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"It will be fine, Gwen, just fine." He stood in front of the door, hands reaching to turn the sign that would welcome customers.
"Are you sure? I mean-not saying that you couldn't do it, because of course you could, it's just that," she took a deep breath, the nervous look in her eyes settling on Merlin. "It's just that, well, you've never done this before."
He turned his face to her with a cheeky grin. "Oh come on Gwen. How hard could it be? All we have to do is say hello to people, show them where stuff is and collect their money." He flipped the sign around without needing to look at it, and walked toward the counter. He sat down on the stool behind it, cupping his face with his hands. "Easy, right?"
"I'm sure that isn't all there is to it. What if-"
"We'll do great, I promise."
...
"Merlin! This is not great!" Gwen's voice was filled with horror as she watched the shelves that carried the medicine powders fall to the ground. She backed away, dodging the flying shards of glass and growing puff of smoke. The shelves hit the floor with a loud thud, and something that sounded like wood being broken into pieces.
Everything was a mess. They both coughed, standing back by the counter and looking over the disaster. The floor was painted in colorful dusts, shiny shards of glass, bits of broken off wood, and three of the shelves had fallen to the ground completely.
"How did this happen!?" Gwen questioned holding her hands to her face. She bit her lip thinking of how much trouble they'd be in. Gaius had entrusted them to watch over his shop for just one day. And what happens? They do they very thing he had warned them not to do. Make a mess of things. Worst part, the day had barley begun.
Merlin rubbed the back of his neck, his cheeks turning a faint shade of red, "we'll need to get this up before anyone sees-"
The bell above the door chimed, and the two guilty kids looked over with wide, fretful, eyes.
"What happened in here?" Elyan walked in, his right eyebrow raised to it's maximum height as he kicked a chuck of wood away from the entrance door. He slowly closed it, his lips moving into a frown. "One hour, was it?" He raised his eyes to see Gwen and Merlin standing stiffly in front of the counter, acting like they had nothing to do with any of it. He was not at all surprised by this-but in every way disappointed.
Gwen let out a frustrated sigh, "we should close the shop, just until we get this cleaned up."
"It will probably stay closed all day," Elyan added, flipping the sign and moving towards the small storage room.
"Well, that is unless.." Merlin started, he twirled his pointer finger in a circular motion. Gwen stiffened, her face sending him an unamused look.
"No Merlin." She squinted at him, "wait- Merlin, were you the one that-!"
He took his eyes from hers, resting them on a spot of the wall that had a glittery yellow powder staining it's white paint, "I was just trying to-"
"You know what Gaius said! No using magic to do you dirty work!" Her eyebrows furrowed as she reminded him, time and time again, of Gaius' advice. Merlin scrunched his shoulders, slouching a little, but kept talking. "I just wanted to get things done faster, you know, be more efficient." He said with a guilty half-smile.
She glared at him, something she hardly ever did, and he couldn't help but laugh a little at the sight- earning himself a huff of disapproval.
"I was trying to stock the shelves faster." He put his arm up in surrender. She let go of a long sigh, rubbing her forehead,
"Merlin," she moved back towards him, he held his arm, looking him in the eyes. "Whenever you use you magic, things always seem to.." she hesitated, looking to the side for a moment.
"Go wrong?" He guessed, to which she nodded with a sympathetic smile.
"This isn't to say always-of course not always- but a lot of the time, it's better to not use your magic-or any magic, not just yours." She gave his arm a pat before holding her hands behind he back, her smile turning somewhat into a grimace.
"I see your point." Merlin said, moving past her to inspect any damages done to the wood of the shops floor. "But I know what I did wrong, I moved too fast, I shouldn't have rushed so much." He traced his finger along the wood near the fallen shelves, feeling for scratches and dents. To his luck, only a few small ones. "For cleaning-cleaning is easy- I'll have this back to how it was in no time. You wouldn't even be able to tell the difference."
Elyan came back with a broom, a mop, and a bucket in hand. "I don't think that's such a good idea, Merlin. You said that last time. Remember when you dropped Lancelot's keys down the sewer? You said you'd get them but you ended up flooding the whole street." He let out a small chuckle as he passed the broom to Merlin, who looked annoyed at the recall.
"Okay, in my defence-"
"Defence? What defence?" He snorted, "You drowned the street for keys you could've gotten if you had just used a hook-the hook I suggestes you use, by the way." He gave Merlin a pat on the shoulder, only earning a glare in return. He passed the bucket and mop to Gwen before turning to the door. "Well, while I'd love to stay and help you clean, I'd rather not." He reached the door, turning once more, "have fun."
...
For two hours, they cleaned-with occasional uses of magic-that Merlin swore cause no harm-only to have made little progress.
"Magic is looking pretty good right now." Merlin raised his eyebrows with an exaggerated sigh. His hands resting on the tip of the mop as he leaned his body weight on it.
"No. It Isn't." Gwen, in her many failed attempts, tried picking up the shelf once more, only lift them by an inch before droping them back down.
With the floor now clean, it was much easier to see the full extent of the earlier mayhem. There were scrapes to the floors wood, small ones he had no problem fixing with a sneaked use of his magic, and powder has stained the floors and walls, he was sure some glass shards stuck in the wood, and a dent to the floor ran along the sides of the fallen shelves. Merlin let out another sigh. They were never going to fix all this up before Gaius came back, which was in-
Merlin proped his head off the mop, his body stiffened with the realization. "Gwen what time is it?"
