ASHFALL INSTITUTE | SHADOW REALM

COLLECTIBLES AND CURIOSITIES

P. A. Moore

It was along the alleyway that Martina walked on her morning pilgrimage to work five days a week. A pop-up shop within a liminal space, zoned neither industrial warehouse nor trendy shopfront. She paused, momentarily puzzled by the sudden appearance. The shop had not been there yesterday evening when she took the short cut home after a quiet Sunday dinner out. And at six in the morning, it already looked settled, as if it had been waiting for her.

She knew the alley’s minutia: the dumpsters, the graffiti, the transient merchants who came and went with the seasons. She usually caught them arriving, hauling crates or arguing with delivery drivers.

Collectibles and Curiosities. The sign was hand-painted, slightly off kilter and charming. Inside, an elderly woman with silver hair braided down her back sat behind the counter. She didn’t greet Martina. She watched her with a patient, almost expectant expression, as though she already knew what would catch her eye.

Martina paused inside the door, intrigued, but time was slipping. She glanced at her watch and hurried on, telling herself she’d return during lunch.

The morning hours dragged on, mundane, repetitive, with the soul stealing sameness of Mondays. She glanced at the clock in the bottom corner of her screen ticking away the minutes with digital precision. 7:50…51…52…53 but the count slowed, yawned, stretched into eternity rejecting the laws of physics. She leaned back in her chair, arms dangling at her sides, and sighed heavily. Collectibles and Curiosities was refusing to tuck itself away in a tidy compartment the way her thoughts usually did. The sign nagged, taunted, and finally yelled for attention.

She reached for a tissue and dabbed at her forehead; she had broken a sweat. Strange, was she coming down with something? Maybe she should take the rest of the day off. She had accumulated weeks of leave over the years. Her life alone was so predictable, she didn’t change her routine for anything as trivial as vacations.

Almost giddy at the thought of breaking routine, she messaged her supervisor: Feeling sick. Must’ve caught a bug. To be safe I should go home so no one else is exposed. Can work remotely this afternoon. –Martina.

Permission came quickly. Her supervisor even added a kind note. Martina quickly closed her file folders, shut down the desktop, and gathered her briefcase and coat. She nearly stumbled in her rush to leave catching coworkers by surprise. She laughed to herself, at least she gave the rumor mill something to gab about today.

She was exhilarated, breathless, feeling like a truant teen pulling out a pack of smokes and heading for town instead of second period. She glanced guiltily over her shoulder to see if anyone noticed. That brought a self-conscious giggle she immediately replaced with her usual impassive expression. “What am I doing?” She asked herself and almost turned around, but the sign whispered again, Collectibles and Curiosities, and she set off toward the shop with strides a little longer and quicker.

The shop was still there in the alley. Silent. Welcoming.

Inside, the air smelled faintly of roses and something older, like ozone before a storm in a place that didn’t exist anymore. The old woman behind the counter glanced up and nodded. Martina wandered the aisles, touching trinkets, ruffling yellowed book pages, absorbing everything. Antiques, oddities, objects that felt like they belonged in other people’s memories.

And then she saw it.

A small painting, not masterful by any stretch - almost primitive. A Victorian cottage set within a garden. Morning, the sun high in a yellow dawn. No people. No story. Just a silent world rendered in uneven brushstrokes.

She wasn’t someone who bought art. She didn’t adorn her walls. Her apartment was functional, spare, a place to sleep between workdays. But she kept circling back to the painting, drawn by something she couldn’t name.

On her third pass, she noticed the shadows extending across the lawn. Longer now. The sun lower in the pale blue sky. Had she misremembered? She convinced herself she had. Still, it was unsettling, but she bought the painting anyway and hurried home with it tucked under her arm like contraband.

At home, she carefully unwrapped the brown paper and put the painting on her dining table. The scene had shifted again. Dusk now. The moon rising. Warm lamplight glowing in the cottage windows.

She blinked, startled. She rubbed her eyes and forehead. She was tired. Is this what it feels like growing older? She tried remembering how the painting appeared in the dimly lit shop with its darkly looming shadows and old incandescent bulbs. She must have been mistaken. She hadn’t looked closely. That was all.

But she didn’t sleep well that night. She woke up again and again to check the painting. Each time, the light glowing through the cottage windows seemed a little warmer, a little more alive.

By morning she was exhausted. She messaged her supervisor: Fever up. Headache throbs. Taking the day off. –Martina.

It became a pattern. Late nights. Early morning calls to her supervisor requesting time off.

Days blurred. Nights dissolved into dreamless stretches. Her world compressed into one room - the dining table, the chair, the painting. She ordered a magnifying glass from Amazon. She had to see the details inside the windows. She imagined the rooms, the furnishings, the family she’d never had living inside. Sometimes she thought she heard a gramophone. Laughter. A life unfolding just beyond her sight.

One morning, she woke still seated at the table, cheek pressed to her folded arms. Her eyes lifted groggily.

A face.

A young girl stood in the foreground of the painting, smiling directly at her. Pretty, with shiny dark hair tied in a ribbon at the nape of her neck. She wore a Victorian traveling suit and carried a small satchel.

Martina startled, stared, breath shallow, heart racing. The girl’s smile was warm. Familiar somehow.

The first of the month passed. Martina’s landlady noticed the missing rent. In eighteen years, Martina had never been late. She gave it time. Courtesy, after all for her best tenant.

By the fifteenth, she knocked on Martina’s door. Lightly at first, then harder. No answer. The neighbors hadn’t seen Martina, but that wasn’t unusual.

The police arrived for a wellness check. The passkey turned. The officers stepped inside and recoiled at the smell. They found what they expected: Martina slumped at the dining table, head resting on her arms, eyes open and fixed on the painting.

The painting showed a Victorian cottage set in a garden. No people. No story. A dark silent world of moonlit shadows.

With no next of kin, the landlady had Martina’s belongings taken to the curb. A few hours later, an old van pulling a trailer rolled up. Collectibles and Curiosities hand-painted on the side, slightly off kilter and charming in its own way.

A young girl hopped out of the passenger door – shiny dark hair tied in a ribbon at the nape of her neck. She lifted the painting from the pile with practiced ease and carried it to the back of the van.

She smiled at the old woman with silver hair braided down her back seated behind the wheel.

The van pulled away.

The alley was empty again.