Page 47 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls (Kissing At Work #2)

Lucid waking eluded her this time. She’d remained swept and bullied by foreboding, infernal waves until her phone sounded.

She bore her weight onto a wall, panting. No more all-nighters.

In a sharp groan, she cursed when she noticed her necklace missing. She’d unfastened it for a shower last night and left it in the bathroom.

Skye erected her back, threw her shoulders into alignment, and began arranging the heavy-duty cardboard Luce set aside for her. “They’re just boxes. I can do this.”

Within minutes, she’d gathered upcycled inserts and corrugated paper-based wrap, not too into styrofoam and its weird little pieces breaking off. She shuffled bare feet around the semi-messy space and laughed. She sounded like her grandma.

“Damn, Luce.” She sighed at the three reliefs on their drying stands.

All square, mounted on thin concrete, spiked on the surfaces in elaborately nestled pieces, fanning in erratic anti-patterns.

The top piece featured shells, the middle was mirrored glass, and the bottom was mostly porcelain. Some of her most striking work yet.

Skye reached for the shell-covered slab first, then thought against it last minute.

The porcelain work in its barbed, angry angles could double as a torture device.

It reflected her dream too eerily not to dedicate several minutes to admiring.

She secured both hands on either side and moored her feet to tug forward.

Heavier than anticipated, it didn’t budge, and if Luce didn’t use rolling carts, Skye would wonder how an eighty-two-year-old woman managed this.

So she braced herself again and pulled harder, realizing her error when the whole shelving followed.

The relief she held dislodged too swiftly to make up for it.

Skye raced to push it back, but all it did was shake the mirrored slab off, right over her arms. Haphazardly yet ultimately effective, she slipped herself out of the way because glass plus skin equaled lacerations.

Though she screeched all the same when the porcelain relief slammed to the hard flooring with a heart-stopping bang, followed by its mirror counterpart smashing on top of it.

Those crashes were terrifying, but from years of her and Luce troubleshooting around accidents, they didn’t fully concern her until she heard the tiniest clinks of shattered bits hitting the floor like rubble.

Fuck.

Fuck .

“Fuck, fuck, shit, c’mon,” Skye gasped, tears in the way of her removing the mirrored relief to assess the damage below. Except when she pushed it aside, glass shards unwedged from their precarious positions, leaving a jagged network of unsightly cracks. How many years of bad luck was this ?

Luce had a good head for securing her art; they were fragile all the same. Skye felt just as fragile as she nudged at about a fifth of the porcelain design, chipped or completely dislodged. “Goddamn it.”

Skye crouched on the floor in a frog-like position, choked up. Dissociation could come easily, imagining Luce’s meltdown or her letting down her granddad posthumously.

And this illustrated why she kept her artist life in the closet. How could she live up to Luce’s standards? Shit, even her parents’ standards? She’d always been a middle-of-the-road type, and this proved it. Another reason Cosmo moved to Michigan: too much pressure to stand out, to be a Florentine.

Skye’s teaspoon of talent could be seen as posturing, as artificial. Try hard. Failing to follow in her family’s talented footsteps. She would’ve wished for any interest besides mosaic art; the comparisons would never stop.

“June.” Skye scrabbled to her feet, yanking her phone from her pajama pocket. June could drive over, use her strength to hold the slabs steady, and Skye would approximate the right sealant to cover their tracks.

Yes. That’d work.

She’d call June for help.

Her mind took a tangent, and so did her fingers. To scroll past June’s number, to fix onto her texts instead.

Celene’s name calmed her in the storm of this calamity. Plus, she worked in high-pressure situations; Skye needed some of that confidence.

Skye – 2:44 pm

If I fucked up Luce’s project, who should I call?

Celene’s immediacy came in bouncing dots. For reasons above her, Skye knew she’d made the right decision.

Celene – 2:45 pm

Nobody. You fix it yourself.

I like your stuff better anyway.

Skye turned to make meaningful eye contact with Phish and Swindle squished into the corner of their tank, blowing fish kisses.

June had Luce’s back about her skills; Skye made a fan of her own.

Skye – 2:48 pm

Okay, if my time’s limited, how do I go about it?

Celene – 2:50 pm

Reach out to your coworker friend.

Thalia.

“Hm. Thalia.” Skye bit her lip, cringing when she spotted a white chip of porcelain next to her foot. Celene’s suggestion didn’t reek of jealousy. Thalia would understand the stakes; she’d save any questions for later.

Snatching an empty cup from the table, she collected the porcelain chip with a weak clink. And propping the phone on her shoulder, picking up more broken pieces as Thalia greeted her warmly, hopefully in the tone of someone available to make things happen.

After they spoke urgently enough for Thalia to project her arrival in twenty minutes, Skye replied to the woman she knew she loved. She couldn’t even pretend otherwise.

Skye – 3:02 pm

Thalia’s heading over. How can I think without you in Yielding?

Celene – 3:05 pm

Just correct your mistake.

This is your calling. Answer it, Nature Girl.

Back when Skye used to comb through analytics in Philadelphia, Luce and Walter ran a table at art coop markets twice a week.

