Tales From Sea Glass Inn (20 page)

Heather chuckled to herself at the idea of
buying the piece and putting it in her office at the bank. Once finished, it
was sure to be powerful, a statement about people and the world they inhabited
and destroyed. She was supposed to remain neutral about such topics at work,
not display her personal beliefs in such a public and symbolic way. Heather
shrugged and kept walking. What did she know about the piece, anyway? Maybe the
sculptor had something completely different in mind, like a statement about
fashion or a protest against Arbor Day.

Several of the people in the studio looked up
when she passed. They were a diverse group, as different from each other as
their works were. One was even wearing an honest-to-God beret. Heather paused
when the beret-wearer turned toward her. Pale skin and wide eyes, with short,
untidy white-blond hair. Young. A bit too bohemian-artist for her tastes.
Still, she found it difficult to look away. Was this the woman whose sculpture
had captured Heather’s attention? Somehow, she was sure of it.

She finally got herself together enough to
walk past the studio and down to the end of the garden. She stood there for a
few moments, chewing her apple and listening to the waves crash below. A huge
basalt formation rose out of the sea like the kraken, a deeper shadow in a
world full of them.

Heather sighed and turned away, heading back
to the inn. She was too cold and tired to stay outside any longer. Besides, she
had accomplished her goal.

Look
at Haystack Rock
.

Check.

*

Aspen Carter spread another handful of clay
on her sculpture’s torso. It felt cool and tacky to her touch as she smoothed
it into an even layer. She wanted to make the waist thicker to keep the
androgynous look of the figure, but she didn’t want to lose its slender grace.
She was having trouble finding the right balance and had already added and
taken away what felt to her aching arms like eighty pounds of clay.

Once she thought the shape looked right, she
used her fingers to gouge the furrows that would eventually be the rough bark
of the tree-trunk-encased upper body. Too deep. Damn. She filled in the divots
and smoothed the clay again before making another try at the subtle forms.

This sculpture had given her more grief than
any of the others she’d done. The transition from an image in her mind to a
physical manifestation of it had been challenging and frustrating. Almost every
step along the way had required repeated attempts before she was satisfied with
her work, and even now she was second-guessing—or was it
twentieth-guessing?—the curve of the sculpture’s thighs. She’d had moments when
she’d wanted to throw the figure over her shoulder, carry it down to the beach,
and dump it in the ocean.

She’d never been happier in her life.

She sighed and stepped back to survey her
progress. She’d been at the inn for three days now, and the amount of
improvement she’d made was obvious to her. Pam’s keen eye had helped her
through her usual trouble spots. The transition points of knees and wrists and
neck had always been tough for her to get right. She usually erred on the side
of making these areas too slender because she wanted to show grace and delicacy
in her figures. Pam had suggested she add more size and fullness to them
instead. She had been skeptical, but she was here to learn, so she had ignored
her accustomed tendency and had slapped on more clay. After only one knee, she
had been able to see what Pam meant. Suddenly, the proportions of the entire
leg were more balanced and elegant, not bulkier as she had expected.

Aspen slowly circled her sculpture. She had
never had the type of feedback she was getting from Pam and the other artists.
She’d taken art classes in high school and college, but she’d mostly been
self-taught and self-critiquing since then. When she’d heard about the retreat
and the discount on a room at the inn, she had nearly emptied her savings
account to come here. Already, only days into the two-week seminar, she had
more than gotten her money’s worth.

Her stomach rumbled, but she ignored her
hunger and decided to keep working through breakfast. She wanted to finish the
torso today, and the texture of the bark still didn’t look right to her. She
needed to make sure it was recognizable as a tree but keep it subtle enough so
it looked like part of the person and not something wrapped around it. She was
about to wipe away—yet again—the lines she’d made, when she saw the same woman
who’d been outside the studio last night walking along the garden path.

Aspen peered around her sculpture. Like the
night before, the woman was wearing old sweats and a thick sweater. Her hair
was tangled and had what looked like twigs caught in it, reminding Aspen of her
own sculpture where nature and human met and clashed. The real human in front
of her seemed less troubled by the connection to the natural world, though. Her
cheeks were red, probably from the wind and cold of the winter morning. She
walked with purpose, just as she had last night after turning away from the art
and the studio’s windows.

