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The young Nonagesimus strolled along the bustling Saturday streets in her mid-size town, looking down at the single twenty-dollar bill in her hands. What should she purchase? She was uninterested in frivolity, nor in an item which would be used and discarded, like toys or sweets. She had no need of new clothing, as all that she required was provided for her. No, this money was intended to be used for a personal treat for Harrowhark herself.
She did want to buy something she could share with her caretaker and schoolmaster, Crux, who had given her the money. She stopped in front of a hardware store and gazed unseeing at the tools therein. She couldn’t buy something she so blatantly would not use. No, it would have to be something they both could enjoy. Another bible? Perhaps some religious literature. She turned to continue down her meandering way when a store across the street caught her eye.
The building was like all the rest, a small awning over the doorway with a sign above the windows reading, “Dve’s Vintage,” with a disk sticking out of the lettering. Underneath that, it said,” Fine Records and Paraphernalia.”
A record! Perfect! Harrowhark looked both ways before crossing the street and entered the establishment to the tinkle of a little bell above the door.
“Welcome!” called a girl’s voice. By the tone and pitch, she might be about the same age. “Have a look around! I’ll be right with you.”
Harrowhark discerned the body, whence the voice came, was ducked under the counter by the register. As invited, she looked around. It was mostly boxes full of vinyl labeled alphabetically. There were a few shelves of CD-roms, one of tape cassettes, and one of books about music. The walls were littered untidily with peeling posters displaying various musicians, most dressed in salacious clothing with copious rips, tears, and tie-dyes.
“Allllrighty,” said the cashier, whipping her ridiculously red hair out of her face as she stood up. “How can I help you, today, miss?”
The cashier’s eyes pinned Harrowhark in place. They were the color of a slab of perfectly-preserved amber, sans bubbles or detritus. The girl–for she was a girl–had warm brown skin with a smattering of reddish-brown freckles accompanied by copious acne pocks. Her red hair was messy, but curled up away from her face, and was longer around her neck in loose ringlets.
“Ancient sap,” mused Harrowhark to herself.
“Huh? You mean like old crooner music? Frank Sinatra type? That what you’re looking for?” Harrowhark did not respond. “Miss?”
“Nonagesimus.”
“Gesundheit.”
“Nonagesimus. That’s my surname.”
“Uh, okay,” said the girl, scratching the back of her neck. This action curled her bicep into a grotesquely erotic bulge. “Got a first name I could call you?”
“Harrowhark.”
“That is… not much better.”
“Well, that is my name,” responded Harrowhark crossly. “I cannot very well change it.”
“I mean, you could,” sassed the cashier. “But I meant more like, like do you have a nickname?”
“… No.”
“Hmm… How’s about Harrow? That’s shorter than Harrowhark and also less…” here, she waggled her hands about, apparently trying to communicate something via gesture. It was unintelligible to the young Nonagesimus.
“Harrow… could be… acceptable,” responded Harrow.
“Whew. Okay. Now, what can I help you with, Harrow?” the girl smiled. It was brilliant. Teeth slightly askew, and in their imperfection highlighting that her nose had previously been broken. A single dimple appeared.
Harrow hadn’t spoken in too long. “Your name.”
“Oh, whoops, sorry.” The girl dug in a drawer for a pin, then fastened it to her shirt. Apparently her name tag, as it labeled her “Gideon. My name’s Gideon.”
“Very well,” Harrow nodded. “I am looking for a record of religious music.”
“Oh cool, yeah we got tons of goth shit.”
“What?”
“Yeah, you know, like with the drama and the makeup and the death and the black and the there-is-no-god, I gotcha.”
“Absolutely not!” screeched Harrow indignantly. “I am looking for worship music. Songs of praise to the Lord, our God.”
“Oh lord,” breathed Gideon. She scrubbed a hand down her face. “So you come in here, dressed like Wednesday Addams–”
Harrow looked down at herself. She was dressed plainly in the manner of her average daily wear. A simple black cardigan over a white button-up with a starched Peter Pan collar, paired with an ankle-length black wool skirt with a large plaid done in a slightly more reflective black. All this with simple black boots and ivory earrings depicting Christ on the Cross. She looked up at Gideon. She did not know who Wednesday Addams was.
“–and you are actually looking for, like. Gospel.”
“Yes! I do not understand what is so difficult about this request!”
“Wow. Okay. Okay. Just. Wow.” Gideon took a deep breath, seeming to steady herself. Then she looked at Harrow again, this time with a certain mischief in her eye. “Okay.”
“You said that already.”
“I did. But now I know what you need. Come with me.” They traipsed through the store to the box marked with the letter J. “Alright, lets see. Late alphabet, not Joplin… Here!”
