Shop Girl Back to Work

I’m back at the shop.
No more holidays planned for the year.
I’m knuckling down.

My neighbour's in too; he's drilling holes in a light fitting so we can hang crystal drops off it.
“Did you miss me?” I ask.
“I didn’t throw anything,” he says.
The holiday blues hit me and I decide to move to Valencia.
Rosie feels the same.
“I could get a job in a supermarket,” she says.
Perhaps we should wait a year.
Meanwhile I’ll focus on changing the window display with Mum and clearing stock. It’s been a quiet week and it’s time for action.
“I’m going to reduce a pile of picture frames,” I say.
Mum works on another dimension.
“We need to hold the lights we want to sell in our mind,” she says. “You know, make them conscious.”
That’s easier than physically holding them, which is what I’m soon doing.
We’re going to move the large gold chandelier into the spotlight.
It’s a meter wide and hangs on two chains.
We call it ‘the boat’; it’s a real bling bargain.
“It would look good over a snooker table,” people say.
But clearly no one has a snooker table because it’s still in our shop.
Its crystal strings catch on my jumper.
“Hang on,” Mum says, and goes underneath to take some of the weight.
I move down the ladder, knock my shins on the metal rung.
My legs buckle and I fall forward on my knees onto the top step.
“There’s no need to swear,” Mum says, as the chandelier swings precariously to one side.
And then I get the giggles.
I can’t help myself.
The chandelier shakes against me.
I’m aware that if I don’t pull myself together I could drop the whole thing.
Still holding it above her head, Mum peers through the crystal and wonders what’s wrong with me.
Then we hear a tap on the closed door.
It’s Papa, not great timing but at least he’s waiting to be let in.
Yesterday Mum saw me up the ladder while she was outside, even waved at me, then she thrust open the door nearly throwing me off.
“Maaaam!” I’d cried as the ladder had rocked and my life had flashed before me.
Not my life up until that moment but my life as it would be if fell.
Another deep breath and we lift the bling boat into place.
Papa comes in and suggests we put a different light there instead.
We don’t offer him tea.
I move the ladder away and a customer comes in.
He’s looking for a picture frame.
“I need a 10” by 12”,” he says.
“10” by 8” is my largest.”
“Will it fit?”
“Not if the picture is 10” by 12”.”
“It is.”
“Unless you can cut a bit off...”
“No.”
He leaves the shop looking disappointed but returns ten minutes later.
“Give me your biggest 10” by 8”,” he says.
I’d almost forgotten what this place was like.
But I’m back now; back to being Shop Girl.

Shop Girl at Las Fallas

Time to write?
Ha.
Not even a text message.
“Go! Go! Go!” our host cried, as my cousin and I chased after him down the streets of Castellón.
In December, Spanish Sergi had bought a table lamp in my shop.
We’d chatted about his hometown for a while and he’d ended up inviting us over.
It was perfect being only an hour away from Valencia where Rosie and I had already planned to see Las Fallas* (pronounced * fal-yas).
Las Fallas is every pyromaniac’s dream.
It’s a festival that laughs in the face of health and safety inspectors all over the world; perhaps English ones most of all.
Kids exchange footballs for firecrackers.
Grown-ups smoke beside unlit fireworks.
Monumental sculptures, decorating both city and villages, are sent up in flames.
Sergi wasn’t going to let Castellón be overshadowed by its bigger neighbour though.
Sleep had no place in our host’s plans, who was so energetic he put the Duracell bunny to shame.
Three hours after we’d crashed into our beds, we were woken with a latin radio station turned up to breaking point.
“Go! Go! Go!”
It was the midday fire cracker show and Baila La Bamba on top volume was nothing to the explosions we were about to hear.
“No! Don’t cover them!” Sergi said, as our hands rushed to our ears. “Open your mouths or you’ll go deaf.”
The bangs shook our insides as we clung on to each other.
I thought about my date, a sound engineer whose ears were his livelihood.
Rosie thought of her grandparents surviving through the blitz.
But there was no time to dwell on these things.
Onwards we went, to a sun drenched square where everyone drank shots of pink Lambrusco and ate monkey nuts.
So many monkey nuts.
Try saying Pamplona with your mouth full of them; in fact try saying Pamplona with your mouth full of anything.
Ah, the things my cousin and I learnt.
We marched to the edge of the city to see artists working on the Gaiatas; beautiful hand crafted monuments, six meters high and packed out with flashing light bulbs.
They welcomed us with cava; we got so merry we ended up signing their overalls.
And just when we were about to crack from exhaustion we left Castellón and headed to Pego, a small village outside Valencia.
Our next host was Josep. He was a fallero artist we’d met walking the Camino de Santiago.
Sculptures, he called them, when people didn’t understand what fallas were.
Compositions, some as high as five storey buildings, full of colourful figurines.
But they’re more than that; they’re stories, busy with characters, meaning and magic.
They set up a marquee beside two of them and doled out beer and monkey nuts.
The girls dressed in traditional dress; elaborate crinoline skirts and princess Leia hair do’s.
The band never slept and our dancing turned into aerobics as the days turned to nights.
At more than one point, Rosie hijacked the drums.
I think it might be her calling.
And then on the third day, the group of falleros set up a barrier around the two fallas outside the marquee.
They wound strips of firecrackers around all those brightly coloured creations and poured petrol over them.
Two fire men turned up.
The fallera queen stepped forward to light the taper.
“Don’t do it!” Rosie said.
“You’re all crazy!” I said.
And suddenly the firecrackers exploded and fireworks shot into the air and the whole thing went up in flames.
Just like that.
A year’s work reduced to ashes.
“The new year starts now,” Josep said, with more than a trace of sadness.
But there was joy too.
It was another opportunity; another chance to do something for the pure love of it.
Monkey Nuts.
But brilliant.

