The world of the uninnititiated is full of superstition and speculation. Poltergeists, aliens, spontaneous human combustion, you get the idea. People want to lead normal boring lives, so they tend to find ways to explain way mysteious unpleasantness, and even uexplaianble good things with luck, karma, fate and prayers. All of this really makes it a wonder in many ways that people ever become innitited in the great mysteries of magic at all.

Take for exmaple Ker Murphy, she has no idea she is in fact a magic wielder. If you told her the truth she would refer you to one of the many doctors she's spent dealing with during the coarse of her adolesence, there are rational explanations for everything just ask them.

Ker tries very hard to be normal, she just isn't, just take today for example.....



Ker was frustrated the two teenaged girls in the shop were messing up all the racks. It would take hours of work for Ker to put them all to rights again. There were now size 8's in the size 4's and the clothing in many sections was no longer color coded. This just wouldn't do at all.

Ker knew where every piece of clothing in the shop was at any given point in time. It all followed a very rational and logical system. Ker knew nothing about fashion trends, but if you came into "The Retro" and asked for an item Ker could not only tell you if they had it but what sizes and colors they had it in. There are some advantages to obsessive compulsive behavior.

The girls however were ruining Ker's precise organization of the store.They had to go. They had to go now.Ker was behind the counter pacing and seeming to strangle the short tangles of brown hair on the top of her head while, Chance, the other girl working in "The Retro" today was attempting damage control on the sales floor.

So Ker was stalking behind the counter yankeing her own hair furiously and wishing the girls would " go away" when they just vanished. They had been there bickering loudly over outfits for some dance, and suddenly they were gone. The door hadn't chimed that they'd left, no feet were under the doors in the dressing rooms, and the key to the bathroom still dangled behing the counter on it's peg.

Ever hear the saying be careful what you wish for?

The bell over the door rang as it opened and Callie stepped into the store. Charlie was finally letting her go out on her own for a bit since his shop was just down the street. It’s not like he took her to the beach and dropped her off. This particular shop was one she always looked at as they passed by in the van. It seemed interesting enough and she could do with a few new clothing items if anything struck her fancy.

Today she’s wearing fitted blue jeans and a light blue tank top with a dove on the front. She also has on her favorite black leather jacket that reaches down to her knees. Hair is let lose which doesn’t even reach her shoulders when let down and is curled under at the bottom. Her highlights have long since faded as she’d been in no condition to go sit at a salon for three hours, leaving her normal dark blonde hair.

She looks through the clothes racks at the front of the store near the display windows.

As the woman browsed teh racks the clerks were talking.

"Ker this is creepy, it's one thing to lose customers, but we just watched two people vanish." Chance insisted.

Ker shrugged. "You saw them vanish not me, they were here ruining everything and then they were'nt. I was ready for them to leave anyway." she said.

"Ugh! Ker they didn't leave I'm telling you." The other girl insisted.

"Keep talking like that and you'll wind up at "Soothing Oaks" (a mental hospital nearby) Ker said. She should know she'd been there a few times.

At this point Chance was looking under all the racks for the "missing" girls.

Ker was putting things back, exactly, where they belonged. She persaonlly thought that Chance was being silly. She's already convinced herself those girls were bickerign so loudly that they simply didn't hear the door when they left.

Attention was diverted from browsing the racks of clothes to one of the store clerks looking underneath the racks and lifting up clothes. An eyebrow was raised as this was curious to her. What was she looking for? Gaze went to the other clerk who was putting back clothes which was definitely not as interesting to watch as the woman looking underneath the clothes racks for something.

”Did you lose something?” She asked the lady with an intrigued look on her face. ”Maybe I could help you look for it?”

Now Chance was not about to admit two people just disappeared in here without so much as a puff of smoke.

Ker on the other hand has no clue she really did make them disappear. (they weren't harmed they just went someplace else) " Chance just thinks there are witches hiding in the clothes making people vanish." Ker said as she arranged a rack into shades of blue the dark blues faded to lighter and lighter the further forward on the rack one looked.

Callie just blinked as she tried to register what the other clerk just said. Witches? Hiding in the clothing racks? She’d known a few witches a long time ago and they definitely did not hide in clothing racks. It did make her chuckle slightly afterwards.

”Must be careful about those witches. Never know where they will show up.” She smiles, going along with the absurdity in which was happening. At least she wasn’t the only person insane in this world. She continues on back through the racks of clothing seeing if she can find anything that she might want to buy.

"How can you just pretend nothing happened?" Chance demands.