She held out a record in a brown paper case labeled, “Judas Priest: Defenders of the Faith.”
Harrow tentatively took it and turned it over in her hands. It was clearly re-packaged, but the vinyl was in good condition. She was unsure about the group name, but could concede that Judas certainly could have benefited from the guidance of a priest. Then she remarked, “Oh, but will this play on a gramophone?”
Gideon stared at her. She stared unblinking for so long that her eyes started to visibly water. Harrow raised an eyebrow.
“Nothing you can find in this store or in this town or probably this country would play on a gramophone.”
“Then how am I supposed to listen to it?”
“J–! Okay, what do you have, twenty bucks? Just give me that and I’ll throw in an old record player for you.”
“Very well, then,” Harrow said.
~
The bell over the door jangled in an aggressive tone as the door hit the wall beside it.
“YOU!” roared a squeaky little voice.
Oh boy! thought Gideon. She’d expected to see the not-goth girl back in the shop with a bone to pick, but certainly not the very next day! Either she didn’t have a lot going on, or she was really ticked off. Either way, Gideon got what she wanted: entertainment.
“How can I help you today, ma’am?” she asked winsomely.
“You can help me by taking back this obscenity!”
“Oh, no, the obscene materials are in the back.”
The girl–Harrow–scowled, revealing that her tinted lip balm got on her teeth. So she does wear makeup… Good to know. Or, at least, the closest thing she can get to it. Which I guess is SPF chapstick with the slightest touch of color. Oh shit, she’s been talking–
“–and it almost killed an old man out of shock! Is that the kind of thing you want on your conscious?! Are you willing to explain that to Saint Peter at the pearly gates?!”
“Are you asking me to defend Defenders of the Faith? Because I will.”
“No, I am telling you that you’re going to Hell, and also that I want a refund!”
“We can’t offer you a refund,” Gideon lied, “but I can exchange the record for something more to your liking.”
Harrow pursed her lips in doubt. It was a pretty cute look. “What do you have in mind?”
Gideon had actually pulled this one out right after Harrow’d left the day before, so she brought it up from under the counter to reveal Holy Moses’ No Matter What’s the Cause. “It’s German, but I mean, Moses, y’know? Holy, even.”
A sniff. Harrow was still dressed as goth as someone could look without dark makeup and also not being goth. There was black, there were layers, there were buckles, and holy shit was that a choker? Harrow self-consciously touched the pendant hanging from the lacy black necklace.
“Oh, sorry for staring.” Gideon blushed. “What’s that?”
Harrow lifted her chin to display the oval ivory carving. The way she tilted her head made Gideon feel embarrassed for some reason and, unrelatedly, she clenched her legs together. “It is a relief of the Virgin Mary.”
“Pretty...” Gideon trailed off, staring at the tendons on either side of her neck. “Uh! I mean, pretty cool! Here’s your record. Hope you enjoy!”
~
Harrow breathed in deeply as she stood at the threshold of Dve’s Vintage, clutching the second horrible recommendation from the redheaded goon who worked there. She had a feeling–actually, she had a couple feelings–that this “Gideon” person would not be giving her earnest offerings of the music genre she requested. Yet, for some reason, she was back. The very next day, mind. She’d even waited until public school let out in hopes that this frustrating girl would be back behind the register.
Peering through the window, a blurred flame of hair confirmed her suspicions. Taking another fortifying breath, Harrow stalked through the door, giving the bell a cheerful little jingle. She had on her sternest expression to show that she was certainly not enjoying this back-and-forth baloney, and was actually here at this record store for “A gospel record, please.”
“Well, well, well,” cooed Gideon. Harrow could feel her ears get hot at that tone of voice. “If it isn’t the midnight maiden, mistress of the macabre, the–”
“You clearly understand alliteration. Prove to me you understand music,” Harrow insisted, thrusting the Holy Moses album at her verbal sparring partner.
This clearly rankled the other girl. “Understand-! Uh, I understand music, little lady. Maybe you don’t understand music!”
“I understand that I asked for songs praising the glory of God and you gave me something in German that probably could have summoned the Devil himself had I played it for longer than a second!” Harrow had actually listened to the entire first track, just over a minute, in case she needed fodder for a reposte. It was horrible, but she was dedicated to this days-long argument.
“Maybe the Devil would do you some good,” was the comeback.
Harrow blanched. Did Gideon notice that she’d worn an old skirt (lovely, with a delicate herringbone pattern) that used to be ankle-length but now, post-puberty, actually fell just above her ankle? Did she realize that Harrow had salaciously combined this garment with short ankle boots that together with the skirt revealed about a half inch of her stockings?!
