Page 13 of The Embrace of Evergreen
Instead of moving the glass back into the fire, he pauses and snickers quietly.
“The glory hole?”
“Mmhmm.”
“You’re fucking with me.”
I wiggle an eyebrow. “I assure you I’m not. Not about this anyway.”
He flushes once more, his eyes darting around the shop as he searches for someone to verify that I’m not hazing the new guy.
“Ty,” I yell out without bothering to look around. I know he’s here, and I know he’ll answer.
“Ya?” a smooth voice yells back from across the room.
“What is the hole in the furnace called?”
“The glory hole.” I can hear the humor in his reply. It’s not the first time someone has needed confirmation that’s its real name.
I just grin like a child who’s enjoying a stolen cookie as I gesture again. “Don’t let it cool down, or we’ll have to start over. Into the glory hole it goes. Spin it slowly so that it heats evenly.”
Ethan shakes his head with a chuckle, but he follows my instructions.
We take our time as I walk him through the process of spinning the pipe and blowing gently as I use wet newspaper and wooden paddles to shape the glass as it thins and grows with his breath. I choose not to look in his direction when his lips are pressed tightly around the metal, his cheeks bulging ever so slightly while he blows. It’s safer that way because I know damn good and well, after the one brief glance I caught of that image, that if I allow myself to look, I’ll end up staring like a creep.When I ask if he wants to add color, my stupid heart lurches when he says, “The color of your hair,” and then flushes dark red as his embarrassment combines with the shop’s heat to drive even more blood into his pale cheeks.
It’s a simple piece, and it’s easy for him to handle as we add a sprinkle of turquoise dust and work the glass until it’s reached its final size. I heat a second pipe, gather a small bead of clear glass, press it to the bottom of the small vase, and then knock my pliers against the original pipe to detach the glass so I can shape the vase’s opening. He follows my instructions without question, spinning the new pipe and returning the glass to the flame when I tell him to while I work to stretch the piece’s long, thin neck. We work together easily and quietly, and it feels as though we’ve done this for a lifetime. Once he’s settled in, there is no nervousness or fear, and he seems to enjoy the process even though he’s half lost in his own thoughts. His expression is serious, and the tip of his tongue peeks out the same way it does when he’s staring at his computer at the café.
When we’ve finished shaping the glowing bauble, I step close and take the pipe from his hands.
“Why don’t you put on those gloves?” I point to a table near the kiln that holds a few tools and several pairs of giant fireproof gloves as I make my way over to the firebox.
As he steps close to inspect the box, the heat from his body seems to sink into my skin once more.
“I’m going to knock it off the pipe, and it’s going to fall into the box. Then you’re going to carefully pick it up, and we’ll take it to the oven. It will be warm through the gloves, but it won’t burn you.”
He furrows his brow. “You’re going to knock it off the pipe and into this box?” He peers into the pile of wet newspaper scraps. “That won’t break it?”
“I mean, technically, it can. We all lose pieces at every stage, including in the box or the oven. But this isn’t a super delicate piece or anything. It should be just fine.”
He nods seriously and exhales sharply as if his continued survival is depending on this small piece of glass enduring the ten-inch fall into the pile of wet paper. “Okay.”
The piece breaks off cleanly, the paper steaming slightly when the hot glass falls gently into its embrace, and Ethan quickly scoops it up, holding it as if it’s something more precious than a small chunk of crystal. He stares at it as he follows me across the room to the annealing oven and places it gently on a shelf. When he turns to face me and remove the gloves, he’s grinning ear to ear despite the sweat beading across his forehead. A few amber strands are sticking to the skin of his temple, and I fight the instinct to reach out and brush them back.
“I probably should have had you come back when we had time to make something more intricate.” I smile as he hands me the gloves, and I put them back on the table beside the firebox. I’m going to be late for work if I don’t get going, and even though I don’t want our time together to end, I start walking toward the door. He follows without hesitation.
“I’d love to come back again if that’s an invitation. No worries if it’s not, of course. But that was sort of amazing.”
“Ya?”
“Definitely. How long will it be in the oven?”
“Just until tomorrow. Spending some time in the oven helps things to cool slowly so that they don’t crack or shatter. I mean, that still happens, of course, just not as often as it would if we let them cool without the oven.”
“Can I…can I keep it when it’s ready?” His eyes dart away from mine, and he looks almost embarrassed by the request.
“Of course you can keep it. I needed to head out for work like five minutes ago, but I’ve seen you at the coffee shop around eleven a few times. How about I bring it tomorrow, and we can have coffee? You’re new in town, right?”
“Ya. I’ve only been here about a month. I move around a lot for work.” He looks away as he rubs the backof his neck. He seems nervous, almost insecure about being new in town for some reason, though I don’t understand why.
