text: "Help Wanted", the sign read. I stopped and pulled my earbuds out, the vaguely death metal music fading as the music left my ears. I peered through the shop's large front window, squinting to see against the glare on the glass. It looked like an ordinary shop. From what I could see the shelves against one wall were lined with random oddities. The opposite wall was lined with glassware of all shapes and sizes. Must be a pawn shop, I thought and looked up at the sign over the door. Sure enough, it named the place "Jerry's Thrift." I shrugged and put my earbuds back in, starting to shuffle on down the sidewalk, but something pulled me back to the shop before I had gotten more than a few steps. I'm not really sure how long I stood there and stared at the door before I finally reached out and pushed it open, stepping into the shop. The little bell above the door jangled out a merry greeting, causing a pretty brunette woman in a dark green sundress behind the counter at the far end of the store to look up from her phone and smile. "Welcome to Jerry's," she said convivially. "Just let me know if you need help finding anything." A couple of the half dozen other customers looked toward me as well. I shuffled around the shop for a few minutes, pretending to look at this knick knack or that. Why was I so nervous? I was just going to get an application to get my parents off my back about finding a job, and then leave. Finally, I steeled myself and approached the counter. Again the woman looked up from her phone. I could see that she was playing some mobile game. "Hi there," she said with a beautiful, enchanting smile. "What can I help you with?" "Um," I said quietly, "I saw the 'Help Wanted' sign on the window. I was just wondering if I could get an application." The woman regarded me with a look of concentration and looked me up and down for a minute, seeming to size me up from my half-untied converse sneakers to my scraggly red hair. Without warning, she turned her head and shouted toward a door that led to what I assumed was the stockroom. "Jerry," she called, "there's a young man that would like to speak to you." "No, no," I replied with a nervous, forced smile. "I don't need to talk to anyone. I'll just take an application." "Oh, we don't have applications," the woman said, turning her attention back to her phone. "My husband will be out in a moment to speak to you." I considered leaving right then, but again there was that pull, and I found that I couldn't make my feet move. As the woman had promised, within a couple of minutes a large, fit man emerged from the back room. He stood about six and a half feet tall with wide shoulders. A brown goatee peppered with gray adorned his chin and mouth, and his dark brown eyes regarded me appraisingly. "Hello," he said in a voice much higher and lighter than his build would have suggested, "I'm Jerry. What can I do for you?" I couldn't tell if it was the way he held himself with confidence, or the kindness in his eyes, but suddenly my worries were all but gone. "I uh," I started to stammer out. I met his eyes and abruptly the words rushed out of me. "I saw the sign in the window and thought I would check to see if you still needed help." Jerry smiled suddenly and nodded. "Certainly," he said. "Would you mind coming into the back with me?" He must have sensed my trepidation returning. "Nothing to worry about, son. Just a quick interview. I don't like applications and resumes; I prefer to interview anyone who inquires immediately." I found myself nodding slowly and started to follow him toward the back. He led me to a small table off to one side of the storeroom and motioned for me to sit. "Coffee?" he asked, pouring himself a cup from a coffee pot on the small table. It smelled good, but I shook my head. "No thank you, Sir," I said. "None of that 'Sir' stuff, please," Jerry said and took the seat across from me. "Call me Jerry." I nodded a bit woodenly and looked down at the table top. "What's your name?" "I'm Chris," I said. "Chris Manfeld." "If it's not too much trouble, Chris," Jerry said gently, "would you mind looking at me while we talk?" "I'm sorry," I said, lifting my gaze to meet his. "I have pretty bad social anxiety." "I hadn't noticed," the other man chuckled, a slight twinkle in his eyes. "Nothing to worry about. Plenty of our kind have it. It's not exactly conducive to business as usual, but it's not a deal breaker." He seemed to be talking more to himself than me, and he smiled wide when he noticed the confusion on my face. He waved away the unspoken question with his free hand and took a sip of his coffee, making a face. "Be glad you refused. Been sitting in the pot too long." He set the cup aside and regarded me silently for a moment. "Tell me a bit about yourself, Chris." "I'm not sure what you want to know," I replied and ran a hand through my hair. He merely stared at me, waiting. "I'm nineteen. I live with my parents. They're the reason I stopped in. They've been hounding me to either get a job or go to school, and I just don't feel like college is for me." "It's not for everyone," Jerry said, nodding slightly. "Any reason you chose my store specifically?" "Not really," I said, considering. "I was on my way to the arcade and saw the sign. Something called me in here, I guess. I know that sounds dumb." "Not at all," Jerry replied. "The universe is full of forces that push or pull us this way or that all the time. And no I'm not some crazy person who believes in the alignment of the stars affecting our ultimate