Shop Girl Lets Off Steam

People are starting to notice we exist.
Some even realise we’re closing down.
A few make sympathetic faces at us.
“Oh dear, did the recession get you?”
I know they’ve only popped in because their friend is in the bakers buying a sausage roll.
“Nope, it didn’t get us,” I say. “We’ve been meaning to do this for years.”
Then I get the urge to make something up. Like, say we’re moving to Peru to breed llamas.
Most of the locals don’t believe we’re closing down.
I’m no longer certain of anything.
The thing is, what with being noticed, we’re finally selling some lights.
It’s not enough to warrant opening another check out or putting a ‘queue here’ sign outside the door. Nothing as dramatic as that.
The only shop that needs one of those signs is the pie an’ mash shop.
People are out there at 10 in the morning, excited at the prospect of jellied eels.
I don’t think I’ll ever feel that way about jellied eels.
Having said that, I promised P, my old school mate, I’d try them before we closed.
I can’t back out, especially now that the pie an’ mash bloke has smiled at me and said good morning for the first time ever.
I’ve been waiting all my life for the pie an’ mash man to say good morning to me. Every day I pass by him as he leans against the green shutters, smoking an interminable roll up.
I tried to smile at him months ago but he just narrowed his eyes at me.
Now the hostility has truly gone and I feel at ease with the whole street.
Well, nearly.
It’s the window cleaner.
I can’t help it. Every time I see him I feel irritated.
It’s the way he huffs and puffs outside the shop when I haven’t put the shutter up.
It’s not like I don’t put it up on purpose.
Our shutter isn’t the fancy electric type. It’s probably the oldest shutter on the street. Even the mysterious wig shop next door has an electric shutter.
She can put her shutter up whilst giggling on the phone because all she has to do is press a button. I, on the other hand have to ask a passerby with a bit of muscle to help me with mine.
The window cleaner can’t do it because he can’t lift his arm; which might be a clue to why he does such a rubbish job of cleaning our windows.
When he arrives I go outside to see if I can get some help.
My only shutter-lifting candidates are two skinny blokes who look stoned.
I hesitate then ask the younger of the two.
Between us both we manage to lift it.
Relieved, I head inside.
After a while I see the same young bloke talking to the window cleaner.
I get the impression he’s asking him for money. As much as I dislike the window cleaner, I feel bad that he might be getting hassled while cleaning my windows.
“Was he asking you for money?” I ask, as he walks through the door.
“What?” he snaps.
Maybe he’s misheard me.
“That bloke....I wasn’t going to ask him to help because he looked a bit spaced out.”
“He was only talking to me!” he cries, missing my concern.
My intention to be friendly starts to fail.
“Calm down, I thought he was asking you for money.”
“He wasn’t asking me for any money, he was just talking to me.”
“Right, good, fine. I just thought he looked a bit spaced out that’s all.”
“It’s his job!” he cried. “He’s probably tired! He doesn’t just sit at the counter taking money all day like you.”
At this point, I completely lose the plot.
“You have no idea what we do in here!” I yell.
And then I tell him to go.
“You don’t need to be like that love,” he smirks. “Start again, shall we?”
I’m seething.
“We can start again next week!” I say, through gritted teeth.
I shut the door behind him.
Then I lock it and go upstairs.
CLOSED, until the kettle has boiled.