Still an undergrad, Thalia visited them every chance she got over the summer.

She couldn’t afford anything more than the ten-dollar bin items, and Luce didn’t expect her to, seeing through her attempts to speak to her as a well-known artist. In no time, she and Walter would set aside a chair for Thalia.

And she’d tell them about her double-major in Digital History and Painting.

In exchange, they’d tell stories about modern art, their work process, and politics.

By the following summer, Skye’s grandparents secured an empty retail space at Yield for Art, and their first recruit was Thalia.

Instead of Skye’s path, or really, the path of many, Thalia considered herself a lifetime learner.

Her degrees were merely stepping stones to more classes, more knowledge of the world.

Not Thalia’s mother’s preferred path, but she’d accepted it.

At twenty-four, she spoke of moving on from Yielding to wherever inspiration led her.

Until then, her savings would be loaded with her above-average sales associate income.

She’d become a friend to the family, a mutual wreck when Granddad Walter died. Thalia and Skye clutched each other’s hands at his funeral, eliciting pins and needles and not budging regardless.

So, Skye could detect Thalia’s curiosity as she attached one of the last glass fragments to her grandmother’s relief, in an unsure smile and glances over multiple sorting bowls.

With renewed authority, Skye directed their next steps, unlike her laid-back persona at Luce’s.

Nothing unkind—surefooted, determined to meet their hours-long deadline.

Thalia played the assistive role like a friend and organized like a professional.

As a mosaic star’s employee, she didn’t need supervision on handling broken materials or help with instrument names.

The painting expertise came in clutch, as June would’ve required references for the pigmented glass Skye asked to sort.

“Now that’s a vision,” Thalia declared as they stood back to admire the results. “It’s different, though.”

“Yeah, it is.” Skye swallowed a lump. These reliefs didn’t conform to her grandmother’s style.

There was no earthly way she could’ve recreated what was damaged, meaning she bore a chisel, hammer, and protective glasses, scraping bigger sections off both so they’d match.

She’d sketched an idea in the twenty-two minutes it took Thalia to arrive.

Finding inspiration in the darkest place, she replicated the swirl of the treacherous clouds in her dream, using spare cut glass she’d passed on in her quest to get Celene’s project just right. And she’d passed on a lot.

Thalia tugged her mask to her chin, extra careful despite the ventilation in the back room. “It tells a better story, though. I’m eager to hear Luce’s opinion.”

“I’m not,” Skye grunted in a bout of pure honesty. No professional appreciated their hard work tampered with, but once she’d gotten started, her hands wouldn’t stop. In a blur, like Luce in her element. “I’ll show her photos when...when it’s the right time.”

Together, they safely transported the two redone reliefs to a drying rack.

Skye shook it to check its stability, still a touch paranoid.

For everything to dry correctly, they’d transport the slabs and packing material to the closed-in patio at Thalia’s mother’s house.

Thalia rescheduled over the phone with Carl, who’d go by Thalia’s to pack and ship in a couple of days.

They’d get to the magazine’s headquarters in time.

“Can I ask why?” Thalia finally mentioned as they sat on the floor at 6:08 p.m., staring at phone photos of the three reliefs in proper order—Luce’s untouched shell-laden one prominently in the center.

Skye met Thalia’s eyes without her usually bold makeup, dark curls loose and limp. “Why what?”

“Two whys. Why have you hidden this talent, and why couldn’t you call Luce and tell her about the accident?”

“Whenever anything has to do with Granddad, Luce goes into a dark place. I can’t expect the open-minded grandma who’ll hear me out.

” Skye drew her finger onto a scratch on the floor from the art collisions.

“We’d just gotten over all that. The magazine issue will be dated for the day of their wedding anniversary.

Imagine missing that because I had a slip-up.

” She smiled when Thalia clutched at the tapestry of gemstones at her neck.

“There’s also a degree of selfishness on my part, showing Luce what I can do.

I wanted to honor him, too. He was all about boldness and coloring outside the lines. ”

“I remember, though he couldn’t even draw a stick person.” Thalia stood, patted debris from her creased jeans, then presented a hand to Skye. “The lines you’ve crossed look marvelous.”

Skye got to her feet. The longer she stared, the better everything looked—more balanced, its story increasingly dynamic. “The swirls I added echo the spirals of the shells in the middle. It’s a unified set.”

“You and Luce are a unified set.” Thalia wiggled the chain of Skye’s necklace, now back where it belonged. “Right or wrong, you did your best. Your consequences are yours, and isn’t that life?”

They hugged for a long moment. Skye couldn’t speak right then anyway, or else she’d weep.

Skye and Thalia reactivated, loading Thalia’s truck to safely transport the precious cargo. Skye buckled herself in, fingers trembling. The risks sort of exhilarated her; she couldn’t lie.

Deep down, Skye hoped Luce would like her changes.

Scratch that— love her changes.

Luce’s approval would make all this hiding worth it. It may fuse their identities deeper, never to part in a town she adored. That mixed anxiety in her cocktail of excitement and stone-cold fear.

Where would Celene fit in any of this, in her tight-knit community? Skye closed her weary eyes on the ride, hoping the best outcomes would find her.