Pandora's Closet

OFF THE RACK by Elizabeth A. Vaughan

Sarah yanked the offending strip of paper from the calculator, crumpled it, and threw it at the basket. It bounced off the rim, hit the wall, and fell to the floor.

With a curse, she jerked out of her chair to retrieve it. The chair obeyed the law of physics and thumped back against the wall. Sarah cursed again, this at the black mark it left on the wall.

Pam stuck her head into the tiny closet Sarah called her office. “Problem?”

“No.” Sarah kept her face down as she picked up the crumpled wad and dropped it in the trash. She wasn’t going to tell her only employee about the red ink on that slip of paper. “Just got up too fast.”

Pam accepted that, as she accepted the meager paycheck each week, with a shrug. “Listen, can I leave early? There’s no customers, and I gotta-”

“Sure.” Sarah didn’t really want to hear it. “Go. I’ll lock up.”

The door was swinging shut before the words were out of Sarah’s mouth. She heard the door chimes marking Pam’s exit even as she turned off the calculator. She paused long enough to watch the negative number fade as the display went dim.

Sarah sighed and stepped out into her store, to watch as the last few moments before closing ticked off. She stepped to the counter and started to clear away the clutter.

Outside, through the glass windows of the store front, soft white flakes of snow started to fill Pam’s tire treads. Painted on the window, backward from this angle, was “Sarah’s Closet,” the gold and cream lettering still as bright and promising as it had been a year ago on opening day.

Sarah looked away from the bright promise and cleared the counter, straightening pens, dusting the unused credit card machine and the register.

Opening day of her consignment shop had been just as bright and promising as the window. She’d spent a year researching, planning, taking out the loan, making the business plan. She’d collected the clothes for a year, searching garage sales and auctions, talking to friends of friends to build her inventory.

But consignment needs more consignments to survive, and as the months wore on, there’d been few visitors who had brought in things. She’d found it hard to replace the stock and watch the store at the same time, forcing her to hire help. A cost she’d left out of her detailed and perfect business plan.

Sarah sighed again. There’d been traffic, sure, but somehow people didn’t find what they were looking for, or it was not the right size, or it was the wrong color. Why go to her store, when they could go the big discounters?

She glanced at the clock. Another three minutes and she could go home and lose herself in a bubble bath, a favorite romance novel, and ramen noodles. Time enough tomorrow to think about negative numbers and looming bills.

Movement drew her gaze back to the window. Someone was trying to wrestle an old shopping cart up on the sidewalk in front of the shop. A shopping cart piled high with bags and cans, and with more plastic bags tied to the sides, all filled with questionable items.

Sarah frowned. She’d picked this location because of its higher-end clientele, and she’d never seen a street person here before. Dressed in a thin, stained sweat shirt, with old jeans almost falling off his hips. His, it had to be, she caught a glimpse of a ratty beard when his head turned. One of the legs of the jeans was pulled up over his knee, displaying a naked leg covered in scabs and sores. A thin ankle, covered in an old cotton sock, pushed into even older tennis shoes. No hat. No gloves. Sarah shivered at the thought.

The man was pulling at the cart, trying to get the wheels over the curb. She could hear it rattling and squeaking as he tugged. He got the back wheels over the curb and pulled until the front wheels clanged into the obstacle. He kept pulling, as if it never occurred to him to go to the front and lift it up.

Or maybe he couldn’t.

The snow that had fallen in his hair was melting, and water drops glistened in the scraggly depths. There were damp patches on his shoulders where his muscles moved underneath. Sarah looked at him with an expert eye, sizing him up without really thinking about it. A medium, easily.

There was a coat on the men’s rack, a high-end winter coat that would fit him. And a warm woolen hat in the bin. Gloves too.

She hesitated, surprised by her impulse. Generosity wouldn’t put food on the table. But the loss wouldn’t make any real difference. And it was closing time. And he was in front of the door.

Without another thought, she gathered up the coat, stuffed the hat and gloves in the pockets and stepped outside.

The snow was a swirl now, the wind making patterns in the light of the parking lot lamps. Sarah took in a breath of cold air, faintly scented by the Chinese restaurant next door. The man was still tugging on the cart, and in frustration, Sarah stepped around him and lifted up the end to clang on the sidewalk.