Shop Girl with a bit of Mustard

I have a go at putting my blog on My Space.
I’m trying to be pro-active. You know, go global.
My profile looks like a take-away menu designed with an etch-a-sketch.
“Shop Girl,” my brother scoffs. “You’re more like Cave Girl.”
My computer skills are the worst he’s seen.
“Go back to playing with rocks then build up to pen and paper,” he says.
I swear at my laptop, sob a little then go back to bed and fall asleep sniffing my pillow.
The next day I’m tired and grumpy.
A customer brings me in a ginger bread man first thing in the morning.
I don’t think all this sugar is doing me any good but I start nibbling at its head anyway.
I’m down to its smartie belly button when Connie walks in wearing her big red cloak.
She’s combed and lacquered her hair into a silver quiff; her nails are bright pink.
“Wow!” I say, “Where’ve you been all this time?”
I haven't seen her for months. She’s been coming in every other week since the shop opened
When I was little I found her monologues so boring I’d run upstairs and sit in the stock room until I heard her leave.
I’ve warmed to her over the years.
In fact, I’m surprised at how relieved I am to see her. I was beginning to wonder if she’d popped off.
“Ginger bread man?” I say, offering her its remaining leg. “Customers keep bringing me cakes.”
“Because you got nothing on you,” she says, cocking her nose up at the gingery amputation, “you’re like one of them anorexits.”
I’m expecting her to go on auto pilot after that and tell me about her blood tests, the time they shoved a camera through her groin, every steak and kidney pie she’s ever defrosted and the curtain tiebacks her friend once bought her in Bristol.
“I’ve had a cold since the 20th December,” she says.
“That’s a long time.”
Then she lifts up her top and shows me how the coughing has affected her hiatus hernia.
“They think I’ve split open my stomach,” she says.
I don’t really understand how she’s still standing with a split open stomach.
“Doesn’t it hurt?” I ask.
“Of course it hurts. I got a taxi to the doctors, didn’t I?”
I get distracted by the white-haired hippie who’s gleefully running her fingers through all the crystal.
I want to slap her hand.
“Yes, it is crystal!” I call out.
That only seems to egg her on.
“Oh it’s lovely,” she gushes, and sends a chandelier into a spin.
I rush over to stop it, inwardly groaning.
“Can you not do that?”
“Oh sorry!”
Next she delves into the boxes of odd crystal we’re sorting out by the counter. She holds one up by the wall then drops it.
“Oh sorry!” she says again.
Connie rolls her eyes; she doesn’t like nonsense.
Actually, I reckon Connie scares a few people.
Not me though.
I can see something now that I couldn’t see when I was little. I can see someone needing company.
When the hyper-active woman has gone, Connie tells me about her blood tests and about the time they shoved a camera through her groin.
She tells me about the steak and kidney pie she had with boiled potatoes, carrots and a bit of mustard.
She tells me about the curtain tiebacks her friend bought her once in Bristol.
“I’ll bring them in next time,” she says.
I start to tell her I’ve already seen them but then change my mind.
One more time won’t hurt.

