Page 61 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls (Kissing At Work #2)

S kye shook Vlad Newsom’s hand.

Because she’d bought a car.

She and Vlad took Honors English courses together, something they reminisced about as he walked her through financing options for a cute hybrid car in shimmery slate blue.

He’d traded in his shaggy hair for the clean-cut look, though his gauges and neck tattoos showed his rock band roots.

June used to live next door to him, often arriving at school with eye bags because he’d bang on drums all night—until the neighborhood imposed quiet hours, complete with fines.

Smiling at the memory, the legalese on Skye’s signed document squiggled into blurry shapes. Her concentration drifted somewhere else.

Because saying goodbye to Celene that Sunday afternoon felt… off .

Skye had entered the closing security code for the Vale house and locked the door. Clear, straightforward directions left by Celene, who—despite the trouble in her eyes—grasped Skye by the chin and delivered a parting kiss. More tender than her usual, a graze at the finish.

It’d lingered on Skye’s lips as she chauffeured the living fuchsia home. While sweet, Celene had poured a distressing tentativeness into it.

Celene hadn’t spoken their reality word back to her.

And it took until the next morning for Skye to wake from another nightmare, realizing her error, how she’d attributed Celene’s mood to the stress of the moment. While true, she’d significantly soured when Skye spoke their reality word.

Skye had voiced it to cut through the fog, to remind them to stop and reassess.

But when Skye showered in her bathroom suite, she revisited the sequence. First, as herself, which jostled her heart, as uncomfortable as it’d been. Then, she detoured outside her sensitive perspective, choosing to imagine everything from Celene’s point of view.

And that did more than jostle. It barged, slammed, flattened anything pulsing inside her because—wait?—

Could the way she’d said ‘Dragonfruit’ come off…controlling?

That would explain why Celene had withdrawn further, to silence followed by strict rule-giving. Sure, the worry about her father exacerbated it, but shit . Skye mishandled something so precious to them—something meant to open them up within mutual, protective honesty.

At that moment, their safe word didn’t feel safe.

She’d pressed her back to the slippery tile wall, regretting her expansive imagination for the first time in her life. But Skye wouldn’t retreat within herself. She let this knowledge wash over her, hot and clarifying.

If she and Celene were going to be good to each other, frank honesty deserved its companion—radical empathy.

After that, she’d dried off and nodded through Luce in her face thirty minutes later, firing off a speech about blue and orange X’s on four boxes.

By Friday morning, Byron had been home for days. Good news as far as Skye was concerned about Celene, though the gorgeous photos she’d sent of them as children further upset her about being absent in a time of need.

Instead of driving to Yield for Art, Skye had called out. Thalia held down the fort, along with Zander and Mei, his newly onboarded art school friend.

To break away from her grandmother, having her own space were tantamount—staying with Celene persuaded her. She appreciated the close bond with Luce, but that didn’t need to be a lifelong living situation.

Another push towards her signing on the dotted line in Vlad’s office was Thalia’s courtyard gallery showing.

It’d come together beautifully. As someone high on the quirkiness scale, Thalia’s furnishings, flowery décor, and balanced piles of geodes enhanced the space in a way only she could pull off.

It would’ve been more entertaining to divulge the fake-to-legit dating origin with Celene by her side, flanked by a pink-haired Thalia’s Neo-Fauvist oil paintings.

But if Celene could confront her stubborn father, Skye could survive giving a rundown to Thalia and Larkin while nibbling on grilled cremini mushrooms. Her friends were puzzled at first, but ultimately amused since Skye and Celene’s chemistry had been too strong to accept any other result.

Plus, Thalia loved a “kooky love story.”

The run to the car dealership took about half the day. Longer than what she’d hoped, but Skye had her own showing to prepare at her and Luce’s house. Twirling a key fob ring on her pointer finger, she eyed the front room leading to the hallway, coming up with a strategy to clear the space.

“Skye?”

When Luce arrived, Skye had been buffing the kitchen counter with their citrus-vinegar cleaning solution.

Other than areas designated for creation, it was customary to make the house spic and span for her parents.

An unfounded demand, since Aisha and Gael thrived in “just enough messiness,” as they dubbed it.

Nonetheless, Luce set up Cosmo’s old bedroom with hotel-quality amenities for them.