destiny or anything like that." The thought had only been halfway through my head. "Do you have any special requirements? What times are you available?" "I don't think so," I said. "I'm available pretty much all the time. I don't really do anything." Jerry stared at me for several long minutes before slapping a hand on the table, causing me to jump. "Well, you'll do just fine for our nefarious purposes." He gave me a wink and a smile and stood. He offered me a hand which I shook with a nervous laugh. "Come on. I'll get you properly introduced to Mare." I stood, a bit bewildered, and followed him back out into the front of the store. The first thing I noticed was that the sun was starting to sink below the horizon. It had been just a bit before noon when I came in here, hadn't it? The store was empty and the door appeared to be locked now. "Well, you boys were certainly back there for a long time," the woman previously behind the counter, now sweeping the floor, said without looking up. "Can I take that as a good sign?" "Yes," Jerry said, "I think he'll do nicely." He turned to me and then motioned to the woman. "Chris, this is my wife Marielle. She and I run this shop together. Mare, this is Chris. Can you get him all the legal paperwork?" Marielle put her broom aside and moved behind the counter. She seemed almost to float across the floor like a spectre. Reaching under the counter, she opened a filing cabinet and produced a stack of papers. She put them on the counter and pushed them toward me with one of the most enchanting smiles I'd ever seen. "This is just the normal stuff," she said. "1040, W2, release form, consent to background check, direct deposit form, et cetera. Take these home and fill them out. Bring them back with your ID and social security card on Monday at 8:30 and we'll get you started. Did Jerry mention anything about pay?" "No," I said, turning to look at the man only to find that he was gone, disappeared back into the storeroom presumably. "Where'd he go?" "Of course he didn't," she said, rolling her eyes. "He does that from time to time. Just wanders off. Well you'll start at fifteen an hour, with full-time hours and full benefits. That's all laid out in the packet I gave you there. After a probationary period, if Jerry decides to keep you on you'll get a five dollar per hour raise." I stared at her stupidly, my mouth hanging open. "What's wrong?" "Nothing," I said. "It's just...that much? With benefits? What will I be doing?" "The usual stuff," she said, her smile widening. "Stocking shelves, sweeping up, keeping up the back room." After a few more minutes of her explaining what the job would entail she asked, "So, do you have any questions?" "How long does the probationary period last?" I asked. "That depends entirely on you, Hon," she said with a knowing smile. "Jerry will know when you're ready. I know this is probably a lot to take in. Are you okay?" "Yeah," I said, still awestruck by just how generous my new employers were, and the whole experience in general. She nodded and extended a hand to me. I reached out and shook it firmly. Something strange passed through me in that moment, like a tingling all through my body. Marielle pulled me into a firm hug. "Welcome to the family, Chris," she said. "It'll be nice to have some fresh meat for the grinder around here." She pushed me out to arms length and chuckled. "Just a joke." I smiled, the first genuine smile since I had walked into the store. Marielle let me out the front door, the sun nearly entirely below the horizon now, and waved goodbye as I started for home. * * * The next couple of months went by smoothly. I learned how to do everything in the store except run the register, which I was told only Marielle did. Every day was pretty much the same, but I didn't mind. It was steady, good work and amazing pay. My parents were off my back, and I had started saving money to get myself a car and possibly move out of my parents' house. Best of all, Jerry and Mare were amazing. Mare greeted me every morning with a cup of coffee and a box of donuts from the bakery across the street. Jerry always asked how I was doing and made a point to make sure I was comfortable with the work I was doing. After a few weeks, I started to notice something a bit odd. Not only were there few repeat customers, but I never once saw payment of any kind change hands. Anyone who came in to purchase items simply signed a receipt and left with their items. At first I shrugged it off and minded my own business, but after two months of having never seen anyone pay for anything, I was starting to get a little freaked out. I finally decided to ask Jerry about it. "Oh, our customers don't pay with money," Jerry said with a broad grin, looking down at me expectantly. I cocked my head to the side and looked at my employer quizzically. I could tell that he was waiting for me to ask what he meant, but I had this strange feeling that I didn't really want the answer to that question. I found my mouth opening to ask it all the same. "You've been working here for a couple of months, right?" Jerry asked before I could say anything. I nodded and he rubbed at his goatee, his eyes pondering as he looked down at me. His presence made me suddenly feel far shorter despite there being only inches difference between us. He turned to Mare where she sat at the cash register as always. "Mare, mind the front would you? I'm going to show Chris the office." The woman looked up from the game she was playing on her phone and smiled knowingly. "Is