Total pages in book: 129
Estimated words: 125117 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125117 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 626(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
“Oof, thank you, dear,” Maisey said, plopping the rest of her armload onto the floor beside the counter.
“Can I give you a hand with anything?”
Maisey waved away his offer with a flick of her hand but gestured him close. “Just picked these up from Maureen.” She didn’t elaborate on who Maureen was. “She saves them for me.”
Maisey opened the box Truman had saved from falling. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting, but it certainly was not a box full of hundreds of eggshells.
“Oh, um. How nice.”
Maisey snorted, eyes sharp. “Eggshells are a tool of protection and nourishment. Ground into a fine powder, they can be used to cast a circle or draw growth energy to you. They’re also excellent for sigil work.”
Oh, dang, Maisey’s a witch!
“You just have to make sure you boil them first,” she instructed. “You don’t want any salmonella in your circle.”
“No, of course not,” Truman murmured. He imagined a magical circle vomiting from food poisoning. “My friend Ramona is really into magic and stuff.”
“Magic,” Maisey said, “is all around us.”
“I wish,” Truman muttered.
“You might be surprised, Truman. Perhaps you need to pay a little more attention to the signs you’re being given.”
“Signs?”
But then Truman remembered Ramona mentioning Agatha Tark when she told him Greta lived in Maine. And he remembered Ramona’s text telling him it would be raining possibilities. He had been inundated with a slew of ideas for Thorn and for his own potential business ventures since then…
“Signs, synchronicities, call them what you will. They’re an indication from the universe that you’re on the right track.”
Truman nodded, unsure how to ask what it indicates if you puke in your boyfriend’s flower bed after learning he led a double life. “Synchronicities like…?”
“Oh, like, if you’re talking with a friend about wanting to redo your kitchen, and later that day you run into another friend who is redoing their kitchen. That kind of thing.”
Truman wasn’t sure about all that, but he nodded politely.
Maisey started moving the bags to the counter and Truman bent to help her. They were mostly books, with a few random gardening tools mixed in. As Truman lifted the final bag onto the counter, the bottom ripped and a large, hardcover book slid out. On the cover was a botanical sketch of a rose stem. It was titled Thorns.
Truman’s eyes widened and visions of Ash danced in his head.
“Yeah,” Maisey said with a knowing smile. “Kinda like that.”
It’s just a sign that it’s nice you’re helping Ash get Thorn in working order, that’s all. Nothing to do with Ash himself.
Maisey was watching him intently. Flustered, he shrugged into his coat and shoved Greta’s knit hat over his head. “Is there a place I can get take-out coffee on Main Street?”
“Yes, the Hardware Store.” She pointed across the street to the store called the Hardware Store.
Truman cocked his head. “But, like, good coffee?”
“Oh yes, best in town. Tell Bob I sent you.”
Truman thanked her.
“Oh, Truman. Did you boys talk to Julia about the woman you were trying to find?”
“Who’s Julia? Sorry, I’m at capacity with all the new names.”
“Ashleigh’s mother. She knows everyone. Well. Sometimes.”
“Oh. No, not yet. Thanks.”
The bell tinkled cheerily behind him, and Truman crossed the street.
Ash’s mother? Why hadn’t Ash suggested her as a source of information? Clearly they got along fine if he’d borrowed her coat for Truman.
Maybe he doesn’t want her to meet you.
The door to the Hardware Store didn’t have a tinkling bell but an ancient buzzer that sounded somewhere in the depths of the shop.
Truman had planned to walk across the street and poke his head in for a moment in case Maisey was watching him, then go find a real coffee shop. But there, just inside the door, was a coffee setup that looked inviting.
“Truman!” boomed a voice from his left, startling him into a display of snow shovels.
“Uh, yes?”
A large, bearded man emerged from between the shelves. He wore padded Carhartt overalls, an orange-and-brown flannel shirt, and worn work boots. “Maisey told me you’d be stopping by.”
“How?” Truman muttered, alarmed. Did the Owl Island phone chain have the power to disturb the space-time continuum?
“You’ll be wanting two coffees, yes? Cappuccinos? Lattes? I’ve recently gotten very into cortados.”
“Wow, um. Yeah, two lattes, I guess. Thank you.”
Instead of moving behind the coffee counter, the man held out a meaty hand to Truman. “I’m Bob. Welcome to Owl Island.”
“Wow, thanks.”
Truman begged himself to stop saying wow.
Bob chattered about Owl Island while he made the lattes.
“Would you like some muffins to go with your lattes?” he asked, and Truman noticed for the first time that the back counter held a bakery tray. “Kenny’s boy makes them. But of course you won’t be knowing Kenny. Landon’s a good kid. Well, not a kid anymore, I guess. Nearly thirty. Excellent baker.”
“I’d love some muffins,” Truman said enthusiastically, concerned that he might soon know more about Kenny and Landon than he did about his own friends if he didn’t interrupt.