The Beautiful Things Shoppe

by Philip William Stover

“No, no,” I say grunting. “It’s a one-man job. I’ll see you inside.” If he helps me there is a chance that our fingers could touch and I’m sure even in this cold air there would be a spark so intense a few pacemakers might go on the fritz.

  Once Prescott is inside Kasia runs over to me. “Danny, Danny,” she says excitedly. “Is that your new young man?”

  “No,” I say, trying not to drop the sewing machine.

  “He’s so handsome. What a face on that one. Like an angel. Are you sure?” She’s talking to me like I’m sitting across from her at a table and not carrying the land mass of a small country between my arms.

  “I’m sure,” I say barely getting the words out and putting down the sewing machine. “He’s only here because he works with me at the shop and we share a van. This is a business outing. That’s all.”

  Kasia looks toward the door Prescott went in and then at me. “Look, it’s been a while since my pilot light has made a pot of water boil and I may need cataract surgery according to my doctor but, kohanie, even I can see the way he looked at you when you were outside.”

  “How exactly did he look at me?”

  “He looked at you the same way my Michelle looked at me. Danielek, my boy. He is definitely smitten.” She nods slowly with a grin that’s half mischief and half sweetness.

  I pick up the sewing machine again and slip on the gravel. I almost fall to the ground but Kasia puts her arm on my back just in time for me to stay standing upright. It takes me a second to catch my breath. She opens the door to the church hall and I think about going to the rectory, lighting a candle and saying a few prayers to make her prediction wrong.

  I help a few of the other parishioners with their tasks before the doors open. I’ve been going to this rummage sale for years and I’ve gotten to know a lot of the community even though I’m not part of the church officially. They are mostly older folks, many of them Polish, so I get to practice a few of the phrases my mom taught me as I help them move things around and do some of the other grunt work that might be too difficult.

  This sale is one of the biggest in the region and I always come away with a big haul at a reasonable price. The church hall is filled with a well-organized inventory of things from lamps to linens.

  Once the doors open to the public I start scouring the rooms for things that I might be able to sell in the shop. There’s a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Party Wagon that’s only missing one wheel, an incomplete set of Holly Hobby mugs featuring those signature country braids, a huge midcentury long-pile rug with purple and magenta stylized flowers and an old-style toboggan with smooth weathered wood and enough room for two people. But the piece de resistance is a ginormous painting of a sad clown holding a drooping flower in one hand. I’ve put the small things in the van, but I decide, as much as I loathe to ask, I need Prescott’s help with the painting. It’s just too large.

  I settle up at the cash box station and thank everyone for a great sale. I see Prescott in the church kitchen. I expect him to be studying one of his books or on his phone planning how we’ll get to the estate sale but he isn’t. He’s in the kitchen with Kasia, behind the line, wearing a pink apron with ruffles down the side. He looks ridiculous and adorable.

  I walk over to make sure what I see isn’t some kind of hallucination.

  “Your friend, he has such good hands for making pierogi.” Kasia grabs Prescott’s hands and holds them out to me in front of the bowls of dough, cheese and mushrooms.

  “Who knew?” he says and his smile beams across the kitchen at me so brightly I almost use my arm to block it. What has gotten into him? I guess Polish cuisine was an undiscovered passion.

  “Danielek, you know how to make pierogi,” she says to me and then turns to Prescott. “I’ve been teaching him the past few years.”

  “Yes, Kasia is an excellent teacher but I promised Prescott we would get to an important estate sale this afternoon.” Kasia is as subtle as a kielbasa sandwich.

  “Danielek, you’re usually not so impatient,” she says pooh-poohing me. “I just need one more dozen of these and he’s doing very good. Almost as good as you.” She puts her hand over his and teaches him how to press the dough together tightly but not too tightly. “See how I use a gentle pressure and just little bit cold water.” Prescott is usually so well put together. It’s funny to see his hands full of sticky dumpling dough, in an apron covered in flour. His usually perfect part is definitely not so perfect.

