up and stop disrespecting me!” I snarled at them in my fiercest tone of voice. The boy exploded laughing at me, in a slightlymaniacal and terrifying manner. With his laughter resoundingin my head, I ran away wishing that I had just stayed quiet. I only slowed down once I was back on the streets filled with concrete blocks of buildings, all the same and as boring as ever. People were bundled up in their jackets as they scurriedaround to get their shopping.

Without even realising it, I had ended up back at my apartment, so I went inside and collapsed on the sofa. I turned on the TV, trying to ignore the sounds from my next-door neighbours and the ever increasing telephone calls urging me to settle my debts. On the tv, a newsflash appeared. It was about a 15-year-old boy that had just killed his whole family and friends in cold blood. The story was dated at 1:30pm today. The boy had a dark pair of piercing eyes that seemed to drill holes in my soul. It was the boy from the graveyard, the one with the terrifying laugh.  I switched the channel not wanting to know anymore, I was now watching Love Islandbut even this managed to bring tears to my eyes. It had been Annie’s favourite show and to think the show was on today,onher birthday, I put my head in my hands and just watched as the tears escaped and turned my blue carpet soggy with a rushing ocean of emotion. At some point I must have fallen asleep because I woke up with golden sunshine exploding through the grimy window. I pushed my hands into my pockets and my hand met a familiar stony shape. I pulled it out and stared in astonishment at the scarab beetle. I was sure that I had left it in the graveyard last night but maybe all those tears and mismatched memories confused me. I placed it on the table and left it there. Maybe I would bring it to the graveyard after work today.

After a hasty breakfast, I went on my daily run. Not a run by choice, I just always overslept and had to run to get to work on time. Today, after a night of maniacal laughter and teens with knives haunting my dreams, the run to the train station seemed longer and more exhausting. Before long, my steps slowed down, my body was sagging and I was gasping for breath. The world went dark, and I felt myself spiral down to the floor.

Bright lights shone in my eyes, and I blinked rapidly before sitting up. I hit my head on the doctor’s light and ended up collapsing right back into the pillows. I could feel a warm dribble of blood on my head. I appeared to be on a hospital ward and a nurse was standing beside me, applying firm pressure to my forehead as she cleaned my head wound. I found her green sterile gown too bright for my sensitised vision but I was grateful for her assistance to sit up. I twisted round hoping to find something to drink but the only thing on the bedside table was the scarab beetle. I had left it at home. I was sure of it.

“No, no, no, no!” I said.

“What’s wrong? Are you in any pain?” asked the nurse nervously. 

“Where did the beetle come from?”

“It fell out of your jacket pocket…It is yours right...?”

“Yes, it is mine, but I never want to see it again. Please get rid of it: it is following me, I think it must be haunted!” I begged her, wanting to smash it with my hand at that very moment but I didn’t want to be called crazy. 

She took it away and threw it into the bin on the other side of the ward. Hopefully it was gone for good now. When she returned, I gave her a thankful smile and asked her when I could leave, she said maybe in a couple hours if my test results gave me the all-clear. Fingers crossed they would.

A solemn faced nurse walked towards me, a huge stack of papers in her hand. Her eyes seemed focused beside me rather than on me, then I realised why, she was walking towards the patient next to me. The patient with the hacking cough that sounded as if someone was choking him. The patient on my other side was a frail old lady, who despite her small size had the lungs of a lion but unfortunately, the hearing ability of a wooden post. When the nurse asked her:

“Hello Sheila, are you alright now? Do you want anything to eat or drink?”

The old lady roared her response:

“SORRY DEARIE, YOU WILL HAVE TO SPEAK UP, MY HEARING ISN’T WHAT IT USED TO BE! I HAVE TAKEN MY MEDS TODAY BUT I NEED A GLASS OF WATER NOW PLEASE. I ALSO WANT SOME BICCIES. I KNOW THE DOCTOR SAID NO, BUT I AM SURE HE WON’T MIND IF I HAVE JUST A FEW BICCIES!”

The poor nurse could barely get a word in sideways. Some classical musical played in the background, it was soothing. Perhaps it was a piece by Mozart but for all I knew it could have been written by Taylor Swift. Another grave faced nurse came in my direction, and I panicked for a few moments but she passed through our ward and into ward F42, right next to ours.

I steadied my breathing in time with the reliable beep of machines on the ward. I think at some point I fell asleep because I woke up to a cheerful nurse chattering in my ear about the pretty charm that was on my table. The blasted beetle sat there, no worse for the wear for being in the bin for an hour or two. I had ended up in the hospital because of thistrinket, I was going to return it as soon as I left this place.

My test results were clear, and I was finally allowed to leave the hospital. I walked to the bus stop and soon my bus arrived. I hopped on and stayed on board till the stop near the Curiosity shop or at least where it used to be…. The shop had been located on Goodman Street between the local library and the small grocery store. But it was no longer there. The store seemed to have been completely erased, there was no space now between the store and the library. I stood there puzzled, wondering if I had the right street. But I was sure of the address, I had picked the shop because it was around the corner from the graveyard. A woman emerged from the library with a stack full of books and a pleasant smile on herface. 

“Are you lost?” she asked. I smiled politely and informed herthat I was looking for the Curiosity Shop that used to be on this street. She told me that she came to the library every day and she had never seen such a place. I thanked her and watched as she walked away, confused by her response.

The lady looked a little like Annie: she had the same curly hair and similar lively blue eyes. This was enough to make tears spring to my eyes and I found myself painfully smiling in memory of the eyes I had loved so much. I chased after the lady, just to see her eyes once more. I stumbled over my words as I asked her what she was reading. She told me that her name was Belle and her books were all about flight and travel. She wanted to make a trip to somewhere exotic for her holidays. Suddenly, Belle bent down and picked something from the street. 

“I think you dropped this…” she said. I was thankful and heldout my hand to accept the object until I saw what she had picked up…. the beetle! I left her hanging, still holding the beetle as I ran away. I ran and ran, till my feet hurt and I couldn’t see due to all the tears in my eyes. I hate the fact that I always run from my problems but this scarab beetle kept turning up like a bad penny. Perhaps those Pharohs in Ancient Eypgt had cursed it and all who touched it. I shuddered to think that I probably hadn’t seen the last of it.