Page 31 of Beneath Pearly Irish Skies
He waggled his overgrown white brows, his brownish green eyes dancing. “I thought you’d throw me out on my ear, so I’m minding myself. Despite the bets people in the village placed with Cormac O’Sullivan.”
They’d bet on it? Oh, of course they had. Months ago, that would have horrified her, but she found herself laughing.
He put his hand on her arm. “I wanted to learn this craft too much to be on the books with you.”
He meantin trouble, she realized. “I think it’s wonderful you want to learn.”
“My brother, Callum, God rest him, was a potter before and after WWII,” Eoghan said. “I thought it might help me become closer to him before we meet in heaven. Something to talk about over a pint, if that’s allowed up there.”
Her heart swelled in her chest. She still wondered about the afterlife and where Tyson had ended up. It bothered her that she wasn’t completely sure. “That sounds like a wonderful idea.”
He dragged his wispy hair off his forehead. “You have a few more arrivals, love. I won’t be keeping you any longer.”
He walked off as her last two students arrived. Keegan O’Malley had his head down as he spoke with chic Lisa Ann Walsh, who owned the hair salon. Megan hadn’t had a haircut since arriving, and she’d looked at the salon’s blue door with trepidation. Her hair was a mess with tangles from the wind. She didn’t know what to do with it, but she was too scared to do something drastic.
Scared.
And she wondered why she was off her center.
“You have quite a group on your hands,” Kade said, coming up beside her.
“My other two classes don’t have any men in them, so the dynamic will be different.” She surveyed the group. She had four bachelors, two women interested in Liam, and Lisa Ann.
“All right, everyone,” she said cheerfully, facing her class. “Let’s get started. I’m Megan Bennet, from the States as you probably know. I’m also Liam O’Hanlon’s cousin—”
“That’s so great,” the young woman with dyed blond hair said with a sigh. “I’m Sarah, by the way.”
Megan wondered how long Liam’s ceramics seraglio was going to last. They were going to get clay all over their nice clothes and ruin their manicures.
“How about we go around the group, and everyone can give their names?” she asked.
“Everyone in Caisleán knows everyone,” said the woman she now knew was Hollie.
“Megan doesn’t,” Kade said softly. “Hi, I’m Kade Donovan and I own the pony farm.”
Everyone else followed suit.
“Great! Let me walk you through your individual shelves and hand out your ceramics kits.”
After showing everyone their personal space, she enlisted Liam and Kade to pass out the clay packs. “In your kit, you will find essential ceramics tools and an eleven-kilo bag of stoneware white clay.”
The ruffling of bags sounded as people started to go through their packs.
She picked up the tools included in the kit. “Let me walk you through some basics. These are your three trimming tools, which you’ll select based on the size you need. Once you throw a pot, you’ll dry it to what we call leather-hard and then trim off the excess clay around the base to make a foot.”
She made a motion of the process with her hands before continuing.
“This is your wire cutter to cut the thrown pot off the wheel. These are your scrapers—both the plastic and wooden ones have a purpose beyond the practical need to scrape the excess clay off your wheel, but we’ll get into that later. This metal needle tool is what you’ll use to check the thickness of the base of your pot, and lastly the sponge… He will become your best friend and your vehicle to both apply and remove water while throwing your pot.”
She pointed to the three industrial sinks against the wall. “Water is essential to throwing a pot—and by pot I mean anything you can throw on the wheel you’re sitting in front of. How much water will be an ongoing journey, as you will see. Rather like our journey in life, I guess.”
Her gaze rested on Kade’s then. He was watching her quietly, and he nodded as if to encourage her. She could feel herself finding her way, and the sensation was powerful.
Shedidknow what she was doing.
“Ceramics is the fusion of earth, water, and fire—some would even say wind since you need wind to feed the fire. Irish folklore speaks a lot about the elements, so this kind of talk might be familiar to you.”
“Like a piece in my soul,” Liam said, patting his chest.