Aspen wasn’t sure what captivated her about
this unknown person, but she felt helpless to ignore her interest and
curiosity. She quickly covered her clay form with moist towels and plastic
sheeting. Maybe she wouldn’t skip breakfast after all.

By the time she came out of the studio, the
woman had already disappeared, presumably through the inn’s back door. Aspen
followed, stopping briefly to wash the chalky film of dried clay off her hands
in the downstairs bathroom before joining the others in the dining room. The
three other artists who were staying at the inn were there, and Pam and Mel
were bringing dishes of food out to the table. Aspen had hoped to sit next to
the woman, maybe talk to her and find out her story, but the two empty seats
weren’t next to each other. Aspen sat down in one of them, and moments later
the woman came into the room and sat across from her. Even better. Aspen was
finally able to see her without distance and plate-glass windows between them.

Mel called her Heather, and Aspen met her
eyes and smiled when they were introduced. Heather must have raced up to her
room and back because her hair was neatly combed and de-twigged, and makeup hid
the windburn on her cheeks. Except for a Band-Aid on her forehead and some
gauze wrapped around her thumb, she was as impeccably groomed as someone about
to have luncheon with society friends. She’d even changed into a pair of dark
brown slacks and a pale lilac sweater, quite a contrast to Aspen’s
mustard-yellow sweater and gray cords—both thrift store finds. Still, if Aspen
could learn Heather’s secret to getting dressed and ready in such a short time,
she’d never be late to work again.

Aspen scooped some eggs onto her plate and
added a cherry scone and some hash browns. She ate without paying much
attention to the conversations around her and stared at Heather while trying
not to be too obvious about it. Aspen estimated her age somewhere in her
midthirties, probably ten years or more beyond Aspen’s age of twenty-four.
Young looking for her age, but something in her expression seemed older and
weary. Aspen’s hands tingled with a longing to mold clay into the delicate
triangular shape of Heather’s face and the slope of her neck into her
collarbones. She’d felt the same urge many times before, whenever something
beautiful or meaningful caught her attention and begged to be sculpted, but she
had never experienced the desire to follow the contours and curves of a woman’s
body like she did Heather’s.

“I saw you leave early this morning,
Heather,” Pam said. Aspen had been focused on the strange yearning she felt to
explore Heather more thoroughly, and she gladly abandoned that troubling line
of thought when Pam and Heather started talking. Aspen was curious about her,
as if understanding Heather would help her understand and control her own
reaction to someone who was nearly a stranger to her. “We were surprised to see
you up before dawn since you got in late last night. Did you go for a drive
along the coast?”

“I did,” Heather said. She flashed what
seemed like a self-satisfied smile before it faded again, leaving her as
expressionless as she’d been before. “I walked to a bluff in Ecola State Park
and watched the sunrise, or what little you can see of it with the mountains in
the east. I drove to a lookout and saw the lighthouse, and I even spotted a
herd of elk.”

Heather ticked off the items with the fingers
of her left hand, as if crossing them off some sort of list.

“I didn’t expect the elk,” she continued,
“but they’re on the list of things to see around here, so they count. Local
wildlife. There were about six of them in a grassy meadow next to the highway,
all shrouded in fog. Stunning.”

Most of Heather’s words had been precise and
clearly enunciated, but the last two sentences were mellower and spoken with a
real smile. Aspen couldn’t figure her out. She seemed aloof and businesslike
part of the time, with her fast walk and quick, careful speech and elegant
appearance. But at other moments, like when she had looked at Aspen’s sculpture
through the studio window last night or when she talked about the elk, she
softened around the edges and made Aspen’s breath catch in her throat.

Mel sat and cradled a cup of coffee in her
hands. “What a busy morning! I hope you find some time to relax while you’re
here. You shouldn’t have to work harder at your vacation than you do in the
office.”

Heather nibbled on a piece of toast with some
of Mel’s homemade strawberry-rhubarb jam on it. She’d barely eaten half of it,
but she’d already had three cups of coffee. Aspen, on the other hand, had worked
her way through something out of every bowl on the table, and she was on her
second scone.

