Threads by Erin Latimer (book recommendations for teens TXT) 📖

told her she was destined to be an English teacher, and she’d figured that was as good a career as any.
“I’m not sure yet,” she finally mumbled as she finished her breakfast, “I need to check it out.”
She put her empty bowl on the counter. “Okay, here goes. I’ll call you in a few hours.” She headed for the door, breathing deeply to stifle the case of nerves she felt coming on. When she was nervous her stomach got upset, sometimes resulting in embarrassing side effects.
“Keep us updated.” her mother gave her a cheeky grin. “I’m sure the vacuum business will be very exciting.”
She rolled her eyes. “Thanks, Mom.”


The shop looked just as dull in the daylight. The only difference was that she could see inside now that it was light out. Alice peeked in the window. The only word to describe it was…boring. Vacuum after vacuum lined the stark white walls like an army of stiff little soldiers awaiting command. Off to the left she could see a few racks of vacuum paraphernalia. At the back was a sturdy oak desk with a cash register. A woman sat there. She had short silver hair with a few leftover black streaks and a pair of small spectacles perched on her nose. And she was staring straight at Alice. Oh crap. Embarrassed to be caught peeking in the window like a curious child, she straightened up abruptly, hoping the woman couldn’t see her face flushing from there.
She entered the store. “Ms. Gray?”
The steel-haired woman looked her up and down. “Yes, you must be Alice.”
“I guess Great Aunt Ruby…told you about me?” She didn’t want to admit to this stern looking woman that she couldn’t even remember her Great Aunt.
“She told me that one of her young nieces would be inheriting the shop when she went.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, um…are you the manager?” Alice tried not to squirm. “The letter didn’t explain much.”
“You are the owner and manager; I am your only employee.” Azura Grey smiled reassuringly at her. “Don’t be afraid to ask questions. I know you must have a lot of them.”
Alice wound a strand of hair around her finger, clearing her throat nervously. “Um, the letter wasn’t very specific. How…I mean, what happened….” she trailed off helplessly.
“How did Ruby die?”
Alice twisted the strand harder, looked at her feet and nodded.
Azura’s mouth quirked into a little half smile. “Nobody is really sure. She was on vacation in Hawaii when it happened. The letter I received said it was a “tragic surfing accident”.”
“Surfing? Wasn’t she…older?”
“Very old. I suppose that’s why there was an accident.”
Alice smiled, and then quickly schooled her face into a frown. “That’s….tragic.”
“It’s rather funny actually,” Azura smiled slightly. “When I first received the letter I had a bit of a laugh.”
“I think I would have liked Great Aunt Ruby. Mom said she was crazy. Oh...” Alice clapped a hand over her mouth, horrified. “I didn’t mean…”
“Don’t worry. Ruby was absolutely crackers. She’d be the first one to tell you that.”
Azura’s hand suddenly grabbed at her shoulder, pinching Alice’s skin through the thin materiel of the blouse. Alice jumped, and tears stung the back of her eyes. What was that for? She blinked furiously, fighting the urge to cry.
“Sorry, dear. There was a bit of lint on your left shoulder,” Azura said sweetly.
Alice bit her lip. Maybe Azura was the crazy one. She didn’t look crazy though. Maybe she just really hates me. Alice realised she was twisting her hair again, pulling on it so hard it hurt. She shoved her hand in her pant pocket instead.
Azura was staring at her expectantly. “Don’t worry, it’s gone. Now, you have questions?”
Just for a second the lights overhead seemed to flicker and dim. Or was it her eyes? Alice blinked as the shop started to go blurry around the edges.
“Are you alright, dear?”
Again she was aware of the woman’s fierce scrutiny. “I’m sorry, it’s nothing. My vision just went a little funny. What were you saying?”
“Questions.”
“Yes. I don’t understand why she left the shop to me.”
Azura laughed. “Ruby had her reasons. I’m sure we’ll understand them in time.”
“I have no idea how to run a store,” Alice murmured, and then wished she hadn’t admitted that.
“It’s okay,” Azura said, “That’s what I’m here for, to show you the ropes.”
The lights flickered again. This time the rows of vacuums faded out and Alice stared as the ceiling of the shop seemed to melt at the corners. Everything grew darker. Her breath was becoming short, and she clutched the counter, afraid she might faint. When she glanced at Azura she seemed to be studying her with interest, and she knew her vision was doing funny things because she could swear the woman was grinning. Alice’s palms were sweaty on the countertop; she could hear her own heart thundering in her ears. She had only fainted once, in grade eleven P.E. It had been one of the most embarrassing experiences she’d ever had and she didn’t want to repeat it. It would be horrible to pass out in front of a total stranger. Azura said something, but her voice sounded a million miles away. Alice’s vision faded and grew darker, and she heard herself babbling.
“I just need a minute. Sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” She shut her eyes and pushed the heels of her hands into them, willing her sight back to normal.
When Alice opened her eyes, everything was different.
Gone were the orderly rows of vacuum cleaners. In their places were old wooden shelves filled with jumbles of baskets and boxes overflowing with colourful trinkets. A display of winter hats by the door had a sign that proclaimed, “Head Warming Hats” in golden letters. Another display boasted “Love Potions and Bedazzling Elixirs”. The shop was lit by several beautiful hanging lamps instead of florescent tube lights, giving the dark wood interior a subtle glow, and the entire place seemed to be bigger. There was a second section of the shop through an arched doorway, over which was painted in silver letters, “IsnerElen Gorga Eshniel”
The words didn’t make sense. The entire place didn’t make sense. Alice could see a fireplace through the arched doorway, a grey cat basking in the warmth of the flames. She breathed in deeply, smelling fire wood and the faint scent of spices. Turning to her right, she found herself staring at a stand of hand drawn maps, a bin full of pencils and erasers, and a shelf of leather bound books with golden writing on the spines. And the air was full of glowing threads, like coloured strands of yarn floating in the air, and looping around everything in sight. They draped down from the ceiling like neon party streamers and wrapped around every shelf and ceiling post. What on earth are those? Alice walked closer to a post that was wrapped entirely in glowing threads of blue and orange. Whatever those things were, they were beautiful, their shining light alluring. She found herself reaching one hand out to touch them, and pulled it back with a gasp. What am I thinking? What the hell are these things? She looked around, wondering if she’d gone off the deep end. The big oak desk still looked the same. That was one thing. The other thing was that Azura Grey was still standing there, staring at her. Something was different about her too. She was smiling at Alice this time, instead of staring straight through her.
“You can see it now, can’t you?”
“I can see…” Alice mumbled, rubbing at her eyes, “…What?”
“Welcome to Threads. You didn’t really think it was a vacuum store, did you?”


