The Queen Mystique

The Queen’s Enchantment

He told me all he’d wanted that day was a beautifully crafted, beautifully old table, and for some unexplainable reason had come across the antique store after having given up hope of ever finding one. I laughed. He’d never even been in my shop. I might have been able to help him. But fate and magic work wonderfully together, in ways that are filled with mist until we are able to look back on them and see the exquisite line and form and color—the finished portrait they painted.
This is how the artists worked.


***

I pulled off the road and came to an abrupt stop next to the vintage car that seemed to have taken root there since Marty bought it. It was one of his dreams to restore it back to its former beauty. My two kids and I know that will never happen now, since Marty died of cancer two years ago. I will never forget him, but time is graciously clouding those terrible years of suffering and chemo. He was taken quickly in the end. I couldn’t bear to touch the car afterward, and most of the time I didn’t even see it anymore, except when it was in the way of me off-loading a new piece for the shop, like the one I found that day.

I own a store in town called Second Life. It consists of old furniture brought back to their glory days, or repurposed, you might say. There are always people wanting to get rid of something their Aunt Rose gave them that never quite fit their décor, and for a few dollars, or even just hauling it away, it becomes mine.
The business and Marty’s life insurance kept us living comfortably in the fixer-upper home we bought five years ago—back in our glory days. Everything was so good then. Exciting. The whole family pitched in and did a lot of the work those first months, except for the electrical. Our experience there was pretty much limited to screwing in light bulbs, or flicking the switches on and off, so good sense told us to find a qualified man in town do the upgrading that was necessary.

I thought back to those carefree days as I carefully unloaded the chair I’d found while driving home from work that early evening. Now, I have been known to dumpster dive if I see something that looks promising, but this piece had definitely seen better days. Still, there was something about it that grabbed me. It’s difficult to explain. Stuffed into that bin among the cardboard boxes and other pieces of trash that would wind up in the dump outside town, it seemed to call me almost. Beg me to rescue it.
I have to laugh at myself. All the pieces I scavenge seem to call out and beg me to take them home—but this old chair…it called in a different, stronger voice.

I tugged it out, and with the help of an indigent wandering by, loaded it into my SUV.

My kids Suzie, 13, and Adam, 10, were at their grandparents that weekend till Sunday night, so I could work and not be sidetracked with dinner and baths, and overdue school projects. Those were Grandma’s concerns for the time being. Once safe and sound at home, I opened the back of my Grand Cherokee, reached in, and oh-so-carefully eased the chair out so as not to damage it anymore than it already was.
I had this excitement surge through me whenever I started something new. I knew there would be little sleep that night. I went in the house, put on a cd by Sting, cranked it up, grabbed a coke, some cheese and crackers, and then began. Walking around the beautiful old chair, I fingered the upholstery; the decorative welting, the seams and stitching, the fabric that would have to be taken off. The wood. What I needed lay in the hall drawer, so off I went to fetch a hammer, my tool kit, and gloves. My nails were never that pretty, but at least the leather would help salvage what was left of them, I laughed.

The fabric was disintegrating leaving me to wedge my

Impressum

Verlag: BookRix GmbH & Co. KG

Texte: (c) Serena Axel, 2011
Tag der Veröffentlichung: 05.01.2011
ISBN: 978-3-86479-036-2

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