“A lock of hair. From a loved one. It was a way of keeping them close.” Marcus picked up the brooch, completely unbothered. “Very common in the nineteenth century. Very collectible now.”
“Very creepy always.”
“You’re touching objects imbued with decades of emotional resonance every day and the hair is what bothers you?”
“The hair is HUMAN REMAINS, Marcus.”
“It’s keratin. It’s no more ‘remains’ than your fingernail clippings.”
“I’m not wearing my fingernail clippings as jewelry!”
“More’s the pity. Very on-trend for the 1870s.”
I stared at him. He stared back, completely straight-faced.
And then—I couldn’t help it—I laughed. A real laugh, the kind that comes up from your belly and surprises you with its existence. Marcus’s mouth twitched, and this time it was definitely a smile.
“You’re messing with me,” I said.
“Only slightly. The hair is real. The trend analysis is accurate. The suggestion that you should start a fingernail jewelry line is my own contribution.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.”
He was right. I didn’t.
That was becoming a problem.
The afternoon lighthad gone golden by the time we finished the music boxes—properly catalogued this time, with dates Marcus actually approved of. The shop felt different in this light,softer somehow, all the sharp edges blurred into something almost romantic.
Not that I was thinking about romance. I was definitely not thinking about romance.
“There’s one more box,” Marcus said, emerging from the back storage room. He was carrying something larger, dustier, with “SARAH - PERSONAL” written on the side in faded marker. “I’ve been putting this off.”
“We don’t have to?—”
“No. It’s time.” He set it on the counter between us. “Two years is long enough to avoid a box.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I didn’t say anything. Just stood beside him as he lifted the lid.
Inside: treasures, but different from the inventory. A pressed flower in a frame, the petals still holding color after what must have been decades. A stack of letters tied with ribbon—his handwriting, I thought, though I couldn’t be sure. A small leather journal with a worn spine. And at the bottom, wrapped in tissue paper like something precious, a snow globe.
Marcus lifted it out carefully, like it might shatter if he breathed wrong.
Inside the globe, a tiny couple stood in a permanent embrace. The man was tall, dark-haired. The woman was laughing, head thrown back, frozen mid-joy. When Marcus shook it gently, silver glitter swirled around them like stars.
“She bought this on our honeymoon,” he said quietly. “Monterey. Everyone said we were crazy. Moving too fast.” He turned the globe, watching the glitter settle. “She said it reminded her of us. The way we fit.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“I used to think it was silly. A tourist trinket.” His voice went rough. “She kept it on her nightstand for twenty-eight years. And I haven’t been able to look at it since she died.”
“Marcus…”
“I’m not telling you this for sympathy.” He looked up, met my eyes. “I’m telling you because you asked. If I missed her.”
I remembered. In the chaos of that first day, surrounded by witches and possessed phones and disco enthusiasts, he’d said he was done with love. That he’d had his chance.