ShΩpolopolous Girl

The date gets his visa to travel around Europe.
“What about Gambia?” he suggests.
The cheap holiday offer is only valid on a specific set of days.
“Ooh yes!” I cry, “How exciting!”
I picture flamingos and red earth.
“I’m away those days so you’ll have to cover,” Mum says, ending the dream.
“How about Malta?” the date asks.
It doesn’t have the same ring as Africa but I’m up for it.
He keeps looking.
“Tunisia?”
“Marvellous.”
“Egypt?”
“I’ve been before but I’d definitely go again.”
I think I’m being quite easy-going but the date suddenly gets irritated.
“You don’t want to go anywhere!”
I’m baffled.
“Just choose a place yourself!” he says, pushing his laptop towards me.
“Uh. Athens?”
He grabs the laptop back.
“Done!”
I’m thinking feta cheese, olives, sunshine, the Acropolis, terracotta pots, vine leaves, togas and goats.
Well, it nearly doesn’t happen because our 4.30 train doesn’t show up.
That’s 4.30 AM; otherwise known as Stupid O’Clock.
The screen finally admits it’s been cancelled twenty minutes later.
We join the other panicking group of travellers on a bus heading for Blackfriars. One of the travellers knows of an alternative train.
Alternative in the sense it moves backwards.
My heart shrinks with every lethargic chug of that awful train.
I can’t believe we’re going to miss our plane. It’s our first international trip together.
Even though our gate is already closed, we still run to the check-in.
The airport is heaving.
The easyjet queues are swollen.
I slow down in front of them, breathing fast.
An air steward steps in front of us.
“Sofia?” he asks.
“No, Emily,” I say.
“Athens!” my date cries.
The steward nods and waves us ahead of the queues to the check-in desk.
“Close the gate as soon as you’ve done these two,” he says.
Thank Zeus!
Three hours later and we’re in unexpectedly messy Athens; there’s graffiti all over the place and lots of burnt and boarded up buildings with unfinished roofs.
I’m not put off though; I’m still amazed we’ve made it.
“Maybe our hotel is in the ghetto,” my date says, by way of explanation.
It’s not very sunny either.
In fact it’s spitting with rain when we visit the Acropolis and so windy I almost lose my hat.
The date takes amazing pictures. I cut his head off in mine.
There’s hardly a tourist in sight even though it turns out to be Carnival.
On Saturday the wigs and party hats come out.
We find a pair of oversized orange sunglasses which boosts our popularity in the bars.
A nonchalant barman in a dressing gown serves us up free ouzo shots with cream.
“Markos,” he says, when we ask him his name.
What a hero.
People think we’re locals. We can’t understand a word they’re saying and communicate with our orange sunglasses instead.
They say travelling with the date is the big test. But it wasn’t really.
The real test on this trip was finding coffee for less than 4 Euros.
Who told me Greece was cheap?
I suppose it was revealing in some ways. I now know the date gets excessively irritated by pigeons.

Sugary Shop Girl

Patrick, the retired road sweeper, is writing his will at the counter.
“This is a bit morbid now, isn’t it?” he says cheerfully.
Mum’s been overseeing a lot of his form filling since his wife died. She insists she doesn’t want anything in return but he’s repaying her anyway, in doughnuts.
This week there’s been a record amount of cakes passing through our door.
It used to be just Patrick but now another elderly regular has started dropping them in too. There are currently two lemon muffins on the bottom of the stairs.
There was a time when Patrick only brought in Tottenham cakes; he’d drop them off in packs of four.
Tottenham cakes are like breeze blocks covered in pink icing.
Mum eventually cracked.
“I have to tell you something,” she confessed one day, “we just don’t like the pink ones.”
Patrick didn’t get it.
“But they come from the bakers next door,” he said.
“I know...” Mum winced. “We love all the other ones...it’s just the pink ones...”
A part of Mum must’ve regretted speaking out. But somewhere, a landfill site of pink cakes was growing, and she couldn’t cope with the idea of such colossal waste.
Anyway, now he brings us in doughnuts, mainly iced rings but occasionally other types too.
Today it’s three jam doughnuts; one for me, one for Mum and one for my neighbour, who’s on a diet.
Patrick suddenly looks up from his will.
“Never been a wine drinker meself,” he says. “But I had a drop the other day and I tell you what, you can really get hooked on that stuff.”
“That’s why I’ve moved to beer,” I say.
“Makes you fat,” Mum says.
“And sherry?” Patrick says. “How about a nice drop of sherry?”
Mum nods. “Yes, sherry’s okay.”
Later on, he comes back with a bottle of the stuff. We put it besides the lemon muffins and the three doughnuts on the bottom of the stairs; we’re a bit caked out this week and not yet ready to take on this new lot.
It’s not over though.
While Mum’s upstairs, Blanche comes in. She’s slurring her words but I’m up for a chat. She once said she was writing a play so I ask her how it’s coming along.
“If I write it,” she says, “it will be a big hit.”
“Great, then do it!”
“A big, big hit. Better than all this rubbish they do on the telly.”
“Fantastic. So finish it and send it off.”
“No,” she says. “I can’t.”
“But...Why?”
“Copyright. If I send it off they’ll copy it.”
“So you’re not going to do it?”
“No.”
She leaves as another customer rushes in to look at a floor lamp.
While I’m switching the lamp on to show him, Blanche opens the door and throws a small box onto the nearest display shelf.
It’s not just any box; it’s a box with the baker’s logo on it.
By the afternoon, there are so many edibles at the bottom of the stairs we’re in danger of tripping up and breaking our necks.
My local Spanish friend comes in with a thermos of coffee.
Oh, what coffee.
It transports me straight back to my days in Barcelona when there was no need for long winded menu boards because coffee was coffee and milk was just milk.
“Ah, what nostalgia!” I sigh.
And then I hear a clatter as Mum trips to avoid the cakes.
I turn to my friend.
“Would you like a doughnut?”
She starts to say no then hesitates.
“Oh alright, go on then.”
One down, I think.
And so spreads the sweetness of our little shop.