“I’m coming over there,” Skye called back, drying her hands on a towel.

Here goes everything.

“Whose car’s parked out...” Her grandmother faded as she loaded her floral pocketbook onto a wall hook. She’d been catching up with an old vendor friend of Granddad’s, where they probably spent more time reminiscing about Walter than updating supply contracts.

Standing before her, Skye infused her words with as much confidence as she could. “Welcome to my pop-up gallery.”

Luce handed off her hat to Skye. She absently patted her white hair, ambling to one of nine pieces waiting for her, propped onto various wooden stands and display cases that’d accumulated in and around the house over the years.

Unlike most gallery-goers, Luce touched.

With the nimble fingers of someone in her field, she held a single mosaic sugar maple leaf above her head.

The light played upon it like a friend, reflecting alternating orange and goldenrod.

She hummed at her fingers barely showing through the translucent petals, and hummed again when the petals swayed on their metal hinges, bending but not breaking.

That hum inched into a laugh. A little chuckle that came rarely to Luce at artsy venues, curving lips painted with rouge.

At Pokeno, Celene called Luce beautiful. Right now, Skye couldn’t help but think that, too.

Mouth dry, Skye touched her labradorite.

Luce shuffled onto the next piece. The cardinal flowers. Unfinished, but enough for Luce to test every one of them. She’d grown fond of moving the hinged leaves already.

Every piece was incomplete. Still, Skye carried no shame about that. Her journey as an artist encapsulated this theme: under construction, open to more.

If Celene’s pickleball-playing father had a health scare, that reminded Skye of life’s inconsistencies and its unfairness.

Her grandmother should see what she could do now , instead of it being closed off like a dirty secret under her roof.

Once Skye hung up the sun hat, she shadowed Luce and watched her manipulate, experience her pieces like Skye experienced the true versions outdoors.

Its temporary, fragile quality added to the appeal. As in nature, nothing lives forever.

Though Skye trusted Luce’s expert hands, none of her pieces would snap today.

She kept the Forever Fuchsia locked away, however. Only for her beautiful commissioner’s eyes.

Skye attended innumerable gallery showings.

Nothing prepared her for the tension, the thirst for validation.

Especially by Lucille Florentine, who’d made a direct impact on someone without an organized background in anything visual.

Those turned out to be the best teachers—the ones who guided without pressure.

Without the expectation to follow in their footsteps.

Pink Rhododendron bunches.

Wild Lupine in blue-purple glass.

Branches of an Eastern Hemlock, dotted with ceramic pinecones.

The white, three-petal Trilliums lined in a row.

Luce studied each in lengthy intervals and with flattering fascination.

By the time she’d interacted with the eighth statue—a spindly branch of witch hazel—Skye muffled her tears into her sleeve.

Living with this woman on and off for years overflowed with strong memories, but they’d never connected like this.

She hadn’t borne her soul and passion with anyone in her family this way, regardless of their support and openness.

And then there was the ninth segment of the showcase. The scariest one.

The ninth piece wasn’t a piece at all. Maybe likened to a small-scale installation—a single tablet propped in the middle of a cabinet top.

On one side of it stood a framed photo of Granddad Walter.

On the other, Celene’s living fuchsia, the planter’s ropes wrapped around its base.

To give context to Skye’s confession. To keep what’s important in the forefront.

“Mahdi from Chromatique Flair messaged me,” Skye mentioned, delaying any understandable questions.

Hands shaking, she seized the tablet and turned it on, facing herself.

She heaved in a deep breath and mentally counted the exhale, like Celene taught her.

“I’d like to start with apologies. Hiding this—” a head tilt indicated her makeshift showroom, “was important for me to discover myself as a creator.”

Luce nodded shallowly, eyes on the photo of her late husband. “What else are you apologizing for?”

“I made a gigantic mistake. I’d been drowsy and disoriented after a nap—after staying up all night working on one of my projects.

Like that, I incorrectly unloaded a relief slab, and it brought another one down with it.

Segments of them smashed loose.” Skye didn’t miss how her grandmother’s eyes snapped closed.

Her hands balled at her sides, too. “I could’ve called you.

I should’ve. But...” Her spaciness probably came to mind; how, at her age, these mistakes were unacceptable.

“I guess I wanted to prove something to you. To myself.”