Page 7 of Startup Fire

Chapter 4

In His Space

The barn smelled like fire, hard work, and dreams.

Jess stood in the space Wayne had cleared for her, taking stock. Her portable torch setup looked almost fragile next to Wayne's anvil and forge. Her tools were arranged on a rolling cart, everything meticulously organized because with glass, chaos meant injury.

The annealing kiln was the problem. The small brick oven had seen better days—she'd bought it used from a retiring glassblower when she was just starting out.

She'd managed to dolly it from her car to the barn entrance, but getting it from the ground onto the metal stand was another matter. She was crouched beside it, calculating angles, when she heard footsteps.

“You're going to throw out your back.”

She jumped. Wayne was already moving toward her. “I've got it—”

“No, you don't.” He positioned himself. “On three. Lift with your legs.”

Together, they hoisted the kiln onto the stand.

“Thank you,” Jess said.

Wayne circled it slowly and crouched to examine the power cord. “This thing's an energy hog,” he muttered.

Jess braced herself for the refusal.

“That circuit can handle it. Probably.” He stood up. “If we trip the breaker, we'll know.”

“I'll pay the difference in your electric bill.”

“We'll figure it out.” He was already walking back to his forge. “Just get it set up.”

The torch hissed to life. She adjusted the flame until it burned with that perfect blue cone, then selected a rod of clear glass. Starting simple today—just getting a feel for the space.

Behind her, Wayne's hammer fell silent.

Jess didn't turn around. She kept her focus on the glass, gathering it, letting it build up on the end of her rod. She was vaguely aware of Wayne moving behind her—crossing to a workbench, the scrape of a drawer.

She pulled the gather from the flame and began to shape it with a wooden paddle, the wet wood hissing against hot glass. A simple sphere, nothing fancy.

“You studied at RISD?”

Jess nearly dropped her blowpipe. Wayne's voice came from behind her left shoulder—close but not dangerously so.

“Yes,” she managed. “BFA in glass.”

“Huh.”

That was it. Just “huh.” She heard him move away.

They worked in parallel for the next hour. Jess finished the sphere—perfectly round, perfectly boring. While the glass was still molten, she rolled it across red and orange frit, then back to the flame to fuse the colors. The delicate work of pulling and shaping softened glass into patterns that suggested maple leaves.

She carried the finished bauble carefully to the annealing kiln.

The barn had grown warm from their combined heat sources. Jess peeled off her flannel and draped it over her stool.

She started a second piece, this time with cobalt blue glass. The blue bloomed through clear like ink in water.

“What are you making?”