  “Don’t forget to buy your tickets for the fifty-fifty raffle. We will have our first drawing in ten minutes,” someone announces from the floor of the cafeteria.

  “Oh, fifty-fifty raffle. I forgot. I have to buy tickets,” Kasia says suddenly. She wipes her hands on her apron and then walks over and pulls me next to Prescott. She grabs my hands and places them over his. “Here, Danielek. You know how to do. You show him. Best way to learn is through hands,” she says and takes off her apron.

  As soon as there is skin to skin contact I feel my heart run like a dog to its owner up my throat. I immediately lift my hands off Prescott’s. Kasia looks back and sees the disconnect. “Tsk, tsk. Danielek,” she says with an overexaggerated frown. “You know you must get the pressure exactly right. Please, kohanie, I don’t want them to explode when they cook.” She looks sternly at my hands and then at Prescott’s hands. It’s a standoff and I don’t have much choice in the matter. I sigh to signal my surrender and put my hands back on Prescott’s, who is most likely oblivious to what is going on. As soon as she sees my hands on his she smiles broadly and leaves the kitchen.

  I take a second to just feel Prescott’s hands under mine. They are strong but also smooth and elegant. My hands are thick with hair even above and below the knuckle. I can feel the heat from his hands radiate across my palms and I try to keep the rest of my body as far away from him as possible. The only way to get through this is to focus on the pierogi.

  “After you have the seam wet you just need to press along the edge like this,” I say like a surgeon narrating a complicated procedure. I swallow hard trying not to think of how close his body is to mine; how close our lips are again. I should just walk away. I know what Kasia is up to and the world won’t stop if a dozen pierogi explode but the truth is I’m enjoying feeling his fingers underneath mine. The pretense of making the dumplings is silly but I’m willing to go with it if it means an opportunity to be close to Prescott without concern of it going any further.

  He presses the next dumpling closed and I feel his hand respond to the pressure from mine. The rummage sale and last call for the fifty-fifty raffle are going on outside the kitchen but we work in silence. He spoons the last bit of filling onto the final pierogi and now his hand is under mine. I’m just along for the ride and enjoying every second of it. He has the technique down perfectly which isn’t surprising. Everything he touches seems to yield to his perfection.

  “That’s the last one,” he says without looking up from the flour-covered counter. I see the corners of his mouth rise up in a satisfied smile.

  I take my hands off his and step away from him like he just announced he was radioactive. The pretense is gone so any lingering touching of body parts is a bad idea. I’m trying to keep my distance from him and was doing an average job at it until this impromptu adventure into Polish cuisine.

  “What’s wrong?” he asks softly.

  “Oh, nothing,” I say. “I know you want to get to your estate sale and I don’t want you to miss that pewter thing. I’ve loaded most of my things in the van and don’t worry, there’s plenty of room.”

  “I’m not worried,” he says with a crooked smile that makes me think he knows something I don’t. We wash our hands next to each other in the sink and by the time we are rinsing he is still smiling. I enjoy making pierogi, but I’ve never come close to enjoying it as much as he seems to have.

  “Are you okay?” I ask wondering what has g
otten into him.

  He keeps rinsing, but then turns off the water in his sink and dries his hands. He looks at me and says, “Who me? I’m fine. Actually, never been better.” A strange smile is still on his face. “But I wanted to ask you...”

  His eyes look the same way they did in the moonlight. I feel like I’m about to go under his spell again so I quickly interrupt. “Wait, before you finish that thought,” I interject. “I wanted to ask you to help me move something into the van.”

  “Sure,” he says with more enthusiasm than I expect. “But then can we...”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I say quickly cutting him off so I don’t really have to commit to anything. I walk to the door where I left the painting and drag it inside the kitchen and say, “Isn’t this going to look amazing in the shop?” I know the sad clown is exactly the kind of kitsch that makes Prescott nauseated. He’ll turn blue when he sees the painting and start yelling about how he’s not going to have his fine antiques next to something as hideous as this clown painting, how black velvet is not an appropriate canvas, yadda, yadda.

