Magic Bean

by Senese, Rebecca M.

  He hadn’t been behind here more than once but already it felt natural, after all he’d be spending most of his time here from now on.

  That first glance and he’d thought he’d have to tear out the counter. He was sure the shelves underneath had been sagging, even the counter itself had seemed lopsided to the right, as if the entire thing was leaning toward entrance leading into the space behind the counter, sagging from the lack of support.

  But now all he saw was dust. The shelves under the counter were straight but grimy. Even the top of the counter looked straight.

  Hadn’t he rolled a quarter on it and watched it roll all the way to the opening?

  There was the mark in the dust, a straight line from the left side of the counter running all the way to the opening.

  The counter had been lilting to the right, almost bowed.

  Now it was straight and true.

  And he hadn’t done a thing to it.

  He stopped mopping, his hands tightening on the wood handle. He looked around the shop.

  He’d been kidding himself.

  The floor had been a disaster, filled with loose tiles and sagging floor underneath. And he was damned sure the tiles had been white and black, not blue. The walls should have taken two coats of paints. In fact, before he started he found some water damage near the ceiling along the left wall but once he started priming, it had miraculously disappeared.

  Miraculously.

  The same way the counter no longer sagged. The same way the window let in more light.

  The cashier had reacted when he clarified which shop he’d been talking about, not because she didn’t like coffee.

  But because of something else.

  Something about this shop.

  His throat tightened. The lemon aroma soured in his nose.

  The realtor had tried to discourage him from buying this place. George had thought it was because it was such a good deal and the realtor would get less of a commission. But maybe there was another reason.

  Maybe there was a reason this place had been empty in the first place.

  Not just empty.

  Abandoned.

  Neglected.

  Ignored.

  Creaking sounded behind him. Soft, like the groan of an old man. Gripping the mop handle, he turned his head.

  At eye level, the shelves that hung on the wall behind the counter, behind him, no longer sagged. He heard another creak and glanced up.

  Just in time to see a sagging shelf begin to straighten and smooth out. Sitting level.

  Fixing itself.

  He dropped the mop and fled.

  Cool September air tickled his forehead as he stumbled onto the sidewalk. He gulped in the coolness, tinged with exhaust and dust. He could feel the sweat breaking out on his forehead. His forearms pimpled with goosebumps.

  “Are you okay?” said a woman’s voice.

  George turned.

  The cashier from the grocery store. She stood several paces away as close to the edge of the sidewalk as possible. As far as she could get from his storefront, he realized.

  She wore a beige trenchcoat over her uniform. One hand clutched a peach coloured purse, the same shade as her chipped nails. A light breeze ruffled her hair, tugging a blonde curl from behind her ear and teasing it across her forehead.

  Without that worried look that lined her face she would be quite pretty.

  He had a sudden image of her, sitting in his coffee shop at one of the bistro tables. Set right in front of the window where the sun would light up her hair. She would be sipping a latte with large text books spread out in front of her. Instead of the worn grocery store uniform, she wore a crisp white shirt with a navy skirt. The jacket hung over the back of her chair. Her nails, trimmed short with clear polish, followed the lines on the page as she bent over the book.

  Studying.

  The bleat of a car horn pulled him back.

  George shook himself. “I’m ah... I’m fine,” he said.

  The cashier gave a wary glance toward the shop. “I just wondered. You came running out like that, lookin’ kinda shook up.”

  He glanced back at the shop himself. Through the door, he could see the tiles gleaming. They still looked blue and white. Then he blinked. The image wavered. Suddenly the floor was black and white, the tiles still clean but now several were cracked and lifted from the floor. Another blink.

  Back to blue and white.

  He tried to swallow but his throat was dry.

  “I just... needed some air.”

  She shoved her hands into the pockets of her trenchcoat. Her body stiffened then she took a step forward. She leaned toward him as if bracing herself against a strong wind.

  “Look, this ain’t any of my business, but you seem like a nice man,” she said. “That store, it used to be, well, not a nice place. Lots of rumours in the neighbourhood.” She shuddered. “Just maybe you wanna get out of it is all.”

  “What kind of rumours?” he asked. “What kind of shop was it before?”

  She shook her head. “I wasn’t around here then. I don’t quite know.”

  “But you heard something.”

  She hunched her shoulders. Shrugged.

  “Please,” he said. “Please.”

  Her arms tightened close to her body. One foot slid forward as if she was going to step closer to him but she stopped, eying the front of the shop. She ducked her head down.

  “It was some kind of pawn shop, junk shop, with books and stuff.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “The man who ran it, they said he could get you anything. They said he could do things, make things happen. People he didn’t like who bought things from him died. He tried to enchant several of the daughters of some of the other store owners. They banded together and forced him out. But when they went through the shop to toss everything away, it... attacked them.”