"Easy I've had to live at "Soothing Oaks" before. nothing hapened."Ker says. She chuckles at Callies comment, but her eyes track every item Callie moves.

"Were you looking for anything?" Ker asks Callie.

When Ker said she lived at Soothing Oaks that registered it was a mental hospital. But she couldn’t remember if that was the name of where her mother was taken or not. She just knew she hated the place and that it always brought back horrible images of her mother shouting at her.

Thoughts were brought back to where she was as Ker asked her if she was looking for something. Callie could only offer a shrug.

”I don’t have anything in mind. Just thought I would come in and see if there was anything I might want to buy. This place always seemed interesting when I drove by.” She pushes the clothing aside on the rack as she looks at each item, but makes sure to put everything back where she got it. Callie was used to putting things back where she found them as leaving anything out of place always got her a lashing across the back (mother was slightly obsessive compulsive about organization).

MMmmm about time something callie had beat into her serves her well. Ker tends towards obseesive compulsive about organization herself.

"Let me know if you need help." Ker tells Callie.

Ker is pleased to note that the woman presently shopping has the good sense not to make things disorderly. Chance is jabbering about calling the police over the tow girls.

"You go ahead and do that, I'm sure they'll help you check the rack for witches you know." she says to Chance.

”Alright. Thanks.” She continues looking through the clothes though her attention is once again distracted by the other clerk who is threatening to call the police about two girls that seemed to have just disappeared. Obviously something interesting happened right before she got here and it was seriously stressing the clerk out. However Ker seemed to be quite calm about the situation; in a weird sort of way since she is talking about witches. At least it was making her smile and keeping her entertained. Back at the antique shop it was quite dull while Charlie was working. Nothing much to do but stay at the apartment and read and eat. No. She had to get out for a little while and she wasn’t about to let the weirdness of the situation scare her off into leaving any sooner than she wanted to.

”You should check in the closets to. They like to sneak up on you like that.” She chuckles commenting about the witches. The absurdity of the situation was amusing her to no end.

Chance went in the office and used the phone. Ker hoped she wasn't stupid enough to really call the police. She laughed at the customer again. Witches hiding in closets, sounded like fairy tales.

Callie was in a relatively good mood today. Good thing or she would have just sneaked out of the place quietly while the clerk was threatening to call the police over disappearing people. Definitely sounded like magic at work, but she wasn’t sure where from. Ker, who was acting as if nothing happened, might have had something to do with it, but Callie kept her mouth shut. She didn’t need anything else horrible happening in her life. Not when it was doing rather well right now.

She found a pair of jeans she rather liked. They had a teddy bear embroidered in the front on the bottom of the left pant leg which looked rather cute to her. And it was her size as well. How lucky was that? Taking that pants she headed up to the counter and laid them down on it. She looked back to Ker.

”I take it this sort of thing doesn’t happen that often?” Turning the conversation back to the supposed disappearing people.

Ker shrugs. "People that get hired here are forever going crazy if that's what you mean." she replies. Actually this sort of ting has made quite a few girls quit, the unexplaiined tends to drive them batty.

She chuckled at her comment. Indeed if someone didn’t know about magic it would make them quite batty. However Ker was acting like she didn’t know anything about magic which Callie wasn’t sure if that was an act or she truly didn’t know.

The other clerk finally came back out and priced the item for Callie and she gave the money to her. The jeans were slipped into a bag and handed to her. As she took the bag the clerk went back to the other room still saying she was going to call the police.

”I can see why if people are disappearing.” Her attention now brought back to Ker as she spoke.

"I didn't see anyone disappear, I'm sure they simply left when they realized I was trying to ignore them." Ker answered. She had finally finished her damage control of the sales floor.

"I wouldn't bother with the police, even if they really had vanished we'd need accuarte discriptions and names...."Ker said to Chase.

”Ah.” Was all Callie could think to say with Ker’s reasoning. It did, after all, sound reasonable to her. But then again she wasn’t here when the whole thing took place so she couldn’t make out which story was true. Ker’s theory of them leaving when she didn’t notice sounded good enough for her though.

”I don’t think they’d listen to her anyways if she says two people disappeared into thin air.” She chuckled after her statement to Ker.

"Yes, they won't take her seriously, and in turn it makes the shop come off as the boy who cried wolf, I hope she doesn't it's bad for the store's reputation." Ker says.
Surprising logic from the neurotic.

”Yeah. That might not be good for the store.” She glanced at the clock on the wall and realized she needed to be getting back to the apartment. Picking up her back with her new purchase she smiled at Ker.