Shop Girl Valentine

I make the mistake of telling the date I think Valentine’s Day is stupid.
“You didn’t!” my friend cries, when I tell her. “What were you thinking?”
“I don’t know! I got nervous!”
“Now he’s not going to do anything!”
She’s expecting her boyfriend to propose to her on Valentine's.
They’ve already organised their wedding and honeymoon, now he just needs to get down on one knee.
It’s all backwards in their tradition; her words not mine.
“But it’s so commercial, isn’t it?" I sigh. "It is though, isn’t it?”

Apart from a plasma lamp and a picture frame with hearts on it, I can’t say we’ve really profited from the event.
My friend thinks I’ve blown it.
“I don’t know how you’re going to backtrack now,” she says.
I have to hang up because I’ve got customers. They are two huge Nigerian blokes, so tall they are in danger of being knocked out by the chandeliers.
One of them is holding an electric hair clippers with mismatched cable perilously taped together.
It looks about as safe as rain in a light shop.
They want an adaptor for its two-pin plug. I suggest changing the plug altogether and ask if I should do it for them.
I get my wire strippers and screwdriver.
They watch me closely. They weren’t expecting I could use a tool because I’m wearing lipstick.
One of them sits on the stool opposite me and leans over the counter. He has watery eyes and badly pockmarked skin.
“You are not British. Where are you from?”
“I am, sort of. Spanish-English.”
“Spanish...” he pauses. “Hola.”
“Hola.”
“Como esta?”
“Bien...”
“Would you marry a black man?”
The question just pops out of nowhere and I’m so surprised I can’t answer.
What black man is he talking about?
Where from?
Can’t he be more specific?
Is he talking about himself?
I think of my date. Why would I marry a random black man when I already have a date?
The tension is palpable. And it grows with every second I delay in answering.
“Well I have a boyfriend so...”
“I’m not asking you if you have a boyfriend,” he interrupts, staring at me. “I’m asking if you would marry a black man.”
“That’s a stupid question.”
His friend, who has been standing by his side looking uncomfortable, agrees.
“Yeah, it’s a stupid question.”
“Look,” I say, “I would marry someone who has a good heart and is well-suited to me, colour doesn’t come into it."
There is silence.
My interrogator nods. “Good answer.”
The atmosphere relaxes. The interrogator’s friend tries to engage me in conversation.
“So how many Valentine’s days have you celebrated with your boyfriend?”
“None... it’s the first one.”
He laughs, as if to say that it doesn’t really count then.
But I learned a while ago that the customer isn’t always right.
It does count.
On Saturday, my date opens the door, grinning.
“Wait here,” he says. “You can’t go into the kitchen yet.”
“Oh!”
I smell a surprise.
It smells delicious.
“Okay,” he calls. “You can come in now!”
I'm glad he didn’t take me seriously.