Page 73 of Rivals
“As I’ll ever be.”
Chapter 46
Revna
Ireluctantlygobackto school with Lachlan. I figured I would never step foot in here again. It’s surreal because it’s how we got to where we are now. It feels ironic, to be honest.
“I still don’t understand why we’re here.”
Lachlan looks over his shoulder as he leads the way. “You’ll see.”
I bite down on my snappy retort and follow him into the sculpting room. It’s relatively clean. I’m sure some classes are still going on, but it’s not a complete mess like it is during the school year. “How do you have access to this?”
Lachlan grins and shrugs. “My professor liked me.” I roll my eyes.
“I’m amazed. What are we doing here, Lachlan?” I watch him grab a bit of clay and fill a bucket with mud, then get his wheel set up.
“We’re going to make something. I don’t know what it is, but we haven’t made anything together for a while, so I thought we could do this.” My chest lifts. I haven’t smiled in weeks, but Lachlan has given me a perfect reason to do it. “Ah, there it is.”
“What?”
“I missed that,” he says and wiggles his finger at my face. I school my expression and cross my arms. “Come here.” He pats the stool sitting between his legs. His foot taps on the pedal, and the wheel spins a little.
I step over his leg and plop down in my seat. Lachlan scoots closer to me and takes my hands, dipping them in the bucket of water. “If I remember correctly, you never took sculpture.”
“I took one class and never liked it,” I tell him.
“Hmm, well, you might like it now.”
He leans forward and slowly presses his foot on the pedal to get it to start turning. It whines as it slowly moves around. Lachlan takes my hands to sculpt the lump of clay with him. It’s smooth and squishy under my touch as it spins around. I watch his expert hands move mine as they shape the clay.
We move up and down, and he bends my thumb to press into the opening of the clay. The wheel moves a little faster, and he takes my index and pointer fingers, guiding the vase into the shape he’s envisioning with my hands.
His hands are so comforting around mine that it makes my heart feel a little warmer and not so heavy. “What are you thinking about?” he asks. He always asks me what I’m thinking or saying, but I never ask him that question.
“I want to know what you’re thinking about.”
He hums and leans in again, curving the vase. His chin rests on my shoulder, and his warm chest at my back presses me in. He takes my hand and dips it in water again to keep the clay wet as he shapes it. “I was thinking about how this is one of the best things I’ve ever done with someone.”
I grin. “Ever?”
He pecks my cheek and then refocuses on the vase. One movement or twitch and the vase will turn it into a blob of clay again. “No, notever, but I’m sure you already knew that.“ I look at his profile instead of what his hands are doing with mine. His eyebrows are furrowed, and the tip of his tongue dips out over his lip in concentration.
I lean in, breathing him in, and I mostly just smell clay, but I get a tinge of something perfectly Lachlan. “If you keep staring at me like that, I’ll ruin this vase, and we will be here all night.” I rub my nose on his jaw and kiss it.
His hands move mine back and forth, and I want to pull them away, but I know it will piss him off. I jerk my hand back, and his jaw goes solid. I smile against it and press a soft kiss to the stone. He ignores it and moves my hands to fix the problem. “Are you going to at least look at what we’re making?” I glance at the vase. It’s nothing special, but it’s a pretty shape.
“I feel like Demi Moore,” I hum. He chuckles and turns his head to look at me as the wheel slows down.
“I’m not a ghost, baby.”
“Lucky me,” I say, and he kisses me this time. His fingers twine through mine and the wet clay squelches between them.
“Ok, what color do you want to make this? I’m going to get this to the kiln.” He lets me go and stands up carefully, transferring the vase to a plate to dry it. I watch him walk away and admire him in his old, splattered, ripped-up jeans with a button-up equally as messy. His hair is unstyled and sticking out in every direction, like he’s been running his hands through it all day.
“I don’t know, I don’t do pottery.”
He comes back from putting the vase in the kiln. “Ok, well, I’ll mix some options and then glazes, and we can go from there.” I wash my hands and wait for Lachlan to mix the colors for the vase along with the glazes. The weight on my chest has lifted a little, but the exhaustion is still there. Regardless, he managed to make me smile today. I don’t think he realizes how thankful I am for that. He also happened to catch me when I was coming down. I didn’t have a chance to pop another pill, so everything is less foggy at the moment.
