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“You’re an artist?” Valerio asked, his voice full of awe.
“A sculptor mostly,” I replied. “But yes.”
They wandered carefully through my organized chaos, stepping around half-finished pieces in various stages of production. I had plaster molds stacked in one corner, boxes of investment and raw materials in another. There were whole shelves of carved wax figurines that I still needed to melt out, and bigger clay models on work benches and turnstile pedestals. My big octagonal kiln took up another space, surrounded by my vacuum chamber, my centrifuge, and a giant barrel of dirty water I used to quench everything straight after the pour.
“This is crazy,” said Kade. “This is…”
“A lot?” I chuckled.
“Yeah. That.”
Brock nearly tripped over one of the cords I’d taped to the floor, but had been coming up lately. He caught himself just in time, his elbow knocking into a stack of crucibles that rattled in their porcelain settings.
“Sorry,” he said sheepishly.
“No worries,” I told him. “Honestly, I really need to straighten this stuff out. I can barely get through here myself.”
I had little doubt they knew what any of these tools or objects were about, other than they created some of the bronze statues and non-abstract pieces I was gathering together for my upcoming show. They were drawn to these of course, because they were polished. Finished. Even beautiful.
“So this is what you do for a living?” asked Valerio.
“Yes and no,” I answered. “I’mtryingto do this for a living, but I haven’t actually ‘made it’ yet. I do have an exhibit coming up on New Year’s Eve, though. That’s why this place is such a mess — I’ve been working overtime to get everything done by then.”
I paused, thinking about how much work I still had to do.
“None of this pays the bills though,” I chuckled. “In fact, thesearethe bills. For now at least, I work at a foundry just beyond the edge of town. We do casting and prototyping for various companies, making high-end steel and aluminum parts.”
“So you pour big vats of molten metal?” Kade asked, catching on.
“Exactly.”
He folded his arms and nodded in admiration. “That’s pretty badass.”
“Shit yeah it is.”
A few minutes later we were lounging around the living area, and I was deep into my third glass of wine. Kade and Brock used one of my stepladders to string all the lights, while Valerio removed the tops from the ornament boxes and slipped hanging hooks through each.
“Plug it in,” Kade nodded downward, toward the end of the cord. “And kill the lights.”
We did, and we were rewarded instantly with a beautiful, colorful array of sparkling lights. They lit up the naked tree from within, sending a warm, muted glow over the now-darkened room.
“Should we really decorate it like this?” I asked. “In the dark?”
“Best way to see what it’ll look like with the lights off,” Brock shrugged.
I smiled and stood up, feeling warm and flush and pleasantly buzzed. The guys were so eager to decorate it was absolutely adorable. It was the polar opposite of my decorating experience with my asshole ex-boyfriend, who approached the task of decorating like it was an unwanted chore.
“We need some music,” said Valerio. “Christmas music.”
I nodded and quickly grabbed my phone. “I’m on it.”
With the punch of a few buttons I called up a playlist I always loved and listened to around the holidays. It consisted of all the old, traditional Christmas songs my parents had played growing up, back when I was a little girl decorating the tree with them. Of course I could never play this list with Drake around.
“Nice,” smiled Brock, as the unmistakable rhythm of the Little Drummer Boy started up from bluetooth speakers set all around us. If there was one thing Drakedidtake care of, it was our surround sound system. “This is perfect.”
Soon the room was filled with a chorus of beautiful voices, accompanied by a soft, distinctive melody. We rotated around the tree placing ornaments, taking turns using the ladder to get to the highest places. The guys had brought enough decorations to cover the tree top to bottom, which was overly generous of them. I felt honored. Happier than I’d been in… well…
Years?
