It looks a lot different from the dry cleaners that it used to be. White Birchwood floors, soft blue walls, copper bins and woven baskets of ribbons and feathers, bolts of brightly colored fabrics and walls covered with unique fashion designs and crazy crafts all combine to make it feel warm, welcoming and happy -- that’s what I hope you will feel when you drop by. Just happy. Oh, and maybe magically motivated to shop your heart out.
“Uh, Olivia, didn’t I see those old metal cabinets on the curb in front of Burley’s Plumbing and Supply?” Constance interrupted, knowing that she had just found me guilty of one of my repurposing sins.
She was right; I had grabbed those cabinets right off the sidewalk, painting them shiny white and filling them with sewing and crafting patterns. Next I had sanded and stained wooden shelves that I’d “borrowed” from one of the oldest beach houses being torn down before attaching them to my shop walls and filling them with all sorts of unique crafting ideas. The wood is still saturated with the smell of the ocean and a trace of that wood preservative they used in the 50’s. I hate that last part, but everyone tells me the stink will go away soon. I think it adds to my store’s ambiance.
Two large cutting tables sit center stage in my shop, ready to welcome soon-to-be cut bolts of fabrics and rolls of ribbon and yarn. Okay, so I’ve told you how much I love to repurpose items, but these tables have been my most challenging DIY project ever, and not for the reason you think.
The tables had belonged to the local wallpaper lady who retired and left them near her dumpster as trash. I grabbed them before the trash trucks came one morning and I spent hours scraping ancient, gooey crud off each of the tables. You can’t believe how much junk I cleaned off. And you’d be proud of me; I only used a little magic to ease the grip of the old glue.
As if cleaning them up wasn’t enough of a challenge, the wallpaper lady up and died and her ghost started bugging me about how special these tables are and what I should be doing to improve their appearance -- as if her ghost knows better than me. I’m kind of exhausted just telling you about it. I don’t want to spend too much more time talking about those darn tables because she’s sure to turn up again to nag me about something else. It’s not easy being a DIY witch!
The back left corner of my shop has a sitting area complete with two overstuffed ocean blue and white striped couches with pillows of conch, periwinkle and clam shells that I carefully embroidered on them. Who wouldn’t long to snuggle down into these two welcoming couches I wondered as I carefully plumped up each of the pillows.
My favorite red rocking chair sits beside the couch just waiting for someone to settle into it. I want my guests to be able to look through design magazines, discuss patterns or just sit and relax while talking over their projects. The funniest thing about that crazy chair, no matter where in the store I place it, it always appears to be rocking. Even when no one is around, the chair seems to have a life of its own. I think I’m going to have to look into that strange rocking a little more. I’m starting to wonder if I might have collected a spirit or two in my shop. Hopefully it’s not the wallpaper lady.
When the beach weather cools down I plan on having hot teas and coffees from around the world as a further inducement for patrons to spend a bit more time with me. Kind of cozy, don’t you think?
Trying to be a bit more gracious, I asked Constance, “Want a cup of coffee before you leave?”
I was definitely in the mood for a little Java juice myself. I moved past the cash register on my way to the coffee pot and noticed that something was sticking out from under the register.
“Where did that come from?” I asked absently.
“What?” Constance said, moving towards me.
“This.” I pulled the edge of an envelope that had been sticking out just enough to catch my eye. “I guess I just didn’t see it before.”
A beautiful old card with pink roses and scrawling letters on it tumbled out of the envelope. And with it came the wondrous smell of roses. The same smell as the perfume my godmother Meghan used to wear all the time.
“That’s the second time today, “I said before opening the card.
Dear Olivia,
Marv and I know that you will use your special powers to bring our little shop back to life. Best wishes. Know that we love you and will always be with you.
Love,
Marv and Meghan.
“Interesting,” said Miss Cassandra staring around the room with her teeth chattering strangely.
“What’s up with you?” I asked.
“The perfume, the card……. earth to Olivia. You need to improve your ghost hunting skills, little witch,” said Miss Cassandra sarcastically. “I think we have company, spiritual company, the kind that goes bump in the night!” she said as she continued to snoop around the room.
“Geez, you have once crazy cat, Olivia!” said Constance. “That card has probably been stuck under there for years and we just now discovered it. And I’m not picking up any ghostly vibrations, are you?”
“Nope,” I said, laughing. “I’ve never known Miss Cassandra to be so worried about spirits. And I certainly wouldn’t attribute her reactions to sentimentality; that is definitely not Miss Cassandra’s bailiwick.” Constance laughed as she headed out my front door with a quick good bye wave.
Turning my back on Constance and my cat I missed the card floating silently away and tucking itself back under the old cash register.
Chapter 3
Company or not, I’m starving and that sandwich was starting to look pretty tempting, when whoosh, the shop front door flew open and all five-foot nothing of Miss Gail Winkler appeared.
“Sorry I’m late, Boss. I got so turned around after I left the freeway that I thought I’d never get here! Glad that you told me the place had blue and white striped awnings. All these beachy little stores look the same to me.”