“Hey, cute haircut by the way,” remarked Gideon.
Oh. Perhaps she hadn’t noticed. There was no explanation for why this made Harrow feel the smallest bit disappointed.
“Like… Anne Hathaway! Circa Les Mis. Y’know, Les Misérables?”
Harrow could not grok the connection between the wife of William Shakespeare and the novel by Victor Hugo.
“Not a musical fan I take it.”
“What?”
“Les Mis, it’s a musical.”
“Why would someone make a musical about the 1832 French revolt?”
“Okay, so I guess Godspell is out.”
“Certainly.”
“Come on, that one’s actually Christian and everything!”
“I think not.” Harrow could not bear to imagine what would happen if this girl sent her home from the store with a record she actually wanted, thereby removing any reason to return.
“Ugh, fine. Come along, nunlet.”
The nunlet came along as Gideon led her over to another crate to extract another record: the self-titled album from the band Jerusalem. The album cover depicted a man in the garb of the crusaders kneeling beneath a sun nearly covered by black clouds. He held a silver sword and wore spurs on his heels. His head tilted back seemingly in religious anguish. This showed genuine promise. Harrow looked up over the 12” by 12” in her hands. Gideon tussled her hair and an ethereal wind blew across Harrow’s face, probably just because of another customer opening the door. The loose tresses fell upon her freckled forehead like autumn sunshine before those eyes like warm honey turned back to make contact. Looking directly into her eyes seemed to almost have a hypnotic effect on Harrow, who swiftly turned her head away and said, “I’ll take it.”
Gideon’s response of “Oh, okay,” almost sounded morose, but that wouldn’t make sense.
~
Jingle jingle.
“I’m here to return this–”
“Hey, are you gay?” Gideon blurted.
This seemed to baffle Harrow. “No, I’m a girl.”
“What?”
“What?”
“But- okay, you know what, forget I said anything.” Gideon took back Jerusalem and led Harrow to the section that housed most of their R&B and soul music.
“This is a different area than before,” remarked Harrow.
“Yeah, it’s cuz I’m actually giving you what you want,” sighed Gideon, trainer scuffing the carpet as she sifted through the bin. “Here.”
“Amazing Grace, Aretha Franklin,” Harrow read aloud.
“Yeah, she’s the queen of soul, and her gospel albums are really something.”
“You listen to worship music?”
“When it’s Aretha, yeah.”
Harrow looked at the record blankly.
“What’s wrong? This is what you wanted, right?”
“Oh. Yes, I suppose it is.”
The two stayed loitering in the empty aisle for a few minutes, neither seeming willing to move away. Gideon of course, had thought through ending her game of heavy-metal-that-could-be-miscontrued-as-possibly-Christian, and ultimately had to admit defeat after running into too many metal groups that were actually Christian. Anything that close to the initial request meant that Harrow might not come back to yell at Gideon for giving her devil music, or whatever. At least then she’d had her full attention.
The aforementioned square continued staring at Aretha’s regal getup on the cover of Amazing Grace without moving to leave. She actually seemed to be staring through the album with a distinct essence of malaise. She even huffed a tiny despondent sigh.
“Hey, um,” Gideon started.
Harrow looked up at her, meeting her eyes for the first time today and pinned her in place with deep soulful baby blacks, so dark the iris almost blended in with the pupil. She blinked and her thick, long eyelashes fluttered against her cheeks, leaving one strand behind. Gideon reached out a finger and lifted the eyelash gingerly from Harrow’s face. The shorter girl seemed shocked still.
“Eyelash,” Gideon explained, holding it out on her fingertip. “Make a wish.”
Harrow darted her eyes to the offering before looking back at Gideon and lightly blowing it away. Neither of them looked to see where it went. Gideon wanted to ask what she wished for but held her tongue.
“What are you doing for the rest of today?” Gideon asked instead.
“Oh. Nothing, really,” answered Harrow, her reply distinctly tinged with hope.
“Do you want to hang out? We could listen to music here. Or I could ditch and we could go walk through the park or something.”
“Won’t you get in trouble?”
“Nah, my old lady’s the owner,” Gideon lied, as though Pyrrha wasn’t gonna give her the what-for if she up and closed the shop. It’d be worth it. “What do you say?”
“Sure,” said Harrow and smiled the most diminutive smile in history. It was so beautiful and perfect that it sent palpitations thrumming through Gideon’s whole body. Her cardiograph could have registered on the Richter scale.
“Cool,” Gideon grinned back. She put her hands in her pockets to play it cool. “Cool.”