Gwen checked he watch, "noon, why?"
"When did Gaius say he was getting back?"
"In the evening, don't worry, we still have time. Though we'll need to explain.." She beckoned to the register. "He'll think we haven't done anything all day." She said with a pout, once again trying to lift the shelf.
"We haven't. Not unless we use-"
"No Merlin. I have a right mind not to let you use any magic." She grunted as she let go of the shelf, letting it fall hard to the floor.
Merlin sighed, "need help with that?"
"Not from magic." She warned.
Merlin walked to the other corner of the shelf, combining forces with Gwen to pick it up. They managed to lift it to their knees, but held it there in place with all their power. "Still..no..magic?" Merlin barley got out. He felt the sides sliping out of his hands. Gwen gave him a look and tried her hardest to puch it further up; she'd hoped she could inch her way to the inside of the shelf that lay hidden, face planted in the ground.
Merlin said a quick spell, eyes turning gold before he shut them.
"Merlin!"
"What? I just helped us. It should be easier to lift now." He opened his eyes to find a horrified Gwen looking up.
"No Merlin- it's floating!" She pointed to the shelf floating just above their heads. "Whatever you're doing, don't. Drop. The. Shelf."
"Well...that wasn't what I was trying to do. All the easier though," he concentrated his magic into moving the shelf from over them, to an unoccupied spot. But of course, as everyone warned, it went all wrong.
The shelf hit another shelf, and like the domino effect, they all fell to the ground one by one, dropping the contents, breaking their frames and wood, scraping the floor, all over again, leving only one standing.
"See this is why I told you not to use it!" Gwen yelled, anxiety overiding anger.
"It's okay-" he said, though his voice cracked with uncertainty, "I can fix this."
"No, Merlin. You can't. Your magic can't." She hissed, "I'll try calling someone, maybe one of the others can help. There's no way we can clean all of this up before Gaius comes back."
...
Five phone calls later, Arthur, like the true knight-in-shining-armor he is, came to their rescue. Offering to help them arrange the shelves back to their proper positions.
"I see Merlin's been a total buffoon again." He said looking at the disaster they-Merlin-made. "When will you ever stop messing up everything you touch?" He looked at Merlin, bemusement setting on his face. "Care to explain how this," he flailed is hand at the mess, "even happened?"
"No. No, not really. And why do you instantly go blaming me when you don't even know what happened?"
"Because it's always you." He sighed. "Okay, how are we going to do this?" The question was more to himself as he placed his arms on his hips, looking over the room.
"We should use-"
"Merlin." Gwen shot him another glare, warning full in her voice.
"What? I was just going to say we should sweep it up again. We'll still need to mop, but after the shelves, you know."
"Good idea, get to it then." Arthur said turning to him with a fake smile. He walked to the stool behind the registry counter and sat, pulling his feet up on the counter top. Merlin looked at him with bewilderment.
"I thought you came here to help. You can't just sit around."
"I came here to lift shelves, not sweep."
...
"All done." Merlin opened the shop entrence, tapping the broom on the cobble stone outside to dust it off.
"Half decent, at best."
Merlin rolled his eyes, "yeah. Yeah. Get to picking up the shelves, prat." He closed the door, letting the broom lean against the frame. "Gwen what time is it?"
Gwen, who sat inspecting the remains of broken products-to see what she could salvage, took a quick glance at her watch. Her eyes went wide, standing up. She grabbed Arthur's arm and led him to the first book shelf, "hurry, he's going to be here in less than an hour!"
"Less than an hour!?" Merlin scurried to help them with it. Arthur stood at one corner, Gwen at the other, and he stood in the middle, wrestling to slip his fingers under the slim area that didn't quiet touch the floor.
They lifted the shelf, some reason being significantly heavier despite having three people on board, grunting at the pressure every so often. They were able to lift it above their heads, pushing to move further under it, to prop the shelf up completely but stopped when they realized another shelf had been laying on top of it, and was not so happy about being lifted up.
Arthur let out a frustrated sigh, "of course. Your telling me no one saw that?"
"I don't believe you can blame us. No one thought to look at the other ones." Gwen said with a huff, her arms shaking rapidly with the force.
"I think I really should just use magic."
"No, Merlin." Gwen reprimanded.
"But it will be so much easier! Think about it, we'll have these shelves back in their positions in no time." He moved his palm so that the shelf would lay parallel to his arms. His hands had marks a deep red.
"I'm going to take a wild guess and say your magic is why we're in this situation in the first place." He sighed, giving Merlin an unamused look. "I'm right, Gwen, aren't I?"
"Quite right." She shut her eyes hard and bit her lip, aiming to keep the shelf up. "Guys. I think we have to put it down, I can't hold it any longer-"
The bell atop the door chimed again, and the three guilty kids, with wide eyes, looked in horror.
"Gaius!?" Merlin and Gwen almost squeaked in unison. Arthur backed away from the scene, not wanting to share any blame, but doing so all too suddenly. The weight of shelf shifted unevenly causing Gwen and Merlin to let the shelf drop to the floor with a loud thud.
Gwen covered he mouth in horror, "Gaius.." she said nervously. "Isn't it a bit, um, well, early. I though you'd be out longer." She gulped looking at the mess they still hadn't cleaned. "Not that you can't come, it's your store- I just mean, I thought it would take more time." She said with a small, forced, laugh.
Gaius looked around the shop, his eyebrow raised high, "What on earth happened here!?"
"Merlin happened." Arthur gave an unappreciated chuckle.