He looked at her, startled, with pale gray eyes.

Sarah didn’t bother to say anything, just held out the coat.

His eyes flicked to it, then back to her face. His beard and mustache covered his face, leaving no hints to his reaction.

Sarah shivered in the cold. “Take it.” She held it out again. “Put it on.”

He reached for the coat with a filthy hand. Sarah watched as he eased it over his shoulders, moving carefully as if it would break. She swallowed hard, afraid to look too close at his leg, or take too deep a breath.

The man pulled out the knit hat from one pocket, and pulled it over his matted hair. He looked at her with those washed-out eyes and said nothing.

Sarah hadn’t really expected much else. Her impulse of generosity had left, leaving her only a desire to close up and get home. But as she turned to go, the man mumbled something and started digging in the cart.

Uh-oh. Sarah winced at the idea that the man was going to reciprocate, and prayed that whatever emerged was-

He held out a hanger.

She reached out and accepted it. It was one of those old wooden hangers, with the metal rod that reinforced the wood. It felt warm and smooth under her fingertips, and she caught a faint hint of cedar.

She looked back at the man, intending to say “Thank you.” But he was already shoving the cart past her shop, mumbling something, intent on his own business.

So Sarah went back in, and put the hanger on one of the empty racks, right by the counter. She gathered her own coat and purse and shut off the lights. The man and his cart was into the next block when she stepped out into the snow and headed for her car.

Intent on bubble bath and book, she drove off into the night.

Sarah overslept the next morning; thankfully, Pam had opened the store on time. Pam was chewing gum and bent over the counter, looking over one of those gossip rags, when Sarah rushed in with coffee and the paper. Sarah nodded and said “Morning” as she headed toward the office door, trying not to look as embarrassed as she felt for being late.

There was a ball gown hanging from the rack. On the hanger. It was a lovely low cut blue silk, with a full gathered skirt.

Sarah stopped dead in her tracks. “Where did that come from?”

Pam opened her mouth, but the chime on the door made them both turn and look. Two women, stylish and made up to perfection entered. Sarah’s brain was processing the cost of their labels when the first one spoke.

“Good morning! I’m looking for a vintage-”

The other woman squealed. “Look!”

Stunned, Sarah watched as they descended on the dress.

“It’s my size!”

“It’s perfect for you!” One reached for the paper price tag that hung from a small ribbon off the dress. She nudged the other to look at the tag.

“I want it.” The first woman announced.

Pam stood up right and reached for one of the longer garment bags. The woman dug out a credit card and placed it on the counter.

Sarah still stood there, coffee in one hand, paper and purse in the other. One of the women gave her a pat on the shoulder. “I’ll be back, if you get in more treasures like this!”

“That will be $1,590.00. With tax.” Pam murmured. The credit card zipped through the machine.

Money worries temporarily forgotten, Sarah still stood there, stunned.

Pam denied all knowledge of the dress, claiming that it had been hanging there when she’d walked in. Sarah had her doubts, of course, but Pam wasn’t the type to do something on her own initiative, that was for sure. Sarah decided that someone was trying to help her, except that no one had a key, or access to that kind of dress, that she knew of.

But then it happened again.

And again.

Each morning, Sarah would open the store, to find a garment hanging from the hanger. Each time someone would come in that day, looking for that particular garment, cheerfully paying the price on the tag.

A business suit.

A sun dress.

A leather jacket.

A wet suit.

The prices varied, the clothing varied, but without fail the hanger had something suspended from it every morning, a small paper price tag dangling in front.

Sarah couldn’t figure it out. She had the locks changed, she set up a security camera. But the camera didn’t work and the clothing kept appearing. As did customers, new ones who became repeat ones, who brought clothes to consign, who came back and bought other clothes.

Within a month Sarah was in the black.

Within six months, she had back inventory and Pam was full-time. She could be pickier now, setting aside the older and worn items to donate to the Salvation Army.

During this time Sarah became a bit superstitious. She forbade Pam to touch the hanger, and left it on the rack in all its glory. Pam, of course, just shrugged. She didn’t seem to notice or care about anything other than her paycheck.

And the clothes kept coming.