it that time already?" she asked. "Yeah, I think so," Jerry responded and turned toward the back of the store, motioning for me to follow without another word. "Have fun, Sweetheart," she said to me, also waving for me to follow her husband. Something in the deepest part of me told me to run, get out the door and never come back. Sure, these two had been nothing but amazing to me for the last two months, but something felt off about this whole thing suddenly. My feet started to move toward the back room as if under their own power. I followed Jerry through the storeroom, which suddenly seemed darker and more bleak than before, back toward his office. I'd never been this far back into the building before. It simply wasn't allowed. The older man took a set of keys off of his belt and they jangled as he unlocked the office door. I don't know what I was expecting, but it just looked like a normal office to me. He ushered me in and then used the same keyring to unlock a filing cabinet. "Have a seat there," he said. I took the chair he had offered in a daze as he pulled a file folder from the cabinet and handed it to me. "Open it up and tell me what you see." I did so. Inside the folder were hundreds of receipts, some dating back as far as ten years. It didn't seem possible so many could fit in this tiny folder. "They're..." I started to say and paused to turn a few over in my hand. "They're just receipts from the store." "Right," Jerry said, "but look closer." I did. I poured over every inch of several of the receipts, but saw nothing different. "Like I said," I told him, "they're receipts." He rubbed at his chin again and studied me a moment before taking a seat on the edge of his desk and crossing his arms over his chest. "Well," he said, a bit of consternation in his voice, "I know I didn't misread you. It must not have manifested yet." He held his hand out for the folder, which I gave to him hastily, and he removed a single receipt, holding it up for me to see. "I'm a sorcerer. So are you." I gaped at him. "What?" I said, nervous and disbelieving laughter in my tone. "That’s impossible. There's no such thing as sorcerers and magic. And I'm pretty sure I would know if I was one." He simply smiled and shook his head. "Not necessarily," he said. "If you haven't hit your breaking point yet, then you wouldn't have manifested. You see, I hired you to take over this store when I'm gone. Our business is kindness." Apparently, I still had a slack-jawed look on my face because he continued. "On every one of these receipts is imprinted a magical contract. When it's signed, the contract goes into effect." "What does the contract do?" I asked against my better judgment. "For that matter, if it's magical shouldn't people be signing in blood or something?" My employer let out a hearty chuckle and shook his head once more. "Gods no, son," he said. "I'm no Warlock, and you've seen too many movies. A simple signature will do, but it has to be given freely. The contract is simply a minor compulsion spell that compels the subject to do one random act of kindness per day." I thought about that for a moment, staring at the folder in his hands. "If you're wondering if the customers know, they don't. They know there's something odd about it, but they're pretty sure it isn't nefarious, as we've been around for almost two and a half decades now. I don't think any of them know it's magic." "Why?" I asked. I had meant to say something eloquent and meaningful, but that was all that would come out. "I told you. Our business is kindness. I woke one day, shortly after realizing my full potential as a sorcerer, and decided I didn't like the state the world was in. What was I to do about it? Did I go about killing people who did bad things? No. That would make me worse than the atrocities I wanted to get rid of. When I met Mare, she knew me for what I was. She's not a sorcerer herself, but her mother was, and she's sensitive to magical energies. I told her on our third date that I wanted to make the world a better place. I had already sort of worked out the idea of the contract, but the shop was her idea." "That’s like rape!" I blurted without thinking, pointing at the folder. He cocked an eyebrow at me, but didn't rush to defend himself, so I pressed on. "Let’s say that I believe you. Let’s say that I believe in magic. What you’re doing...you're taking away people's free will." "Oh?" he said, not seeming the least bit ruffled. "How am I taking away free will?" "Your spell forces people to do something they might not otherwise want to do. Kindness means nothing unless you have the free will to choose to do it." "I told you, son. The customers know there's something strange going on here, but they come in anyway. I merely use the inherent greed of the human condition to do my job for me. I don't use magic to make them come into the shop. I don't force them to sign the receipt. Besides, the compulsion wears off after a few weeks. By that time, most people are so addicted to the warm and fuzzies that come with helping someone just to help them that they continue doing good without being compelled." "Again, let's pretend for a minute that I believe you," I said warily, choosing my words very carefully. "Let's say that you are a sorcerer and all of this is legitimate. How can you claim you don't use magic to force people to come in?" "Because I don't," Jerry replied with a confused look on his face. "You did it to me," I said, heat creeping into my voice. "The day I came in here to get an application, I