The Potter's Daughter (Literary Series) (10 page)

Abby hung her coat on a hook next
to the door, “Yea it was fine, thanks.”

Will brought his elbows to the
table, clasped his hands, and then began tapping the ends of his fingers
together.
 
“Hey, Abby, about the
Stone Bar --.”

Abby interrupted, “That…”

Will now regretted mentioning the
bar.
 
He had not even had a cup of
tea yet.

“I’m sorry,” said Abby.

Will did not miss this window.
 
“You’re sorry,” he opened his hands to
her, “no I’m sorry honey.
 
I forget
myself sometimes.”

“It’s ok,” Abby turned away from
Will and walked over to the open tea cupboard.

“I forget myself too,” said Abby.

Abby saw the empty can of coffee
and understood Will’s sudden inclination for tea.

“You wanted a black tea?” asked
Abby.

“Yea, the ‘Black Breakfast Tea’,
that’s the one I like,” said Will.

Abby took out the honey and two tea
bags, one Earl Grey and one black tea, and placed them into two cups.
 
She then put the rest of the tea back
into the cupboard and closed the door.

Abby realized that Will had not had
an afternoon caffeine fix and decided she should ease off, or at least be
subtle.
 
She was right to think both
were relieved to put yesterday’s incident behind them.
 
Still
Abby
’s
back was to Will as she straightened the counter and sorted his dishes from
lunch.

Will dropped one hand onto his
knee, put his back to the wall, and began tapping the table with the other as
he watched Abby straighten the counter.

“So what did you think of that big
old monstrosity up the hill?” asked Will.

“You should see the place.
 
Brian and Caroline really know a thing
or two and Mitch is doing a great job.
 
I think it’s going to be a real nice resort.
 
It’ll stir up a lot of business for the
village and lodge.”

“Can’t say we don’t need it, lodge
almost went under again last year, new owners bailed, sold quick.
 
That house is still going to be an eye
sore though.
 
I grew up with that
thing looming over the lake, been empty most of my life, half my fathers
too.
 
Gives me the creeps,” said
Will, he shook his jowls, “Ahuhuhuh.”

“Well, it’s not going to be empty
any more,” said Abby.

“Still gives me the creeps.”

“There were some old urns up
there,” said Abby, “a lot like ours but different somehow, nothing I’ve ever
seen you make or in the scrapbooks.”

“They’re ours all right.
 
Your great grandfather made them custom.
 
Thick as hell so he could carve
down the ivy.”

“I’ll have to tell Mitch he was
right.”

“That’s how we ended up out here
you know.”

“I thought we were on the lake
further back than that.”

“The property was in the family
further back but we didn’t start hauling urns out of here until your
great-grandfather built the studio and wood kiln to make those urns in
particular.
 
His pottery studio had
been in Fremont.
 
This isn’t the
Bellen’s first,” said Will.
 
“Built
the business selling to all the rich people on the hill here, and in the city,
then other cities, and so on, and so on.”

The flames licked the bottom of the
kettle which started whistling at first a low pitch and then higher.
 
Abby pulled the kettle off the burner
and poured hot water into the two waiting cups to steep the tea.

“So those were the first urns?”
asked Abby.

“Oh no.
 
He made urns back in Fremont, that’s how
he got the commission,” said Will, “but it was a small part of his
business.
 
He made a lot of salad
bowls and cups, practical things people could use.
 
My Dad said he had a good contract
making clay insulators when they ran the first electric from the dam through
Fremont, less then a penny a piece, but a fair amount of money at that time.
 
But the lake business changed
everything.”

Abby faced Will, “I never knew.”

“Yea, well, I guess I told your
brother.”

Abby turned her back to Will again
and prodded the tea bags.
 
Michael
had been the protégé, the obligatory male apprentice in the Bellen line of clay
artisans that went back farther than Will’s grandfather, all the way back to
northern Italy as far as she knew, and Will would be the last in the
tradition.
 
That was made clear to
Abby when Will stood above Michaels casket.

Not because Abby did not know her
way around the Bellen studio.
 
That
is where Abby and her brother spent their childhood.
 
Her earliest memories were playing with
clay while her father worked.
 
Her
father had made a child-size kick wheel Abby was able to spin with skill and
ease before she could read or write.
 
Michael, however, had the benefit of Will’s mentorship.
 
Will would take Michael with him around
the studio and teach him about the craft.
 
Abby would eventually always learn from Michael what their father had
taught him.
 
Michael loved to show
off any bit of knowledge or new technique to his sister.
 
Michael would spend as much time as he
could to be sure Abby learned the new skill and in trade, Abby would teach him
the skills she learned from her apprenticeship with their Mother.

“Yea, I suppose you told Michael,”
said Abby.

Will tapped his fingers a little
faster as the tea was taking too long.
 
“Well, they’ve ordered some new urns,” said Will, “you’re cousin and
Brian.
 
Urns and pots, some
discs.
 
Good amount of work.”

“That’s great,” said Abby.
 
“What would you like in your tea?”

“Oh, uh.
 
Like yours, I like it like the way you
make yours.”

Abby added milk and honey to the
tea, took the cup to the table, and sat across from Will.
 
He was quick to have a sip despite the
steam.
 
Will curled his lip, “This
is great, good tea.”

“It’s tea,” said Abby.
 
Abby decided this was as good a time as
any to have the conversation she wanted to have with Will so she started, “so I
need to get back to the city in a week.”

“So soon,” said Will, his blue eyes
formerly somber now lighting up as he took another sip of tea, “that’s a
shame.
 
You just got here.”

