Finders, Keepers

A tardy Halloween post and a short story

Hello, Romantics. We’re back after an unscheduled break from posting. The good news is that I’ve gotten my flu and covid vaccines out of the way – the bad news is that a cold is making the rounds in our house. I apologize in advance if I end up sounding like the crypt-keeper as I read though this week’s post. Maybe it will add a spooky edge, who knows?

I do know that it is a spectacularly crispy fall day here in Treaty 8 territory, the traditional and ancestral lands of the Cree, Dene, and the unceded territory of the Metis people. Each day this week, as I drove down the large hill that takes me to work, I could see the river changing as the temperatures keep dropping. Flecks of ice are starting to form, but the speed of the current is as strong as ever. Watching the river reminds me that change and flow is inevitable and put some of the silly things I’ve been worrying about lately in perspective.

For example, I really wanted to record and post this story for Halloween, but being responsible and getting my vaccines knocked me on my butt and then I lost my voice. I was beating myself up about not being consistent or more prepared for my Substack posts, but in the grand scheme of things – one week does not a Substack ruin, you know? C’est la vie and all that jazz.

I was tagged in a spooky campfire story challenge by Grace R. Colt , with the following prompt from Lucy Vega:

One day when you’re walking, you find a bracelet on the ground. It’s beautiful, and looks expensive, so you turn it into the lost and found. Heading back to your apartment, you’re excited to relax. But when you go to hang up the keys, the bracelet is hanging on your key hook. The bracelet you just turned in. Where did it come from, and why is it attached to you?

Now- I admit – if I was entering a contest with this take on the prompt, I’d probably end up disqualified. But, hopefully Grace or Lucy aren’t too disappointed in my take on it.

As soon as I got this prompt, I imagined the bracelet as a type of contract or golden handcuffs. (Image credit: Getty Images)

Finders, Keepers

“Hello? Oh, another visitor for the Corner Market. How fortuitous. Lovely, lovely.”

The voice is coming from somewhere, but as your eyes are adjusting to the sudden change in brightness, you’re not entirely sure where. Blinking rapidly, eyes burning, everything finally comes into focus. You look around; every surface is covered in something. It’s all cluttered, and there’s a strange hum that you can feel more than you can hear. A small woman, red hair piled on the top of her head in a knot that seems about to fall apart, appears around one of the stacks. Layers upon layers of colourful clothing are draped over her, a mass of colours and textures from head to toe - all topped off with a pair of large, white bunny slippers. As you’re looking down at her, you swear that one of the slippers looks up at you.

That’s impossible though. Right?

I mean, you had just been stepping off of the train on the way to work and now you appeared to be… well, you’re not really sure where you are exactly.

The woman peers up at you. Her eyes are the same colour as her hair, glinting red at you in the dim light of the shop.

Okay, this time the slippers definitely looked.

“Um, hi?”

She pushes an imaginary pair of glasses up her nose, fluffing one of her cardigans around herself.

“I’ll put on some tea.”

-

The woman sits across from you, sipping something that looks unlike any tea you’ve ever seen.

“Where am I?”

“You are in my store.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Nobody found ever does.” She sighs as she swirls her tea. “Tell me, have you ever had something that followed you? That wouldn’t leave you?”

Your mind immediately goes to the old leather watch that keeps showing up on your nightstand. The one you’d strapped to your wrist this morning before leaving for work…

“Ahh, I can see you have.” Her voice sounds older, gravelly even, “I was once like you.” She held up her wrist. “For me, it was this bracelet. Sparkling at me in the snow outside my apartment building. I turned it into the lost and found three times. Three times it came back. Three times before I tried it on. Three times before it changed my fate.” She dropped her hand. “Next thing I know I’m swirling around in this room. Although it wasn’t quite as full as it is now.”

You shift in your chair, feeling the weight of the room pressing in around you. The humming seems to shift, and the items stacked around you appear to almost whisper, murmuring so slightly you still doubt your ears, but the hair on your neck raises just the same. You can’t stop yourself from fiddling with the old watch on your wrist.

“You’re in the void, Pork Chop.”