almost walked right by. Something pulled me back." "Okay," the other man said, understanding now. "That wasn't me. You were drawn to me, sure, but it was my magical presence that brought you in. It wasn't some evil spell that did that. Like I told you that day, the universe has a way of guiding us in the right direction." I sat in stunned silence for a moment, and felt my anger receding. I didn't want to believe any of this, but I knew he was telling the truth. "It still isn't right," I said, my earlier conviction waning. "It still seems wrong somehow." "Look," Jerry said, suddenly very serious, "what I do here doesn't hurt anyone. No one is rushing to give their life savings to a charity or jumping in front of trains to save lives. It's simple stuff, like holding the door for someone or paying a dollar and change to buy coffee for the person behind them in line at the gas station. When I started my work, this town was miserable with angry and hurting people. In the twenty-four years since those doors first opened, people have become kinder to each other, and our little town has become a place where people want to live to get away from the hatred and violence of the big cities." When he had finished, I just sat there, staring at the floor. My head was starting to hurt. Part of me wanted to be angry at this man that I had started to like so much, but what he was saying made so much sense. Who was really getting hurt in all this? No one. After several minutes of silence, I felt his hand on my shoulder and looked up to see him crouching in front of me. "Do me a favor," he said. I nodded. "Take the rest of the day and the weekend off. Mare and I can manage without you. If you still feel so strongly that what I'm doing is wrong come Monday, don't come in. I'll pay you two months wages for your troubles and you can find yourself a different job." "And if I do come back?" I asked. "When you come back," he said, emphasizing that he knew my mind was already made up, "we'll start trying to break you so that power of yours can manifest. After that, I'll start teaching you how to run this place properly. Like I said, I want you to take over for me when I'm gone." "Why me specifically?" I asked. "Mare and I can't have kids of our own," he replied. A small, soft sadness briefly took his eyes, but it was gone the next instant. "So I need a protege to keep my good work going, and you just happened to be the first one to apply for the job in whom I saw some good. There were a few other sorcerers who applied before you, but I sensed a darkness deep in them just waiting to be let out. I can't have that be the legacy I leave behind. So here you are." He stood and offered me a hand. After a quick consideration, I took it and rose from the chair slowly. When I reached the door to the office, I turned. "You're sure this is okay?" I asked. "Been doing it for over two decades, son," he replied. "People in this town have never been happier." A thought struck me as I turned to leave again. "One last thing. If no one pays for anything, how can you afford to stay open? How can you afford to pay me for that matter?" "I was wondering when you would ask that," the older man chuckled. "Nothing evil going on there, either. I sell my magical abilities to a very small, select client base on the side. People with money who want a quick heartburn remedy, or potion to make their roses grow stronger and healthier. You'd be surprised how much people will pay for simple things like that." I considered a moment before nodding, and left without another word. When I returned to work on Monday, it was with a renewed vigor for life and what was to come. Marielle poured me my cup of black coffee and handed me a donut, and Jerry and I retired to the stockroom to start breaking my walls as Master Sorcerer and Apprentice. * * * It had been twenty years since I started working at the shop, and another year since Jerry had sadly passed due to a massive stroke, leaving the shop to me. I could tell Mare still held sadness at her husband's sudden passing, but she insisted on continuing to work the cash register. She still had a cup of coffee and a box of donuts waiting for me every morning. My own wife, while having no problem with our business, had decided to go a different route and worked as a veterinarian a few blocks away. She and Mare got along very well. One night as I was doing evening inventory, the doorbell jangled merrily to announce that we had a customer. "I'm sorry," Mare said. "We were just closing up. Perhaps you could come back tomorrow." "Oh," I heard a young woman's voice say from where I was working. "I was hoping to get an application. I saw the sign in the window." "Chris," Mare called to me, "there's a lovely young lady here to see you." I emerged from the store room and sized up the girl. She was probably no older than I had been when I had started working here. The magical presence surrounding her was astoundingly powerful, but fuzzy like a blunted axe. I led her, Katie, into the back room and interviewed her briefly before making an easy decision. When we both returned to the front of the store, I nodded to Mare, who smiled that knowing smile of hers. "Mare," I said, "this is Katie. Katie, this is my employee and friend Marielle." The women greeted each other. "Mare, could you get Katie here the employment packet? She can start Monday." Mare just nodded again and reached into that same old filing cabinet under the counter as I turned and headed back into the storeroom to finish up inventory.