Pushing back her sparkly head band and adjusting the hot pink glasses that currently hung on the tip of her slender nose, Gail dumped her purple knapsack on the cutting counter, sucked in her breath and let it out slowly.
“O-M-G! ….. Olivia, this place is totally awesome!”
Gail Winkler is my best friend and college roommate. Tiny as Tinkerbelle with lavender spiked hair, she has the same violet colored eyes as Liz Taylor. Gail is not only a talented seamstress, but also an unpredictable visual delight and the perfect person to have by my side daily.
“I’m so glad you’re here Gail,” I said, giving her my best welcoming hug. “And by the way, cut out the Boss stuff. Who else besides my bestie would I want to work with?”
Back in school not everyone got Gail or her style. A few of my friends thought that she was just totally weird, but I got her and she got me and I knew that together we could create magic. Of course, it also helps that Gail has magic running through her veins. Her heritage is jam packed with all sorts of practitioners of witchcraft over hundreds of generations.
“Hey Olivia, I noticed that little lavender stage in the back of the shop. Is that for me?” Gail asked drawing my attention to the back of the store.
I couldn’t help but laugh as I took Gail’s hand and dragged her to what I called The Design Center.
“This is it! This is where you’ll use your magic to craft wickedly creative outfits for our customers.”
Nudging Gail forward until she stood upon the little stage I asked, “What other color would I have made it? Didn’t you tell me that lavender was your super inspirational color?”
As Gail looks into the mirror, her smile repeats over and over again in the seven mirrors that surround the stage. From the start I was emphatic that the stage needed to be bordered by mirrors, seven mirrors. Seven mirrors meant good luck - at least that’s what a well-known fashion wizard told me once - seven mirrors capture the seven distinct personality traits of any person who steps onto the stage.
“Wait, wait, wait,” Gail announced, pushing her sparkly glasses back where they belonged. “I’ve got to do
something really important first. I need to cast my own spell so that we can be sure that our magical and creative juices will harmonize together so that our design center will be a huge success. Are you cool with that Olivia?” she asked, looking at me hopefully.
“As long as no one comes in, go for it Gail,” I said, walking to where I could keep a closer eye on my front door.
“I’ll place an enchanted ward on the door so that if anyone walks by they won’t be able to see what we are doing,” said Gail turning her back to the store windows and snapping her fingers:
You cannot open
You cannot see
Keep what happens behind these windows a mystery
That none will see
With the ward in place, and after making sure that there was no one else in the store, I figured it was safe for Gail to start her spell. Since Gail is much better at casting spells than I am, I’m feeling confident that everything will be okay.
Stepping her tiny frame up on the stage Gail lifted her arms and sighed:
Mother Earth, Sister Stars and Brother Moon
I ask of you to listen to me
Creative I want always to be
Expressing colors and designs outwardly
What talent slumbers now within me
Let shine forth for all to see
Entwine our magic in harmony
And let success flow for Olivia and me
Please join our creative powers
And may they shine together for endless hours
“OOOH. Thanks Olivia for letting me do that. It felt so good. I love the feel of magic coursing through my body in the morning. I feel so creative and raring to go!”
As she finished her spell a glow remained about her and Gail smiled with satisfaction. She giggled and looked back into the mirrors only to be startled out of her joyful state.
“Whoa, who was that?” Gail asked and quickly jumped off the stage.
“What?” I said without realizing that the mirror had just captured any unexpected guests. “Did you see something?”
Had Miss Cassandra been right? Did I have some sort of lost spirit hanging around? Or worse yet was there a poltergeist of some sort living in my shop? I didn’t smell the telltale scent of wallpaper paste so I was pretty sure it wasn’t the wallpaper lady. Geez, I was just getting started and there were already too many mystical issues for two young witches to deal with.
Gail and I stood in front of the mirror for a while longer hoping to get a second chance to see who or what had been spying on us, but nothing showed itself.
“Let’s calm down and I’ll split my sandwich with you,” I offered as I directed Gail towards the cutting table stools. “My sister Constance has already been here trying to fatten me up. Watch out, before long she’ll be after you too.”
“I thought that might have been her deli that I passed while I was trying to find my way here,” Gail laughed. “You can’t miss that big pickle on her sign. I don’t know exactly why she chose that symbol, but I have to tell you that I love it!”
Turning to look at me and lowering her voice, Gail said, “Hey, I got something kind of weird to talk to you about.”
“Kind of witchy weird or kind of just everyday life weird?” I asked because I was still a little spooked by what happened when I grabbed my front door handle, not to mention the unexpected reflection in the mirrors or the handwritten note from Marv and Meghan. If it was something kind of witchy weird I would probably need to sit down.
“Not witchy weird and maybe not even weird to you at all,” Gail said, getting kind of testy with me. She gets that way when she thinks I’m not taking her seriously. So I waved my hand, encouraging her to move forward with her question.
“You have my full attention,” I said.
“You know your friend, Larry Webber. The one who’s the surfer hottie?” Gail asked.
“Yeah, what about him?”
“Well, other than the fact that he’s a six-foot two blond haired dude with an awesome surfer’s body, did you know that he and Harmony are having a thing?”