”I must be going now. Nice talking to you.” She waved good bye and headed out the door and down the street in the direction of the antique shop.

"Goodbye." Ker said. she was already not paying attention though, Chance was still on the phone and another customer was already coming into the shop.

"Need any help today?" Ker asked.

In the bakground Chance can be heard on the phone, very insistant that two people simply vanished.

Whoa. Prompt service. This received a quirk of an eyebrow and the removal of one earphone from the young man who had just entered The Retro. He was a lean sort -- more legs than anything else even though his height wasn’t that impressive.

“Uh, no ma’am. Not just yet anyhow.” He smiled at her like you were supposed to smile at people you weren’t acquainted with, and walked further into the store. Clad in jeans that looked a shade closer to green than blue and more like something you would donate to a thrift store, with all the patched holes in the knees, and a form fitting black shirt on top of a long-sleeved, orange-striped black shirt with holes near the bottoms of the sleeves that he’d fit his thumbs through, he certainly didn’t look like someone who would be frequenting a clothing shop of this fashion.

But he wanted something different. So he began looking through the styles and designs of the shirts closest to him. Found that they were of entirely the wrong size. He turned around, looking for the sales clerk again.

“Think maybe I might need some help after all. Where’re your smalls?” Sheepish grin combined with tanned fingers twisting through semi-spiked, dark red-orange hair. Today’s music was something without lyrics – but it didn’t sound like it was from a video game. He’d have to check the CD when he got back to his dorm. Didn’t remember what it was.

Ker walks out onto the flor and directs him to two racks, sorted by color, that have smalls.

In the back room Chance can be heard swearing and hanging up the phone in disgust. She is threatening to quit as she picks the phone back up. Ker simply laughs.

"Let me know if you need to find anything else." she tells the unusual looking young man.

Alphonse was rapidly beginning to like this place. The clothes were in order, for the most part, and once he'd been pointed to things that might possibly fit him, it was easy enough to find what looked good.

Orange. Ooh, and there was a bit of purple in the design, too. Looked like cubes or something. He didn't know. It was a button-up, a blouse, possibly meant for a girl but then how was he supposed to know? Oh. The buttons were on different sides, weren't they...?

He decided he didn't care, and that he wasn't even going to bother trying them on -- did this place have dressing rooms, anyway? -- Alphonse walked up to the counter with two different shirts(one of which he hadn't even glanced at). Caught the tail end of a particularly interesting swear from what he assumed was another employee on the phone, grinned and got his wallet ready.

"This happen often?" Head inclined towards Phone Lady, though not in derision or scorn. Just... a sort of amiable chitchat.

Ker rung up the shirts and nodded as she listened to Chance talking to the owner.
"Yup, Come back tommorow and we'll likely be hiring. " she said in ana amused voice. She really didn't get people sometimes, especially her co-workers. So two girls left and Chance hadn't really noticed. It wasn't as wierd as when Robyn had quit the day no one had wanted to put away the recent shoe shipment, and all the boxes of shoes had been full of frogs. That had actually been weird.

"I think Chance spends too much time in the sun." Ker joked.

The exchange of money was quick, and the redhead pocketed his wallet.

"I'll keep that in mind if I'm ever in need of a job," Alphonse said, then looked down to the dual MP3/CD player clipped to his jeans' beltloop, skipped forward a song. That one had been a little slow.

"What happened? ...oh. Bag, please?" He asked, looking at the shirts. He'd probably be walking back to the dorms, didn't want to bother with more than he had to carry.

Ker gets out a paper bag with loop handles at the top with the shop name printed on it and bags the shirts.

"Chance inists two customers vanished into thin air a little while ago. I didn't see it." Ker answers. "It's always something around here, I think you have to be crazy when you start working here or this place drives you crazy. I believe I'm imune because I'm obsessive compulsive." she goes on cheerily.

He took the bag with one hand and shrugged his opposite shoulder carelessly. "I'll keep that in mind, too." And he would. He liked his sanity. Only wouldn't it be interesting to see the sorts of music that could come from the other side of the asylum's walls?

Hm.

"'d you do the clothes like that, then? It's a good job, easier to find stuff here than most other stores."

He'd turned and taken a few steps before glancing back at the brunette -- "Have a good day," he settled on, and replaced the earphone that he'd taken out so he could hear.

Ker resumed obsessing over the store. There was always plenty to do. Things in back, to sort, price, and put out on racks. She carried a box up front to begin putting it's contents out on the sales floor.