Jacob was, very obviously and unquestionably, an extremely handsome (and educated) man with the most wonderfully magical shop in this little London town.
Unfortunately, he and Nathaniel had a sad tendency to misinterpret each other’s words.
And these were the only, though very strong, reasons why ...

Touché. That was good. That was very, very good.
Nathaniel did not express any of his admiration out loud, but the smile on his lips said a lot to those who could read him.

“Wise words, my dear friend. I could not have put it better myself,” Nathaniel nodded along, thinking how good of an asset ...

“Are we?” Nathaniel sounded surprised. Probably because he genuinely was. “Well, I suppose that yes, we are courting.”

They were courting in a bit of a reverse order, but courting nonetheless, and that thought, although correct, needed a bit of fermenting in Nathaniel’s mind. Was there anything ...

“I’ll be ready to hear your price, Mr Forsythe.”
It was immensely difficult to find the willpower to keep playing the part of a regular client when Jacob touched his hands this way. Nathaniel could not hide his smile, but tried to at least restrain his immediate desire to make up for the lost time ...

Was it time to be cautiously optimistic again? Nathaniel kept coming back to that feeling with Jacob, but it was hard to predict whether it was truly justified this time.
But Jacob was smiling and seemed eager to do the reading, which Nathaniel chose to interpret as a good sign. The locked doors ...

It was only neighbourly to bury a family member when they asked you to. And who was Nathaniel to refuse his neighbours when the ask came to the threshold?

The unfortunate event happened upon the Soloveis when the family least expected it, as it always does. The shopkeepers occupied a small space on ...

It had been nearly three days since Nathaniel had been insulted by Jacob Smith. And although he was still hurt, and the worst of Jacob’s words still echoed in his head, he found himself missing his company. Granted, they had only a handful of conversations together, and most of them — unfortunate ...

“ Poor!? ” now this was a step too far.
“A mistake!? ” another far step in a very wrong direction.
Nathaniel felt the fire inside of him burn anew. Only a miracle of an unknown nature stopped him from hitting the table with his fist.
“You are insulting years of my family’s work now, too? You ...

Nathaniel found himself on the cusp of something of a metaphysical conundrum: on the one hand, Jacob’s touch and the sheer fact that he used the word ‘like’ in his proximity made Nathaniel’s heart melt. On the other hand, his other spoken words were… something else.

“So let me get this straight ...

Nathan should have known better — in particular, he should have remembered that the topic of family was a taboo subject with Felix; to his mild, but sudden surprise, it turned out that Jacob was more willing to open up about his background.

What it was all about was something Nathaniel could never ...