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It seemed like everyone on the west coast knew of Buckland's Emporium. It is a small antique looking shop in east Portland. Seemingly aged well beyond its years compared to surrounding buildings and perpetually covered in graffiti from the local teens wanting to tag the hottest place. The staff seemed to be entirely a single old woman who has seemingly never been spotted outside the store despite how rare it has ever actually been open. No one even knew her name, but the community sensibly seemed to agree to refer to her only as Ms. Buckland. The reinforced windows were covered in what seemed to be vanta black paint from within. The door was likewise covered completely save for a small square perfectly cut out to showcase a hand-written sign, reading "Open 7 Days!" It was as if the shop was the exact opposite of what a shop was supposed to be.

Buckland's certainly wasn't open seven days every week. In fact, in the eight years that people can remember it even existing it has only been opened three times. The first opening was the day the store seemed to first appear. Rumor is only a few people even bothered to enter the store, let alone buy something. It's been disputed if anyone at all truly bought a single item that day. The recollections were always roughly the same on the offerings available however. It was what seemed to be your run of the mill snake oil junk sold at ridiculous prizes. A genie lamp promising three wishes for $300. A fuzzy pair of dice meant to hang from a car's dashboard promised fantastic luck to the owner for $400. A beautiful but cheaply made costume jewelry necklace claiming to grant the wearer immortality for $1,000. Every item as ridiculous as the last. When the store didn't open after that most assumed it was just a failed scam.

Everything changed when the store re-opened three years later for a second day. A local college girl had recently hit an explorative phase and was trying to hunt down every weird and indie shop she could find for her small blog. The decor of the place was bizarre to say the least. The pictures from her blog showed seemingly random items hanging from the ceiling making it hard to walk. A rainbow colored bicycle. Animatronic heads that seemed to always be looking at the camera. Long strings of Monopoly money hand-sewn together with red string. The items within the shop were stranger than the first time. Still promising extravagant claims impossible to fulfill. The photos showed an old timey phone that claimed you could speak to the dead for $600. A pocket watch that would let you fix any mistake for $400. A black box sealed close that simply said "everything inside" for $2,000. The girl had loved the eccentricness of the shop, it was the weirdest place in Portland she had found yet! Having never heard of it before despite it clearly being open some time and not seeing any other customers she decided with great pain to force herself to support the small business despite the crazy prices. She had found one of the smallest items in the store, a gorgeous gold coin with mysterious symbols carved into both sides. The paper attached to it simply said "CERTAIN VICTORY - $250". That was more than she'd paid for basically any of her favorite clothes but it reminded her of the victory she had finding such a cool place for her blog and motivated her. Besides, it looked like real gold so maybe she could sell it later to a pawn shop for some of the money back.

The blog had barely any entries after that post. However, it would be quoted endless in TV interviews, documentaries, and books since. The author had spent a few days going about business as normal, keeping the coin in her purse as a small token of good luck. She was having a great week. She had won the scholarship she wanted despite feeling her essay was a complete mess. She had won her Tennis match against an opponent who had previously completely out-classed her. She entered the local scratch ticket lottery and won the grand prize with her first ticket. It wasn't long before the pieces starting clicking together for her. She played a game of Chess, a game she never cared for and just barely knew the rules to play and best the AI at it's hardest difficulty just guessing what pieces to move randomly. Every test she seemed to just remember the answers despite not studying, so soon she stopped studying and somehow kept aceing tests. One day she had forgotten her purse in her car and got the worst grade of the year. That seemed to seal the fact to her that the coin wasn't just a piece of pretty junk. She went on to play professionally in several sports, being the undefeatable rising star. She had no hesistation thanking the trinket she bought from her store as well. People showed up often to check if it was open and ask around only to be let down like all the rest. Finally one day she took a private jet to attend a professional tennis match and it simply disappeared over the Bermuda triangle, never to be heard from again.

The store had gained a small cult following, although many still were incredibly skeptical, they couldn't resist the temptation of curiosity. The soft whisper in their ear of "but what if?" A sub-reddit and forum were made discussing theories and potential opening dates. A local nerd and active member of /r/Bucklands coincidentally living across the street from the store had setup a camera pointed across the street and at the door setting it to stream on Twitch so people could casually watch the door while they played their PC games or read a book, hoping one day they might see it open. At exactly 7:06 AM, June 6th, it opened for the third time. It only took 13 minutes for someone to realize it. Then quickly they had posted it everywhere. By 8:15 AM there was a small crowd. SunshineLilly, the most popular YouTuber in Portland. /u/BigCatsBigHats (commonly referred to as "Bigs") the admin of /r/Bucklands. GriftahTTV, the owner of the Twitch streamer who had lived nearby, and a trio of friends - Stephen, Eric, and Melissa - who had talked each other into rushing over after seeing a Tweet with the news. A few arrived just minutes after the last of the group but none managed to enter the store before "Ms. Buckland" started shooing people away saying the store was about to close.

SunshineLilly recorded the majority of the store's experience for her channel. Wanting a more interesting story to give her viewers she peppered the owner with countless questions. Only two pieces of information were given thoroughout the dozens of questions. "Ms. Buckland" was a collector. Customers may only purchase one item per person due to limited supply. SunshineLilly had purchased a small plastic trophy labelled "Ms. Popularity" that looked like it was stolen from a 10 year old ballerina's participation trophy shelf. It was the cheapest item this time costing "only" $350. Bigs bought a dirty Japanese lucky waving cat figure that said "good fortune" for $2,500. Stephen and Eric both reached a similar conclusion roughly equating to, "This is ridiculous. It's a cool looking shop, but I'm not going to drop half my paycheck on a piece of junk because one prodigy girl claimed she got good luck." Finally Melissa was the last to purchase an item, deciding on an old silver mirror that looked as if it would have been considered old during the American Civil War for $700. It's price tag included a brief description of "See your best self". Moments after the last purchase they were all pushed outside - for an old lady she seemed to be packing some muscle in her musty sleeves. The late-comers bombared them all with questions. "What gives? I thought the store was open today? It hasn't even been an hour! I called off work for this!", "Wait, you guys were actually in there? What did you buy?", "I'll pay you double whatever you paid for that cat!".

Soon enough the commotion died down and people returned home. Then sure enough, everything changed yet again. SunshineLilly went from being the most popular YouTuber in Portland to the most popular in the world. She was landing acting contracts and commericals just to play herself. Bigs had gone on to make it onto Forbes' Youngest Billionaires of 2020. Melissa had gone from an overweight frumpy self-proclaimed "potato bod" to one of the most recognizable super-models in the world within six months.

Then, one by one, each mysteriously disappeared by the beginning of 2022. Since Bigs, the last to disappear, had finally gone missing the "Bucklanders" as the community grew to call itself had numbered in the tens of millions. Real estate near Buckland's Emporium had sextupled in price since the store opened. There was always at least a couple people hanging around the store at all hours now. Yesterday recordings from the outside heard rumblings of furniture being dragged and nails being hammered inside. The frequent rumors of a new opening went from active to relentless now. Major new outlets kept trucks on standby. People slept outside of the store and police had to frequently disrupt fights over who was first in line. The store was going to open again, and it was going to be soon.

Love it! The mystery continues …

loved this but was the switch from Buckland to Berkland intentional?

Whoops, no that was 2AM writing, I'll fix it, thanks!

Any chance of a second part to this? Love it

Thanks so much! The part 2 request always feels like the highest compliment here lol. That being said I think I’m leaving this one here. If I were to continue it I think I’d want to rewrite part 1 a bit and turn it into a full length short story but it’s just not quite worth the trouble I’m afraid. x_x