“You must never come in here alone, do you understand me?” she had shouted, wild white hair obscuring the creased leather skin of her face. “You must never wear any of my treasures and trinkets! Do you understand me Panda?”
Miranda nodded with fright, her eyes stinging with impending tears. She had struggled free of her grandmother’s grasp, and run all the way back into bed. After that, she had always stayed away from the pieces, only touching them briefly when passing them to waiting customers to purchase. That was the other rule of ‘Trinkets and Treasures’; all jewellery was to be bought, but never tried on.
“These pieces are one of a kind,” her grandmother would regale visitors expansively. “They choose you, not the other way around.”
Of course, the tourists lapped it up, unlike those who actually lived in the small town who were rather more cautious, barely looking in through the dusty windowpanes as they passed by in the street. But for those who were only stopping for the day, the place held a magical, old world charm. Miranda loved meeting all the new people, but her grandmother didn’t like visitors, always closing up early when the coach parties rolled in.
It was the first day of the summer season and the doorbell jangled noisily, advising her almost-deaf grandmother that a potential customer had entered the premises. Miranda stood next to her at the counter, barely able to see over the glass cabinet of necklaces, rings, earrings and jewels.
A woman sashayed in, her grey suit only just managing to contain her ample curves. She carried a brown envelope under one arm and had a large blue handbag slung across the other. Miranda had seen it in a magazine and noted it to be very expensive.
“Mrs. Pasternak?” the woman said brusquely to Miranda’s grandmother, handing over the brown envelope roughly. Miranda watched the exchange from her vantage point behind the counter. The woman was blonde and broad, she reminded Miranda of Hervor the Shield Maiden, a Viking warrior woman you wouldn’t want to mess with.
“My client has upped his offer. I think you will find it more than generous,” the woman said, looking around the shop as if she were imagining it were somewhere else.
Miranda’s grandmother sucked on her remaining teeth loudly, her white hair already escaping from the confines of its bun. “I have given you my answer,” she said with quiet authority. The woman lazily wafted her hand in the air as if she were swatting a fly.
“Remind me of it, I can’t remember,” she said with vague disinterest. Miranda could feel her grandmother starting to bristle with anger.
“It remains the same. I am not interested in your money.”
The woman wasn’t listening. She was too busy wandering around the shop, her voluptuous figure bumping carelessly into the glass cabinets and stands as she walked past them. Suddenly, she stopped to examine a piece through the confines of its glass case.
"How much for this?” she said, her fat finger leaving an imprint as she jabbed at the cabinet. Miranda’s grandmother narrowed her eyes to see where the woman pointed.
“That piece? It’s not for sale,” her grandmother said, adding under her breath, “Not to you.”
The woman ignored her, opening the glass cabinet with the little brass key that sat in the lock. She peeled a heavy pendant necklace from the faux tree branch stand around which it was wound, handling it roughly and throwing it around her neck as if it were a scarf. The snake necklace looked too delicate to be worn by such a wide expanse of neck, the silver and gold scales of the chain beginning with the pendant head of a reticulated python, its green and yellow hues glimmering in a complicated geometric pattern around it’s head, culminating in a tail which was also its clasp. The disruptive colouration of the snake necklace stood out starkly against the pink and florid skin of her chest.
“It suits me, don’t you think?” the woman said, stroking her purple painted fingernails along the scales of the chain which ran down her décolletage. “What do you think, little girl?” she added, twirling in Miranda’s direction so that she could take in full admiration of the view. Miranda looked to her grandmother. She wondered if she was going to shout at the intruder the same way she had at Miranda when she had dared to try on the items, but her grandmother remained silent. Slowly, she could see a strange smile begin to make its way along the thin lips of her grandmother’s mouth.
“Grandma?” Miranda said, tugging at her grandmother’s sleeve, but her request went ignored. The woman had turned away from Miranda and was now examining her reflection with delight in any reflective surface she could find, smiling to herself, the expression of someone who was used to getting her own way, a person for whom no was a challenge, not an answer.
Suddenly, the eyes of the necklace began to gleam, as if something behind them was awakening. Slowly and deliberately, the silver and gold scales began to move and tighten around her neck, the green emerald eyes of the python now shining with purpose, it’s pewter tongue that flickered permanently out of its mouth taking on a sinister grin. Miranda gasped.
“It’s a little tight!” the woman complained, her thick pink fingers clawing at her flesh under the chain. The snack necklace continued to squeeze her, the clasp tail winding its way independently around her broad neck until she began to panic, shrieking “I can’t breathed!” her thick coral lips opening and closing like a fish, her eyes wide with confusion and fright.
“Grandma!” Miranda said again, but her grandmother was too busy enjoying the show to respond.
The snack necklace continued to coil around the woman’s throat, her breath coming in uneven gulps. Shakily, she sunk to her feet as the blood flow to her brain became restricted, no longer the warrior woman who had strode in so confidently only moments before, but a quivering mess on the crimson carpet, her eyes helpless and pleading like a child’s.
The attack lasted only a few moments more before her blue painted eyelid became heavy, closing over her eyes as a final curtain. Miranda and her grandmother watched in silence until the struggle was over, and then the snake necklace unclasped itself, slithering down from her sallow neck and onto the carpet below, leaving a clean red line around the flesh in its wake.
Miranda watched as the snake necklace danced quickly across the floor, its pewter jaws opening wide to begin devouring its prey, its body arching to propel itself forwards. Miranda saw the mouth of the pendant open and she closed her eyes as the sound of cracking bones and squeaking tendons filled the air of the small shop.
“Throw this away Panda,” her grandmother said carelessly, tossing the brown envelope in her direction. “We won’t be hearing from them again.”
Miranda opened her eyes and obediently took the envelope over to the waste bin underneath the till. Her grandmother stepped out from behind the counter, lifting the ‘Open’ sign that hung across the doorway to ‘Closed’, careful to step around the snake necklace, which was now demolishing any evidence of its prey with the smooth dislocation of its magical jaws.
“Come along Panda,” her grandmother coaxed. “Don’t you know what time it is?”
Miranda shook her head. Her grandmother placed her wizened hand on her shoulder kindly.
“Why, lunch time, of course.”
Miranda nodded slowly, and prepared to follow her grandmother into the back of the shop. The summer sun gleamed boldly through the shop windows, kissing the silver and gold scales of the snake necklace as it lay coiled in silent sleep on the carpet. Miranda reached over, and lifted the blue expensive handbag from the space where the woman had once been. With a deft movement, she slung it over her shoulder, and disappeared into the darkness of the back of the shop.
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Sadie has had work published by Aurum Press and Gothic City Press, with forthcoming short stories appearing in Prole Magazine and Snowbook Anthologies. She has also had poetry published by Clockwise Cat, The Commonline Journal and The Red Booth Review. She has an audio play in development with Audio Scribble for a Christmas 2014 release.
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