Chapter Two- A New Career

CHAPTER TWO
A New Career
Alice blinked at the woman standing in front of her.
“What’s happening? Are my eyes going?” She put her hands over her face, blocking out her surroundings. “Oh, my gosh…I’m…seeing things. I’m losing my mind. I’m going to be the bag lady that talks to herself and lives on the street in a cardboard TV box.” Azura eased her hands down gently. The woman was studying her with soft brown eyes. She had very long, dark lashes.
“You’re not crazy, Alice. I’m sure you must have thought I was the crazy one, pinching you like that, but you’ve had a spell on you for a very long time and I’ve just removed it.”
Alice squinted at her in disbelief and finally choked out, “A spell? What…why did the shop suddenly change?”
“The vacuum shop is what most people see. You are not most people. Your Aunt Ruby saw that about you when you were very small, and she cast a spell on you so that you wouldn’t see the magic. It doesn’t do to have non-magical parents raising a magic child; they tend to think the child is unstable or possessed.”
“Magic?” Alice repeated dazedly.
“You never believed in magic, Alice Cunningham? Not even as a child?”
“I…I suppose when I was a child.” Alice continued to gawk at her surroundings, waiting for them to start flickering again, to turn back into the vacuum shop. Nothing changed. The cat in front of the fireplace uncurled with a sleepy “mew”, and observed her disinterestedly before sauntering towards the back room and out of sight.
“This isn’t possible. Magic isn’t real.”
“True - to anyone who doesn’t have magic, it isn’t real. They won’t hear it or see it. Anyone else who walked into this shop right now would see a very dull store full of over-priced vacuum cleaners.”
This was ridiculous. It had to be a joke of some kind, or she was hallucinating. This happened to people in movies, not in real life. And it most certainly didn’t happen to her. “I’m not magic. It isn’t real,” Alice insisted. “It can’t be.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know! It just isn’t!” Her voice squeaked a little. She was beginning to sound hysterical.
“It took a while for you to see through the enchantment on the store,” Azura mused.
“It’s not real,” Alice whispered, trying to convince herself. She blinked again, wishing this new shop would go away, wishing for the boring vacuum cleaners. “I’m not going nuts. I can’t be crazy. There’s no history of mental illness in my family, so it wouldn’t make sense…wait, crazy Aunt Ruby, Oh no!”
“You are not crazy,” Azura said. “The denial will last for a few minutes until you get over the shock.”
“This is crazy.”
“You seem to use that word a lot.”
“Oh no! That’s a symptom of being crazy, isn’t it?”
“I wouldn’t think so.”
Alice tried her best to calm down. It occurred to her suddenly