  “Attacked them how?” he said.

  “Books fell on them, floor tiles tripped them up. One heavy shelf fell on the butcher’s son, almost killed him. His leg was trapped underneath. They heard whispers and saw things. They closed the shop up and it’s been like that ever since. Thirty years or more. Not one person has ever made a go in there.”

  She shook her head. “Like I said, you seem like a nice man so I thought you should know about that place. Even if all that ain’t true, that place, it seems sorta... haunted.”

  She shuddered and backed away, turning before he could say anything. Her footsteps hurried away on the sidewalk, tapping faster and faster on the stone.

  George turned to look through the doorway again. At the blue and white tile.

  And blinked.

  * * *

  Haunted. The place was haunted.

  George paced the length of the dark brown, throw rug in the living room of his apartment. He stared at the shag fibres that shifted with each step. The air in his apartment felt stale. He hadn’t opened the windows for days. He hadn’t been here for days other than to sleep.

  He’d spent every waking moment in the shop.

  The haunted shop.

  Had it possessed him? Cursed him?

  Was he going to go crazy?

  Food. He needed to eat something.

  He headed in to the kitchen. The fridge was empty. He’d spent so much time at the shop he hadn’t had time to go shopping, to do any of the regular activities of living.

  He yanked open the freezer door. There on the bottom of the freezer was a single Salisbury steak TV dinner, sitting beside two plastic ice trays.

  He had to use a knife to pry the dinner from the bottom of the freezer but it finally gave.

  He rinsed the box under the hot water tap in his sink. His double metal sink, nothing like the sink in his shop.

  After a minute under the tap he could read the instructions. He peeled the metal tray out of the sagging box and stuck it in the oven at four twenty-five. He set the timer for thirty minutes although it recommended twenty.

  Probably even thirty minutes
wasn’t enough to defrost that block of ice.

  In the meantime, he could have a shower.

  Just another way to avoid thinking about the shop.

  But as soon as he was lathering away in the shower, feeling the grime and the dirt slough off his body, he thought about how clean and fresh the shop looked. Almost like new. When he’d added the blue to the ceiling trim, the floor had changed its colour as if to accommodate his choice.

  Was that haunted?

  Wasn’t haunting when some evil ghost tried to possess you or scare you away or kill you? Nothing like that had happened in the shop. Instead it was almost like it was...

  Trying to help him fix itself.

  Like it wanted to make up for what it had been in the past, like it wanted the attention after being empty for so long.

  Hadn’t he thought it felt like it had been abandoned?

  Was he going to abandon it too? Abandon his dream?

  Even if it had been some kind of evil pawn shop, had that been the fault of the shop itself or the man who ran it? He knew all about the insidious force of personality some people had, how it seemed to stain the air around them. They’d had one of those guys in his accounting office a few years ago, made the place a living hell to work in. His nasty comments, scowling attitude, hunched and lurching form, had poisoned the atmosphere.

  It was funny thinking back on it how things in the office seemed to go wrong with that guy around, the photocopier jamming all the time. The phone lines crackling with static.

  But as soon as he was transferred, everything cleared up. The phones worked again. The copier ran smoothly. Even stuck desk drawers opened and closed with ease.

  Was the shop the same way?

  Warm water trickled along his forehead and into his eyes. He blinked it away. All the soap was washed away, along with the dirt.

  He was clean. Ready to start again.

  Maybe that’s all the shop wanted too. Just a chance to start again.

  He wanted a coffee shop. His own place. That was all he’d ever dreamed of, the smell of fresh, roasted coffee. Having regular customers, folks he knew by sight, even by their favourite drink. The soft murmur of voices as people sat at the tables.

  He could have it now. The shop was willing to help him.

  Was it the shop’s fault that the man who used to run it was evil? He thought back to his time in the place. It hadn’t felt evil. None of the things he’d seen had tried to hurt him.

  Everything had been trying to help.

  It just wanted to be useful.

  Just like him.

  Maybe it wasn’t so much about the place but about him. If he wanted to make it work, it would work. Maybe he decided how the place would go.

  Just like that other man. He’d wanted a place of evil and he got it.

  George wanted a coffee shop. A place of comfort for people.

  Maybe he could have that. Maybe he could make it that.

  He turned off the water and climbed out of the tub. Steam covered the mirror but he didn’t bother looking in it. He could feel the determined set of his chin. He dried himself off with his old navy towel and hung it up. A few steps to the bedroom and he yanked on a fresh pair of jeans and a white t-shirt.

  Then he went back into the kitchen and turned off the oven.

  He didn’t want a block of iced Salisbury steak for dinner anyway.

