The Diamond Quilt

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It was just shy of a month later, early in the morning on September 30th...around seven. The glow of the sun had just encompassed the street outside, and a beam of light was piercing through the large window in the front of the shop, illuminating a turquoise tea set sitting on one of the shelves.

On the way in, she had stopped to pick up the newspaper...only because it had taken a ride on the door as she’d opened it.

Apparently, rain had fallen earlier that morning, because the corners of the paper were a little wrinkled, and some of the ink had bled, making the word ‘taxes’ look like a fucked up version of ‘tits’, and an article about Her Majesty had a headline of just ‘Qu’...the ‘een’ was a river of black heading down the edge of the text.

But one section that was still in tact was the obituary section. Some 95-year-old woman that loved to bake had died and left behind ten children, and a ‘large’ amount of grandchildren. There was another one for a 10-year-old boy that had been hit by a car...and one for a 45-year-old man that had been crushed by a falling bookshelf.

One has to wonder what the fuck kind of books he kept on the shelf to be crushed by them...certainly not paperbacks.

The last name on the list...a 71-year-old man that had died of cancer...left behind a daughter, and a grandchild…

...oh.

William Buckley.

A farmer for most of his life, an auto mechanic, and a homebody until...

Will...or Bill for short...it fit him, she supposed...not that she had really pondered his name, as she hadn’t seen much of a point. That wasn’t to say that she hadn’t thought about him, his quilt, and his grandbaby since he had wandered into the shop four weeks ago…

...because she had. A lot. The image of his sad blue eyes flecked with the joy of leaving behind something that mattered...they had been twinkling at her even without him around.

It made her wonder what she could leave behind for her grandchildren...if she ever had any...not that she necessarily planned to die of cancer, but the thought had come up now and again.

Just then, the little bell on the door rang, and she looked up to find a blonde-haired woman standing there looking a little lost.

Before she could say anything to her, the woman walked past the counter into one of the aisles and disappeared. Footsteps went all the way to the end of the shop...the woman was wearing heels, so they were more like footclacks…

And then stopped.

And started returning.

The shocking blonde hair reappeared, and this time, it headed in her direction. The woman looked like she normally wore makeup, but her face was bare.

“Hel-”

Apparently her phone was more important for the moment, so she paused and waited. And waited, for a good three minutes, until the woman finally looked up with an expression of ‘what’s going on’...then back down at her phone, then back across the counter.

Then rolled her eyes.

“Oh, I’m sorry...I’m just...sorry.”

The phone disappeared below the counter, presumably into a purse. “My name is Charlene...my father was in here four weeks ago? He bought a quilt.”

...Oh.

“A quilt? You mean...the star quilt?”

“Yes!” the woman said with the fake enthusiasm of someone that is trying too hard to mask their unhappiness.

“Yes, he bought it. I still have the purchase receipt filed away if you-”

“-Oh, no, no...nothing about that. I...this may be strange, I don’t know if you’ve had anything like this happen before...but the quilt was actually in my family...it was made by my great-grandmother, my father’s mother.”

In the agonizingly slow few seconds that they stared at each other, she quickly leafed through her memories to discover that there had been a few incidents of people claiming certain items...but nothing like this.

“No...not really. Did you...I’m not really sure what-”

Charlene placed her hand on the counter, and did a little head-shake. “I’m not worried about the star quilt. See...there were two. Quilts, that is. She made two. One with stars, and one with gems. Diamonds, I guess. Not real diamonds...just cloth shaped like diamonds.”

Had he known that it was made by his mother when he bought it? How did he know where to find it? Something like that didn’t quite fit in the ‘coincidence’ basket.

“No...he didn’t know what it was when he...his memory started going bad a few years ago. But I knew, and I asked him where he got it. He told me about your shop, so I was hoping you might have the other one.”

Keeping her eye on the woman, she scooted her chair back. “We can go look in the blankets area-”

“-No, I already looked. It’s not there.”

“Oh.”

“But maybe you could keep an eye out, yeah?”

“...Sure, I’ll make a note.”

Charlene nodded, tapping her fingers on the counter a few times. “The other quilt is mostly blue.”

Blue quilt with cloth diamonds. Got it.

“Well, thank you for your help,” she said as she backed away.

Then she turned and headed for the door too quickly for a response.

Not if she could bloody well help it.

“Oi, Charlene?”

The other woman turned just before she opened the door. “Hm?”

“I...I hope your daughter loves the quilt...and I’m sorry for your loss.”

A little bit of warmth sparked in her eyes. “Thank you,” she said quietly, and then headed back onto the street.

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