“I want to make sure I take full advantage of
everything Cannon Beach has to offer,” Heather continued. “I’m signed up for a
yoga class on the beach this afternoon, and I’m sure that will be relaxing. I
need to call and sign up for one of those cooking classes at the culinary
school in town, and I’ll go to Tillamook tomorrow.”

“Tillamook? Where they make cheese?” Aspen
asked. She had been content to listen and try to puzzle out Heather’s shifting
personality. She was vacationing with a vengeance, and Aspen’s curiosity was
growing more ravenous every moment. She surprised herself by interjecting into
the conversation, but she’d spoken without thinking.

Pam nodded. “They have some interactive
exhibits and a shop where you can buy ice cream. Marionberry Pie is my favorite
flavor.”

“I want to go,” Aspen said. She looked at
Heather. “I don’t suppose you’d mind some company?”

“Oh, I…well…” Heather looked as disconcerted
by Aspen’s request as she had felt suggesting it. “Aren’t you going to be busy
with your retreat?” Heather asked in a relieved-sounding voice, as if she was
happy to have come up with an excuse to go alone.

Pam spoke up before Aspen could answer.
“Tomorrow’s retreat activities are scheduled early in the morning and after
dinner at night. The artists work at their own pace during the day, and there’s
plenty of time for a fun sightseeing trip.”

“Besides,” Aspen added, “I’m sure
take a sculpting student to get
ice cream
is on a list somewhere of the top things to do while in
Cannon Beach. After tomorrow, you’ll be able to cross it off as accomplished.”

Heather gave her an inscrutable look, but
then her expression collapsed into softness again. She smiled. “Okay. But only
because I don’t want to skip any of the Cannon Beach highlights, and I’m sure
this sculptor–ice cream thing is one of them.”

“Then it’s a date,” Pam said before Aspen
could respond. “You two will have a great time tomorrow. Be sure to go to the
Air Museum, too.”

“And there are a couple of wineries along the
way,” Mel added. “They’re on the page from your welcome packet, Heather. I’ll
mark all these places on a map for you.”

The two of them launched into a tourism board
advertisement for Tillamook, Oregon. If she and Heather went to even half the
places mentioned, they’d need more than an afternoon. Heather listened to their
suggestions with an unreadable mask on her face again, and Aspen ignored most
of what they were saying and tried to justify crashing Heather’s plans. She’d
been working hard on her sculpture since she’d arrived, and a break would do
her good. Plus, she might get some inspiration for future works in a new
setting.

Besides, she wasn’t a commercial artist
anyway. She would take full advantage of Pam’s lessons and learn as much as she
could while she was here, but her art wasn’t her livelihood like it was for the
other participants. She was a barista in Seattle who sculpted when she had the
chance and the cash for materials. She was playing a part here, but it wasn’t
one she’d take on full-time. While she was at it, she’d play along with her
body’s reaction to Heather and give in to its enthusiasm about spending some
time with her tomorrow. These two weeks were a game, and she’d win if she left
here with some new skills to apply to her art. That’s all.

Aspen excused herself and left the table
without another glance at Heather, but her image was visually imprinted on
Aspen’s mind. Time to get back to the studio and back to her creation.

*

Heather sat in the living room at the inn and
waited for Aspen to finish her morning sculpting. She wasn’t thrilled about
spending too much time with any of the other guests, especially since she had a
mission to accomplish, and she hoped Aspen would be ready for the speed-dating
version of sightseeing. She would have been more annoyed with her for inviting
herself along if Aspen hadn’t looked as surprised to be suggesting she come as
Heather was to be asked. Still, Heather would make the most of her unexpected
company. Aspen was lovely and interesting, and Heather thought an afternoon
talking about her sculpting would be a nice change of pace. Heather and her
coworkers never had in-depth conversations about art or culture, tending
instead to stick with mundane talk about the weather and the bank. Aspen didn’t
strike Heather as the small-talk sort. Besides, Heather could use a witness to
vouch for her if her doctor didn’t believe she had really done everything on
her vacation list.