  The keys jingled in his hand as he grabbed them on the way out the door.

  * * *

  The last rays of the setting sun were splashing orange and gold above the variety store across the street. George stood in front of his little shop, looking in the front window. Everything looked the same as he’d left it. The floor still gleamed. The mop handle lay on the floor, poking out from behind the counter.

  But he could feel the place waiting. Waiting for him.

  Waiting for his decision.

  What was he going to do?

  He clutched the front door key in his palm, feeling the bite of the metal in his skin.

  He could call up the realtor, tell him he’d changed his mind and resell the place. With the cleaning up, it looked a thousand times better. He might even make a bit of a profit.

  But if he did that he’d have to wait for it to sell before he found another place. More waiting until he could open his own coffee shop. His dream on hold.

  Again.

  Sunlight dimmed from the sun dipping behind the building behind him. In the shop, the floor seemed to dull. The walls greyed.

  It knew he was thinking of selling.

  Leaving it.

  It knew he’d listened to the stories and judged it. He could almost feel the sorrow dripping from the walls.

  How many things had he walked away from because they were too hard or more complicated than he’d thought? Even dealing with his father and his miserable personality. Instead of demanding better treatment, George had avoided him as much as possible. Even becoming an accountant had been an escape from his own desire to start a business.

  Now he had the chance.

  And didn’t the shop just want its own chance? Didn’t it want a way to make up for its own past?

  Here he was running away again. Instead of finding a way to deal with the shop, with whatever was in the shop.

  He squeezed the key, feeling it imprint in his palm.

  Not this time.

  The door creaked a little as he pushed it open. As he stepped inside, he smelled the lingering scent of lemon polish. For a moment, he could almost smell a hint of roasting coffee beans.

  Was that the shop trying to ask him to stay?

  He squared his shoulders and puffed out his chest.

  “I understand something or someone is here,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to run a coffee shop and I bought this shop to turn it into one.” He swallowed. “If you’re willing to work with me, I’ll stay and make it happen. What do you say?”

  The place was empty. He felt vaguely ridiculous talking to the shop, to nothing. What was going to respond? Maybe it really had been his imagination. Maybe the tales the cashier had told him were really just that.

  Stories.

  Then he heard the skitter of something rolling on the tile. It sounded like it was coming from the back kitchen.

  He turned to see a tiny brown object rolling toward him. It skipped and jumped as it rolled, then slowly rolled to a stop.

  Dark brown. Somewhat oval shaped.

  A coffee bean.

  George stooped to pick it up. It felt hard in his fingers. Real.

  A coffee bean.

  His answer. The shop’s offering.

  And that’s when he got it. The name for his shop.

  The Magic Bean.

  He closed his hand around the bean resting in his palm and smiled.

  They were going to get along just fine, him and the shop.

  “How about a cup of coffee?” he said and gave a chuckle.

  The light in the back kitchen flickered on.

  It was the shop saying sure.

  He just knew it.

  And tomorrow he’d go back to the grocery store and tell the cashier there was a new coffee shop on the block.

  Everybody deserved a new beginning.

  Even every place.

  END

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  Uncollected Anthology

  If you liked this story, check out these other amazing urban fantasy authors and their stories in the Enchanted Emporium anthology! Click on the titles to go to their websites and order their urban fantasy tales…

  “The Sweet Shop”

  Leah Cutter

  Tong Yi waits for something to happen—for his brother to return from the war zone, for his boss to trust him again,
for his magical training to be expanded.

  Something. Anything.

  Then powerful wizard Uncle Bei takes him to The Sweet Shop—a magic shop more special and strange than Tong Yi has ever imagined.

  Tong Yi finally returns to the war zone as well, delivering a message to a client he'd never expected.

  But he must now make a decision about the war, about his place in it, about his magical training.

  And everything, everything, has a price.

  “The Sweet Shop” is a sequel to “Dancing with Tong Yi” and “War on all Fronts,” both also available from Uncollected Anthology

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  Why does a two-thousand-year-old djinn own a convenience store and spice shop in Manhattan?

  The world has changed, for one thing, and Wadid isn’t proud of some of the things he’s done in the past. But really, he loves that he can help the magical community—and enhance the cooking skills and palates of some of his customers.

  That’s all well and good until two gunmen burst through the front door and threaten him and one of his customers. Wadid breaks his personal code and uses his darkest ability to make them go away.

  Not that it matters. Because the next person who walks through the door is the last person he would wish for.

  “Fear’s Mirror”

  Michele Lang

  Viv Levy, owner of the Sacred Circle magic store in New York City, knows she runs a big risk in her job. All kinds of supernatural currents, including quite dangerous ones, run under, through and above the streets where regular people walk. And evil often seeks a place of power...