“My name is -”

“Your name is irrelevant here. All that matters is that you were found,” the ears on her bunny slippers twitching as she speaks. “You see, there is a darkness. It seeps through shadows and shade. Looking for sustenance. For a feast of a soul. Fate offered you a gift, and you accepted it.”

You shake your head.

“No. There’s some mistake. I’m not supposed to be here.”

“You put on that watch. It found you. And now you have a choice.” She crosses her legs, ignoring your protests as her bunny slipper clad foot gently taps into the air. “Become a Finder or become a Keeper.”

“What are you?”

She smiles and she gestures to the stacks, “I am a Keeper.”

“What does a Keeper do?”

“I keep.”

“Keep what, exactly?”

“Things that are found.”

“And what does a Finder do?” You ask, but something tells you that the answer won’t be helpful.

“Find, of course.”

“Find what?”

As the woman stares at your face, something akin to pity washes over her features.

“Finders find, Pork Chop. They find food for the darkness.” She taps the bracelet on her wrist, “They find the strange magic that gets trapped inside of the things mortals make. Finders find and Keepers keep.”

“And if I don’t want to be either of those things?”

“The Finders would find that too.”

“This is insane.” You shake your head before standing up. “You’re insane, and I’m late for work.”

“That life isn’t yours anymore.”

The whispering that you hadn’t been sure was real is getting louder now. You can’t make out the words, but they sound rushed. Worried.

Like a warning.

“Oh dear, you can hear them.” The woman clicks her tongue and pulls her layers closer, “Not a Finder or a Keeper then, it would seem.”

That’s when you notice it.

Inky black rivers of darkness, undulating as something alive slowly begins to ooze down the walls.

-

Finding a door in this place is shockingly easy. Too easy - but you’re too panicked to think about that.

“I wouldn’t, Pork Chop.”

Ignoring the woman, you fling the door open and stumble outside. You’re on the train platform again, but how?

Nobody even glances at you as they all push through on the way to work.

The woman is standing in the doorway behind you, the entrance to the shop hovering about six inches off the ground as her slippers stare at you with wide eyes. The sound of a low grumble, punctuated with a deadly clicking sound, rolls through the station. Shadows begin to pour out of the door, pooling around the woman’s ankles, rising until even her bunny slippers disappear into the inky black.

“You idiot! You can’t go back, you’re already found!”

Her voice is fading as you sprint away from the platform. The grumble rolls behind you, and you realize that whatever it is, it’s laughing at you.

It doesn’t dawn on you at first, that the platform is suddenly too empty now. No people. No trains. The shadows around the station are too long, too big. They stretch for you, inching and bending across every surface, forcing you to leap and twist to avoid them. It is merely an inevitability before your toe catches on the dark, and you smash into the floor.

You claw the watch off of your wrist, throwing it before you scramble to your feet and begin to run again. The darkness is swirling, but the sound of the watch landing with a crack makes it hiss. You run and run, reaching for the doors to the station, finally smashing through them with all of your might, landing hard on the ground.

-

The birds are chirping outside of your window when you finally realize you’re wrestling with your sheets.

Just a dream. A bad dream.

You scoff to yourself, feeling silly as you try to slow your racing heart. But before you sink back into sleep, the sound of something clinking makes you pop your eyes open.

On the nightstand, that old leather wristwatch stares back at you. The one you know you left on the coffee table last night.

Your heartbeat thuds faster and faster in your ears as the watch face stares back at you. A whisper, so faint you can’t even be sure you’re truly hearing it, floats around the room.

“Finders find.”

-

If you’d be open to hearing more of my spookier stuff, let me know in the comments. Likewise, if you think I should stick to working on romance – let me know that too. I’ll be honest, I’m going to keep writing whatever inspires me – but if you’re all liking seeing different content, I do want to take that into consideration.

Now, if you’re looking for your own inspiration, or to find writing camaraderie – check out my friend Rachael Reads and Writes new Substack Merrows' Moon Academy. If you’re a fan of fantasy, someone who is still sad they never got whisked away to a magical school, or maybe you’re simply seeking some creative community – this academy might just be the place for you!

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Until next time,

xx