2016 – Day 52

"We're closed!" Thea shouted at the woman outside and pointed to the sign posted on the door.

The woman, dressed in a floral-print dress and flip-flops, seemed surprised.

"When will you be open?" she said through the window.

Thea rolled her eyes and turned away, then walked toward the rear of the antique shop where her brother, Dan, stood.

"Stupid-ass tourists," she said. "I hate this place."

She watched her brother sort through their father's papers on the jewelry counter. Ledgers lay open next to piles of receipts and invoices. Everything was handwritten in their father's tiny scrawl.

"I don't understand his system," Dan said, putting another invoice atop the pile and then rubbing his fingers across his temple. "He doesn't follow any standard accounting principles."

"I knew this place was a money sink," Thea said. She leaned down to look at the rings beneath the glass.

"I didn't say that," Dan said. "He was doing pretty well. I just don't understand how it was all coming together. Like this invoice, for instance, it says Belknap Brothers paid $250 for a tea set, but when I look at the ledger..."

"I don't care about the details!" Thea said. "Just tell me what it's worth. Can we sell the place?"

"You really want to do that?" Dan said.

They both looked around the shop that their father had run since they were in grade school. Nestled in the midst of a thoroughfare that led from the town's larger shops to the public beach, it had become a known tourist stop. A local travel magazine had twice rated it a "hidden gem," piquing the interest of antique-loving visitors who would have normally stayed away from tourist traps. As shoppers entered the store, the less expensive items favorited by most tourists lay near the front in beautiful array–scarves, spoons, costume jewelry, and more. But if they continued toward the back, shoppers would begin to discover more unique items of value along the walls and short center shelves, ending with the jewelry case containing rare rings, broaches, earrings, and, occasionally, coins.

Thea stepped away from the jewelry counter and picked up a small brass sculpture of a dancer mid pirouette off of a small shelf.

"What else would we do with it?" she said. "I'm not planning to move back to run it."

"It feels like someone should," Dan said.

"Seriously? Are you going to do it?"

"I don't know. I'd have to think about it."

"You'd just quit your job and come run the store?" She laughed and put down the statue, then moved to the next shelf to explore its contents.

"It wouldn't be impossible. I could keep most of my clients, I think. I mostly communicate with them online now, anyway. Nobody needs to see their CPA daily. And I could drive into the city on occasion."

"I can't believe you're actually thinking about this," she said.

"Why?"

"Because we should sell it. Auction it all off, split the money, and be done with it."

Dan looked at Thea across the store as she poked through a clear case of antique sewing needles.

"You'd do that? Get rid of it, just like that?"

"In a heartbeat."

He stepped out from behind the counter and walked to a phonograph that had been in the shop for the past five years. Each time he visited his father, he considered buying it, but he always left without it. He thought it always felt more right in the store than it would on his shelf at home.

"So what if I did run it?" he said. "By myself. You wouldn't have to do anything."

She looked at him, lips pursed.

"What about the money?" she said.

"What money?"

"The money from the store. We inherited this place evenly. It's not very fair if you get everything, even if you are the one running it."

"Then what would be fair?" he asked.

"Buy me out. If you want to run it, take it. But I want my share now. I don't want to wait 10 more years when you decide you're done with it and it isn't worth much any more."

"That's a lot of money, Thea. I can't just pay you half of what this is worth. The money is in the building and the items. It's not like there's a pile of it sitting somewhere."

"I know that. "

"So what if you just share in the profits each year?"

"Uh-huh. Not interested. I want to sell. We both have to agree to keep it, and I don't."

Dan shook his head and walked back toward the ledgers. He didn't understand them, but he wanted to. There was something exciting about figuring it out. He ran his fingers across his father's notes and thought about what he was about to do.