“Craftsperson,” he corrects. “Small difference. I need things I make to have a practical purpose.”
“For the coming apocalypse,” I say, remembering our talk on the Quarterdeck.
He chuckles. “Hey, I like art, too. A lot. But this … is my thing. It’s just a personal choice. Like your photographs of signs. This is what speaks to me, I guess.”
“Hey, I get that.” I look around. “You rebuilt your motorcycle here.”
“Yep.”
“You weld.”
“I do,” he says, nodding.
I blink up at all the scraps of metal hanging from the rafters. There’s something else up there too. A sword. “What about that?”
“That,” he says, taking it down to unsheathe a rustic black blade, “is what I’m learning. The forge.”
“Wow,” I say, touching the pommel. “So cool. You can fight off zombie hordes.”
“Maybe slice off an arm or two before it goes dull,” he says with a shy smile. “Not that great at forging yet. It’s hard work. But really cool. You can hammer iron into anything you want, if you’re patient. Not sure I am, but I’ve got a good teacher. I justhaven’t had time to take lessons from him lately, what with everything going on.”
Iron. Hammer. Forge. Anvil.
Blacksmith.
“Your shirt—the one you were wearing when you took me out on the boat …”
He nods and looks at me a little funny. Like maybe he’s surprised I remembered it?
“The blacksmith,” I say. “There’s a blacksmith on Lamplighter Lane with a wrought-iron wolf hanging above the shop. That’s what was on your shirt. That’s your teacher?”
“Mr. Sideris,” he says, nodding slowly. Squinting at me.
Why is he looking at me so strangely?
He’s making me nervous, so I scratch my arm and yammer. “My mom has this weird hang-up about Lamplighter Lane. Like, I sort of remember her mentioning it once or twice when I was kid, but she definitely freaks about it now. Anywho, she thinks there’s a black cloud over that street, or a portal to hell. It’s haunted? Something, I don’t know. She hasn’t stepped foot there since we came back.”
“Really?” he says, making a face and chuckling.
“You know how superstitious we Saint-Martins are. The whole romance curse and all.”
He sheaths the sword and hangs it back up on its hooks. “I’ll definitely have to tell Mr. Sideris about Lamplighter Lane. He’ll get a kick out of that. Maybe he unwittingly opened upthe portal inside his forge. Hot enough, that’s for sure.”
Hot enough to burn someone. I glance at the burn scars on his forehead. “There’s actual fire in the forge, right? I mean, I don’t know anything about how it works, but it seems intense after what you’ve been through with the fire at the lake house that you’d …”
“Want to stick my face over a screaming hot inferno again?”
I laugh a little nervously. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“For a long time after the lake house, I wouldn’t go near an open flame. Totally petrified of my dad’s grill out in the backyard. Old Man Leary, who owns the store at the end of the block and always smokes those stinky cigars out on the corner? I nearly had a heart attack one day when I was walking past while he flicked a lighter.”
“Oh God,” I mumble.
“Yeah. Anyway, I was seeing a counselor at the children’s hospital in Providence a couple times a month, and she suggested I confront my fears head-on. What could be scarier than a red-hot forge that heats up to two thousand five hundred degrees? Surprisingly, it worked. Took a couple of tries, and I may have sobbed like a baby the first time. Don’t tell anyone.”
Little tree, big shadow.
“Your secret is safe with me,” I say, smiling softly. Then I glance at his scars. “I’m sure you get tired of people staring. They were all bandaged up when I left. It’s weird to see them now.” I scratch my arm and look at the floor. “I worried aboutyou for a long time after we left town. Everyone kept telling us it wasn’t that serious, but I knew they were lying.”