“Well, I’ll clean this place up
before I go.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“And then, I’m bringing someone in
to look after you and to help keep the place up,” Abby had taken her shot and
was poised for Will’s reaction.

There was a pause, Abby expected
that, and then Will took another sip of tea.
 
“You know,” said
Will
,
“I should drink more tea.
 
Yes, I
think I will.
 
It tastes so much
better than coffee.”
 
Will examined
the sides of the cup as if there were some label of confirmation, “feels good
too.”

“You heard what I said.
 
I’m bringing somebody in to help you
out.”

“Black Breakfast Tea, that’s the
stuff,” said Will.

Abby’s jaw clenched, “I am going
back to the city and you can’t be trusted to take care of yourself.
 
Don’t pretend you don’t hear me.”

Another pause.

Will set down his cup of tea onto a
saucer and put his hands flat on the table on either side.
 
His blue eyes went foggy as his brow
furrowed over them.
 
Abby watched
Will’s lower jaw recede, making his lip pout.

In a low voice Will said, “Go back
to the city.”
 
Then in almost a
whisper, “No ones coming around here.
 
I can damn well take care of myself.”

“Is that what you call this, no
food, your clothes, the dishes, this house.”

“I get along just fine,” said
Will.
 
He stood up and put his hand
behind his head, fingers scratching a neck that did not itch.

“Just fine, is that what you call
it?”

“Yea, just fine.”

“Well I’m just getting
started.
 
You don’t eat, I don’t
know how much you’re drinking, and from what the doctors tell me --.”

Will cut off Abby mid-sentence,
“—That will be just about enough, we don’t need to talk about doctors.”

“When are we going to talk about
it, Will?”

“We’re not, doctors don’t have a
lick of sense.
 
Any idiot can tell
ya I’m just getting old.”
 
Will held
up both his hands, “And I don’t want anyone poking around here.
 
That’s the end of it.”

“That’s not the end of it.
 
I’m not going to let you destroy
yourself,” said Abby.
 
“Regardless
of what you want.”

“Regardless, of what I want?
 
Fine way to talk to your Father.
 
Your Mother would never stand for this,
I tell you that.”

“What would she say about you
self-destructing?”

Will was cornered, “So what of it!”

Abby had never heard her father
raise his voice out of anger.
 
It
was time to back off.

“Fine have it your way.
 
Go in the other room and I’ll make you
your dinner,” said Abby.
 
She was in
no way giving up.
 
Abby knew when to
call the battle done.

“Fine,” said Will.
 
He picked up his teacup and exited the
kitchen without giving his daughter a second look.

* * *
* *

On that long restless night the
Bellen family came together again.
 
Abby
found herself in the lake room peering out the bay window at the darkness and
the glowing grey blanket of the lake hovering within.
 
There were no phantoms floating in the
mist before Abby yet her mind was clouded with the ghost of what Will had said.
 
Of course, he would have told her
brother the many things needed to carry the Bellen legacy and had the cancer
not taken her mother there would have been so much more her mother could have
shared with her.

A father has his son and a mother
has her daughter, or so was their family dynamic.
 
Will loved his daughter, the Bellen
family was full of love,
Abby
however was under
Emily’s wing.
 
Will and Abby did not
know how to be alone with each other.
 
Abby was never daddy’s little girl.
 
Abby was in her teens when her mother passed and was in college when
Michael was killed.
 
Will and Abby
had essentially lived separate lives.

Abby felt she knew why.

Outside the window, Abby could not
help notice, large in the dim lit sky, the silhouette of her mother’s weeping
willow haunting the horizon.
 
Her
eyes fixed upon the tree and thought went to the time Abby spent with her
mother before she died.
 
Abby knew
that Emily would not want Will to continue on his downward spiral.
 
She knew not just because her mother had
instilled in her the same compassion and gentleness that her mother held within
herself.
 
Abby knew because of a
promise that was made that had already been broken once with Michael.
 
As the cancer ate away at Emily, she
asked Abby to watch over her brother and father.
 
After Emily passed, Abby took the
unrealistic request seriously.
 
The
request was not taken so seriously by her brother, he thought the need
ridiculous, or by her father, distancing himself from Abby because she reminded
him of her late mother.
 
The request
was the essence of Emily reflecting the glue that held the family together, the
concern for each other’s well being.
 
Michael and Will had rejected that compassionate concern.
 
Abby felt she failed Michael and now was
not sure how deep she would have to go for further compassion if Will rejected
what she had available for him.

Gradually the sky above the horizon
began to illuminate with the first glow of the coming day.
 
Outside of the bay window, some shadows
dissipated while others took form.
 
In the height of the tree, the branches of the willow were now clearly
etched in the horizon, and at the base of the tree, the first morning light
revealed a figure on the split log bench.
 
A man sat with his arms wrapped around himself rubbing his sides.
 
Abby had not seen Will go out of the
house yet she knew he was the man on the bench.
 
“He could have been out there half the
night,” she thought.
 
Abby continued
watching Will through the bay window as the morning brought more light.
 
With the morning light Abby was able to
see
Will
clearly.
 
Will was talking to the tree.

Abby was not sure how long she had
watched her father down by the frozen lake.
 
Some time had passed and the sun had
fully risen to a vibrant day.
 
The
golden light refracting from the morning sun created shimmering diamonds on the
icy snow and small animals and winter birds were moving around.
 
Abby stood up and stretched her arms
from her sides.
 
She decided that
she needed to go out and speak to her father.
 
Abby did not get dressed.
 
She put her coat and boots on, wrapped a
blanket around herself, and tromped out to the lake.