  “What? In the world? Is that thing?” he asks, his eyes widening like I just revealed a killer python in my hands.

  “That thing, as you call it, is art. Look how the brush stroke reveals the texture of the velvet and the expression on the clown is so meaningful. You see, he’s sad but he’s also a clown.” I do a Celine and gently pound my chest with my fist. “Oh, the irony of it all. I can’t decide if this should go in the window or maybe next to the door so it is the very first thing people see when they walk in.”

  He walks over and stands between me and the painting. I look to make sure he hasn’t grabbed a knife to shred the velvet canvas, and when I’m sure he hasn’t I just stand there smiling. I know this will make him absolutely explode. He breathes in through his nose like a bull about to charge a matador and then says rigidly through clenched teeth. “You want to put that on display in our shop?”

  I nod my head and smile brightly. “Uh-huh.”

  He looks at the painting and I know I’m about to see cartoon steam coming out of his ears. I hunker down, ready for one of our brawls, ready to put him in his place with his snobby attitude and bring to light how different we are. Bring it, Prescott.

  He looks at the painting again and then at me. He moves even closer to me and I can feel what I think is his building anger. He looks me in the eyes and says, “Great. It’s lovely. I’m sure it will look very nice wherever you put it. Let me help you carry it.”

  “What?” I feel like a rocket that has just failed to launch.

  “I said that I think it will look very nice in the shop. But we should wrap it with some of the materials I have in the van. I don’t want it to get damaged. I’ll be right back.”

  Prescott walks out the door to the parking lot and I’m left in the kitchen wondering exactly what kind of mushrooms are in those pierogi.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Prescott

  This time I’m in the driver’s seat and I’m quite enjoying it. Danny isn’t sure where we are or what’s going on and I’m kind of enjoying seeing him so flustered. “I think we missed a turn back at the dairy farm up the hill,” he says.

  “Relax,” I say shifting gears. “I know exactly where we’re going.” I keep my eye on the road but make sure the most devilish smile I can conjure appears across my face. Danny thinks he can just pull the plug on what we started last week. After what Kasia told me in the kitchen privately, I’m not going to keep pretending he doesn’t make me smile from ear to ear or cover my laughter at his silly jokes with a fake cough or quick sip of coffee. When he finally went to scour for bargains, I went into the kitchen, where Kasia cornered me alone and—unsolicited—helped me put everything into context.

  “So, you have feelings for Danielek?” she asked as soon as the door swung closed behind her.

  “What? Who? Me?” I stammered. “Feelings? For Danny?”

  Without missing a beat she grabbed a woman spoon, held it near my face and said, “Feelings. You. Danny. You have, yes?” I kept walking backward until she had me pressed against the industrial-sized oven.

  “I don’t know,” I said hoping it was close enough to the truth to throw her off the scent.

  “You be very careful,” she said backing away from me and starting to prep the kitchen for her pierogi making. She pulled ingredients from the refrigerator. “Danielek is a good boy. Very sweet. Very nice.” She pulled down the large bowls from the shelves.

  “He is very sweet and very nice,” I agreed. He’s also super sexy and I can’t stop thinking about him naked, I wanted to add but didn’t.

  “Ah-ha,” she said turning to me and holding her wooden spoon out again. “Just as I say. You do like him.” She started adding things from the fridge into the bowls and turned her attention to her cooking. She knew she had me baited just enough. There was no hiding from her. She saw through me like I was covered in the industrial plastic wrap she had on the counter.

  “And,” I said cautiously, “what if I do like him?” The words fumbled out of my mouth like a new pair of dentures that don’t fit.

  “Danny is very special boy. Has been coming here for years, not just for the sale but for helping anytime anybody need something. Last week Andrej need ride to doctor. Boom. Danny is here. Everyone here love him.” I wondered if that’s where he went last week when he said he had an errand to run.

