“Do you assume I don’t understandclay?”
“I think you underestimate it.” He stole both my hands in his, leading me away from the table and to a different area. Careful to step over the buckets, tools, loose forms littering the ground in his collectorium of rubble.
He stopped in front of this small, rickety wooden thing, pinching the fingertips of my gloves and pulling them off.
“Hey!” I swiped for them, and he tucked them in his back pocket.
“You can’t wear gloves for this.” He sat me down on the stool.
It was a bit low to the ground. My skirts were already dirty at this point, the heat of the kiln making sweat inevitable, and there was nouse fighting off more dirt. I accepted I would be a mess at the cost of his amusement.
Slam!
I flinched as Arkady threw a lump of clay onto a small table ... a potter’s wheel.
“You’re going to make me do this?”
“I certainly couldn’t force you to do anything, Mrs. Kameneva.” He pulled up a stool behind me, his legs on either side of mine, trapping them there.
“Why do you say it like that?” I looked over my shoulder, his face right there, hanging over me.
“What?” His arms further entrapped me as he reached forward, pulling the small wheel closer between our legs. “Kameneva?”
“Yes, that!” My cheeks flushed.
The corner of his lips pulled slightly in amusement. “That is your name.”
“I thoughtourname wasKamenev.”
“It is.” He used his foot to pump the wheel, the misshapen lump beginning to blur. “Women, when referred to singularly, have a feminine spelling.”
“Oh,” I muttered, biting my lip.
Arkady reached over to a bucket, dipping his hand in clean water before letting it dribble onto the clay. Some of it speckled my cheek when the wheel spun, and I wiped it away hastily, checking my palms to make sure it wasn’t still smudging.
The flush of my face burned. I might look as if I’d forgotten my parasol in the sun for hours by the time he let me go. I dabbed my forehead with my wrist, moving a stray hair or two out of the way.
“You may want to take that off.” He glanced down at my sleeves, leaning closer to the wheel, bending me forward. His hands cupped over the clay, forcing it into a uniform dome.
His arms stretched out, sandwiching me between them.
“Don’t worry, the statues won’t mind,” he teased.
“You are making it difficult on purpose.” I flicked the buttons of my top piece, struggling to pull my arms out of the long sleeves, claustrophobic between his arms. I tossed it to the side, leaving myself in only my corset cover. The skirt needed cleaning anyway, so I wouldn’t bother. Though, it did feel nice for my arms to be bare.
I looked back at him, his expression pleased with his tomfoolery so far. I wouldn’t let him laugh any more, I’d play his stupid game.
“What now, then?” I straightened my back, which pressed against his chest. Just the touch made my shoulders fold to my ears as I slouched forward, all too aware of the limited room for movement.
His hands took mine, wet and sticky from the clay.
“Oh no.” I winced. “God, what a horrid texture.” I nearly gagged.
“You’ll forget it in a moment.” He guided my hands to the wheel. “Clay is my favorite, because if you don’t do well the first time, you can roll it back up into a ball and try again. It’s relaxing, if you let loose a little.” He took my finger and guided it to the middle of the dome. When he put pressure on my index finger, it dipped straight into the dome and opened wide like a crater.
The form was mesmerizing, the way was so fluid, every small movement of our hands making it dance before us.
He took both my hands along the rim, squeezing them and guiding the clay to a vaselike shape, making the opening smaller now.