A christening gown of linen and lace.

A slinky little black dress.

A XXXL wedding dress, with veil and slippers. Sarah waited all day to see who would show up for that one.

And sure enough, close to the end of the day, in walked a large woman with her groom-to-be. She fit the dress perfectly. And never blinked at the price. Once the sale was made and Pam had left for the day, Sarah stood in front of the rack and stared at the hanger.

“I don’t suppose you could find me a man? I’m not fussy, although I prefer brown eyes to blue.”

The hanger just hung there in silence.

Sarah laughed, and shook her head. “That’s okay. I’m grateful for the clothes and the help.” She eyed the hanger seriously. “But it won’t last forever, will it?”

The hanger remained silent.

And so it went.

Sarah’s Closet became the in place to shop, with both the society crowd and the young people looking for bargains. Sarah had enough stock that she was starting to think about the Internet, getting a website, and putting pictures of the clothing on-line. But something deep within made her hesitate. “Nothing good lasts forever” echoed in the depths of her brain. “Wait and see” was another thought. After all, magic never lasted, now did it? In all those stories. She took the prudent and cautious route.

So she wasn’t really surprised the morning she opened the shop, a year and a day later, to find that there was nothing on the hanger.

The cold air and snow blew in as she stood there in the doorway, staring at the rack. It was indeed empty, swaying slightly in the draft.

She stomped the snow off her boots, stepped in, and let the door close behind her.

A year and a day.

It had been a year and a day since she’d seen that odd man and given him a coat. He’d handed her the hanger in exchange, a more than fair exchange for the magic that it had brought with it.

Magic that had saved her dreams.

Sarah sighed, mild disappointment flowing through her like a wave. She’d expected it, but it still hurt. It had been a wonderful year, and she was in good shape financially. The store would still need hard work, but she knew that she could make it, after this year.

The magic was over and done.

But to see the hanger just… hanging there…

It hurt.

She sighed, and went about the day.

Business was brisk in the morning, but the snow kept falling all day, large wet flakes. Customers slowed to a trickle, and the radio spoke of businesses closing early. Sarah let Pam go home and settled behind the counter and watched the snow. She tried to ignore the hanger, which was still on the rack.

Once or twice it occurred to Sarah to pack it in and treat herself to a bubble bath, but she had the oddest sense of waiting, as if something was going to happen.

There were no more customers, and the only call she got was from the Salvation Army, asking if she had anything to be picked up. She said she did, and they’d be by shortly.

Sarah’d wait for the truck and then close the store and go home. Yes, a bubble bath, that new hardbound romance she’d just bought, some General Tso’s from the Chinese place next door. Good plan for a snowy night.

The Salvation Army truck pulled up; it was the regular guy, so he went in back and carried out the box crammed full of clothing. He set it down on the floor and handed Sarah the clipboard with the paperwork. She signed off, and he put it under his arm and reached back down.

When he lifted the box up, the hanger was tucked in among the clothes.

Sarah darted a look at the rack, and sure enough, her hanger wasn’t there. She looked back as the man headed for the door.

She could just see the wooden corner of the hanger, as if it were waving goodbye over his shoulder. It seemed right somehow. Fitting, even.

At the same time, the door opened, and a customer walked in, dancing around the man with the box with a laugh and an apology. Sarah was still focused on the box, and she watched as it was loaded on the truck, the big metal door coming down with a muffled clang.

“Excuse me.” The customer placed a coat on the counter.

Sarah looked down. It was a well-made coat, from a high-end designer. Warm and thick, with deep pockets. She reached out to touch it.

“You want to sell this?” She was still oddly distracted. There was something familiar about the coat.

“No,” came a warm, deep voice that carried a hint of laughter. “Actually, I found it, and your business card was in the pocket, so I brought-”

It was the coat that she’d given away, a year and a day ago! It had to be.

“Where did you get this?” She looked up into a smiling face and the warmest pair of brown eyes she’d ever seen.

The man laughed again. “Well, that’s kind of a strange story, truth be told.” He smiled even wider, and Sarah caught her breath. “I’ll tell you,” he continued, then hesitated for a moment as he seemed to study her. “I’ll tell you, but only over some dinner. Do you like Chinese?”