  “I’m not surprised. He’s very kind and funny,” I said thinking about him and the kiss and how he always makes me laugh all the time with stupid jokes.

  “You be careful. I know he is always with the ha-ha and jokes. Making fun of himself even. I tell him stop, but he does that because he is very scared.”

  “Of what?” I asked. He seems like the most confident guy on the planet. He has no fear in talking to anyone about anything. What could he be scared of?

  “Not important,” she said brushing me off. “What is important is that you don’t hurt him. He has been hurt by guys like you before. He seems strong and tough but he’s very fragile. Hurt easy.”

  “Guys like me?” I asked. Am I a type? I didn’t think so.

  “Take advantage. Of his big heart.”

  “Ma’am,” I said, mustering as much sincerity as I could from deep in my heart, “I would never do that.”

  She looked me up and down and squinted her eyes. I knew I was being inspected and I held my breath hoping to pass. After a few seconds her scowl switched to a big bright smile.

  “You good man too,” she said. “Danielek is more complicated than seems at first. Promise you not hurt him.”

  “I promise,” I said knowing there would be consequences if I wasn’t sincere. “I would like to get to know him better but...”

  “But what?”

  “I’m not sure he’s interested,” I confessed and as soon as the words came out of my mouth she started laughing.

  “Czujesz do niego miete,” she said after wiping a few tears. “I knew it!”

  “What does that mean?”

  “In Polish when someone has, what you say a crush, on someone or if you like them, we say you smell mint on them. I knew you smelled mint on Danielek and I know he smells it on you too. I’m sure of it.” She clapped her hands together with a big smile. “Good. Now you are in for special treat. I show you how to make best pierogi.”

  Then I spent the rest of the morning doing what she said until Danny came in and I decided to stop pretending what happened didn’t happen.

  Kasia helped me understand. He’s nervous but so am I. He’s been baiting me, pushing me to walk away from whatever we’re feeling for each other because he’s scared. Seeing the look on his face when I suggested we hang his ugly clown painting in the window was priceless. He thinks it’s easier for us to keep fighting rather than deal with whatever is lurking underneath all that arguing.
I get that. I’m unsure as well, but that doesn’t mean what I’m feeling will just go away. One of us has to take the wheel and after my secret talk with Kasia, I feel like I can drive us where we need to go. I put my foot on the gas pedal, glance over at Danny and accelerate toward our destination.

  * * *

  While the church rummage sale was a charming collection of odd leftovers, Brown Brothers is more austere and intimidating—a large pristine warehouse with a loading dock and ample parking. It’s a transactional location where deals are made and personal estates are sold and resold. Most of the heirlooms come from multimillionaires many times over who have either not established an advanced directive or have left their estate to heirs who want to simply cash out.

  I’m sure Danny thinks this place is snob central. I want to be sure he feels comfortable. “I know Browns can feel intimidating but they really have some great things. Why don’t you browse with me?”

  “That’s okay. I was going to play Candy Crush on my phone,” he says. “I’m almost at Marshmallow Meadows.”

  “Come on. I’ll even let you make fun of the antique doorknobs,” I say.

  “Really?” His eyes light up just a bit. “Okay then.”

  At the rummage sale everyone was dressed casually but neat. At the auction house, more formal attire is common with some people in suits. I’m wearing my usual blazer and slacks. At first I was worried about Danny feeling underdressed but of course that was me projecting how I would feel. Danny feels at home wherever he is.

  As we walk past the room where the bidding is taking place a heated auction is escalating. The auctioneer is furiously taking bids as the price for a piece of Bavarian china climbs higher and higher. “Isn’t it exciting?” I whisper to Danny, moving my mouth a bit closer to his ear than I may actually need to.

  “Ugh,” he says. “No, I don’t find it exciting at all. It makes me anxious. All this competing. The stress of it. No thanks. I’d much rather be sifting through a dusty bin of old Barbies any day.”