“What? What are you talking about? You think Larry has a thing for my sister, Harmony?”
Larry Webber was the richest man on the beach, and I’d introduced him to Gail once when she came home from school with me. I could tell that there was a little magical sizzle between those two. I was just not sure what else, if anything was going on there.
“Do you think you could be mistaken, Gail?”
“I don’t think so. I’m talking about the guy who wears board shorts,T-shirts and flip flops all the time. The same guy who’s so rich that he never has to work and who inherited all of his parents' money when they died? The guy I once a long time ago thought that I might have a thing for?” The last part of this sentence came out in more of a whisper.
“What makes you think that he and Harmony know each other like that?” I asked.
“Oh, they know each other like that. I saw them with their heads together talking in his old red Chevrolet at the gas station. They were so deep in conversation they never even saw me, and I was at the pump right next to them. I could have reached in and pinched Harmony,” she said before mumbling, “Kind of wish I had.”
“Now that I think of it, Harmony did start calling Larry the unofficial mayor of New Moon Beach; he seems to always know everything that’s happening around town. But I never in a million years thought he knew Harmony that way.”
“Isn’t she a little old for him?” Gail words rang with more than a hint of jealousy.
“Yeah. Hang on; maybe they were just having a friendly conversation.”
“I couldn’t hear what Harmony was saying because her back was to me, but they were definitely talking about something important. Harmony was very animated. I mean, she even had her hand on his shoulder part of the time. Are you sure you don’t know anything about this?” Gail asked.
“Nope. It’s news to me.”
“Hmm, I know one thing for sure; I’m getting out of their way if those two are an item. Too bad, I really liked those board shorts,” she sighed wistfully before beginning again.
“Hang on to your broom, that’s not all. First, Jonathan Maxwell was on campus looking for you right before I left. I told him that I didn’t know where you had gone. I lied and said I thought you were moving to a design studio in New York.” Gail lowered her eyes and whispered “I hope that was okay?”
“Was there a second thing?”
I wanted to step right over the Jonathan sighting, so I scooped up Miss Cassandra, who had apparently wandered in looking for some girl time.
“Oh yeah, I’ve just figured out that our shop is haunted.”
“Finally, someone with superb perceptual abilities like my own,” spouted Miss Cassandra. “I wondered how long those two spooks were going to wander around here before someone picked them up on their radar. They have been driving me crazy with their constant jabbering. Olivia, perhaps you might want to listen to your friend.”
“Thank you Miss Cassandra, now hush!” I said before turning to Gail. “Who is it that you think is haunting my shop?”
You’ll notice that I never doubted that what Gail was telling me was true. She can see and hear dead people. That’s old news. The new news was that I had somehow missed the fact that my store was being haunted. My magical skills lay elsewhere. I can’t see dead people like Gail, and it takes a while before I’m even able to hear them.
“Sorry, but it took me a while to figure out who was staring at me in the mirror. It’s that cute little couple who used to work here.”
Suddenly, Gail's attention turned from me to the spirits.
“Yes, yes, I can see you. No, she can’t. I can’t help that. Yes, I’ll tell her. Now zip it please, you both can’t talk at once.” Gail said and then she turned to me. “Marv and Meghan want you to know that they are here. They were your godparents weren’t they?”
“Yes, yes. Tell them that I just found their card, and I smelled
her perfume, and I thought I felt Meghan at the house the other day,” I said excitedly.
“Oh boy, this is getting just too crazy! They have a million things they want to tell you.” Gail turned toward the cutting counter. “Guys, I just got here. Give me a chance to get settled in and then I can channel you both a little bit better, and don’t try to scare me again by popping into my mirror. That was not nice.”
It was back to me again.
“These are two of the chattiest ghosts I’ve ever met, Olivia. I certainly hope that you’re going to be able to hear them soon because this is just not going to work. And hey you two please stop moving the fabrics around! This is not your shop anymore,” Gail said as a bolt of calico print floated from one shelf to another.
With that, the fabric crashed to the floor. That had to be Meghan; she always was the emotional one. I could only hope that my communication skills would improve soon and that I would be able to take advantage of one of my weaker gifts and hear these two very important ghosts, even if I couldn’t see them. In time, I bet they’ll be able to tell me if anything strange is going on around here. Especially if some lost spirit is stuck in my store.
Chapter 4
Every summer morning in New Moon Beach begins the same way. Large, old, corroded city beach tractors huff and puff up the beach belching out gray exhaust as they rake the sand into neat little rows. I love to watch the Lifeguard trucks zig-zagging back and forth delivering good looking, tanned men and women dressed in red shorts or bathing suits to their baby blue city lifeguard towers.
It’s so much fun watching the early morning surfers racing along the sea shore before diving in, straddling their boards, balanced and waiting for that perfect wave to hit. I know there are sharks out there, I’ve seen them! But none of the surfers seem to take notice. Believe me; all I need is to spot just one of those black fins heading towards any of my surfing buddies and I’ll be down on the shore performing an anti-shark spell pronto. Even if I’m not that good at spell making, those sharks won’t stand a chance!
Morning Magic Page 2