Looking for Hawthorn Berries

"Hmm... I wonder if they have any fresh North American hawthorn berries yet?" Natasha murmured thoughtfully as she stopped outside a little shop that obviously sold supplies to make potions, craft spells or simply make a herbal remedy if you were into that kind of thing. She knew it was a bit early for the berries yet, but she figured that it couldn't hurt to ask if they had any, and if not, maybe they could tell her when they were expecting a shipment in. Besides, she also needed some clary sage to finish off a potion she was trying out to strengthen or enhance visions.

Pausing to check herself out in the glass of the shop window before going in, Natasha lowered her sunglasses for a second, and inspected her reflection. After a brief moment, she shrugged, she looked respectable enough in her faded jeans and grey hoodie. She looked rather young today, she thought, always a little struck by the irony of that, of never really aging and always being young, as she glanced again at her reflection and noticed how pale she was. Maybe she should have put some makeup on so she didn't look so - white... like somebody who never saw the sun. Oh well, she wasn't about to go home to put on makeup just so she looked a little less like a ghost or a vampire.

Pushing the door open to the shop, Natasha was immediately assaulted by all the wonderful scents of dried herbs, spices and other exotic ingredients. It was a smell that always took her back in time, because it was a smell that never changed over the years - apothecaries, herb shops, natural remedies stores, old fashioned chemists - they all smelled the same, no matter the century, time period or even country. It was something that she could always count on, and rarely, if never changed.

Spotting some baskets filled with exotic wild flowers and strange fruits and berries that must be native to the island to one side of the shop, Natasha hurried over to inspect them. She loved discovering new foods and ingredients.

@Romi

Natasha turned from the strange-looking fruits, she had grabbed a few of each, wanting to try each one, and gently placed them in a basket the store had supplied for exactly that purpose. She then studied a few branches with long green leaves that looked like the leaves from a weeping willow though she could tell they weren't willow leaves. Sensing a male presence coming up behind her, she turned to face the voice when she heard him address her.

"Why?" she asked simply as she studied his face for a moment, not exactly getting the warmest of vibes from him.

"Are these fruits not to be handled in an unsafe manner?" she inquired curiously as she held her basket out to him, thinking that maybe he was the owner or store employee, and perhaps the strange fruits were poisonous or needed to be prepared in a certain way before they could be taken from the shop.

@Romi

Natasha raised an eyebrow at the man when he shook his head and said he wouldn't know anything about her basket of native island fruits. Eyeing him over, noticing his somewhat boring professional attire, Natasha quickly felt he was a bit annoyed at something, or someone, probably her for confusing him with staff.

Shrugging at his words about not knowing anything about her possible purchase, she took back her basket and let him continue. When he asked, in a very direct way, if she was undead, she really couldn't help but think he was the oddest of men.

"Well, it depends on who you ask." Natasha answered almost off-handedly as she excused herself and walked past him to get a package of clary sage which she spotted on a shelf right behind him."I'm not fully a vampire, if that's what you want to know," Natasha explained as she placed the packet of sage in her basket along side the fruit. "I don't kill people and suck their blood either." she added looking at him calmly while wondering if he was maybe a vampire hunter or hater. She had dealt with a few of those fanatics over the years.

Natasha glanced suspiciously at the strange man as he patiently followed her while she did her shopping. Picking up a small bottle of witch hazel, she turned it over to see the pureness level. Some brands were mostly water and alcohol, and were passed off as pure witch hazel when they weren’t.

Not paying much attention to him as he rambled on about “an unnatural lifespan”, Natasha put the witch hazel back and reached for some clove oil. She had heard all this before from orthodox and catholic priests to lutheran missionaries. She knew all about her being one of nature’s abominations and found it rather tiresome.

When he started on about returning her to life from the undead, she stopped and faced him. His offer might have interested her some 150 years ago, but now she was quite happy with her lot in life. She had seen the ugliness and often the pain of withering away while growing old. In a way, she saw that as unnatural. Nope, she wanted nothing to do with that anymore. Her existential crisis back in the early 1800s happened because everyone around her started dying of the small pox and the plague, and she felt she couldn’t go on. But now, 150 years later, she knew she could, and she loved life.

“Listen, I don’t mean to be rude here, and I really don’t know, or even care, which God you’ve decided to be the self-appointed helper of, but to me dying is unnatural. It implies huge amount sof unnatural suffering and pain.” she said as she walked away to look at some lovely looking bars of handmade soap.

@Romi

Picking up a light blue purplish coloured soap from a wooden box of handmade soaps, Natasha put it to her nose and sniffed. It smelled divine. She smelled it again, and tried to place the floral scent, was it lavender? No, not lavender, she decided after a second. Taking another whiff, she realised it was lilac! What a lovely smell, she definitely had to get a bar or two. While she looked through the soaps, she heard the voice of the annoying little "unnatural life span" man.

Keeping her back turned to him, Natasha moved to the next aisle of products, hoping that if she ignored him long enough, he'd get tired and go away. But after looking at a bottle of nettle shampoo, two tubes of hand cream and a bees wax lip balm, she realised that he wasn't going anywhere.

"Honestly, how can you presume to know my lifespan is unnatural? I was created by nature, no? Or do you think nature is wrong and you know more than she does?" and before he could answer her with some other asinine, in her opinion, thing about life cycles, dying and damages souls again, she thrust her basket of goods at him.

"If you are going to follow me around the store and lecture me on the errors of my ways, you can at least make yourself useful and carry my basket." Natasha stated as she stared at him with an almost "I dare you to say no" look.

@Romi