Page 22 of Fire Dancer
“Too bad,” the woman sighed.
“I’m pretty good with a blowtorch,” the guy said. “Could you show me what to do?”
Wow. When his woman wanted something, he found a way. A keeper, for sure.
The woman beamed.
“Well…” I shot a look at the clock. I really had to finish my current project.
The guy rooted around in a deep pocket, produced a wallet secured to his low-hanging jeans by a heavy chain, and pulled out a twenty-dollar bill.
“Would that be enough?”
I stared. Oh. I hadn’t been hinting at a tip or bribe, but heck. Now that he was offering…
It wasn’t twenty grand but, heck. Twenty bucks for a two-minute demo wasn’t bad.
I nearly said yes, then caught myself. You didn’t mess with young love, and you certainly didn’t make a quick buck off it.
“Not necessary,” I said. “I’m happy to show you — but you didn’t see me show you, if you know what I mean.”
He grinned, putting his wallet away. “Show us what?”
Good. I was happy to keep this our little secret.
I got to work, setting the materials on the counter: a blowtorch and a couple of pieces of cast-off glass tubing.
“Basically, you hold the tip of the vial to another piece of glass in the heat of the blowtorch. Once they start to fuse, you rotate them like this…”
He watched closely as I demonstrated, as did his girlfriend and Stacy, who peered over their shoulders.
“When you pull them apart slowly, it seals both ends…” I stretched the glass until it was as thin as a thread. It separated on its own, leaving me with two pinched-off tubes. I tapped the molten ends on a steel plate, then rolled them gently. “Then you do this to give it a smooth finish. That’s it.” I held up the sealed tube. “Easy.”
The man lit up like a child at Christmas, and his girlfriend beamed. “That’s awesome! We’ll have to tell all our friends!”
God, I hoped not. We would end up inundated with requests for the real deal, which would be hard to explain to my boss. Or worse, my boss might embrace the idea and advertise it to pull in a whole new revenue stream. I’d be sealing blood vials for the rest of my life.
“That’s really cool.” Stacy fingered her own vial quietly.
It did beat the crazy glue solution, butcoolwas not how I would describe blood vials. More likecreepy.
“It’s super cool. Thanks,” the couple gushed.
In the end, they bought three sets of vials — one for themselves, two for friends — and headed for the door. The guy had vertebrae tattooed on the back of his neck, and that was my last view of him. That and the arm slung tenderly around his girlfriend.
Ah, love. It came in all shapes and sizes.
Stacy watched as I cleared the impromptu workshop from the counter.
“Did you find something you liked?” I asked.
She jerked up with another insta-smile, then went back to the candlestick display. “They’re all so beautiful. It’s hard to decide.”
“Take your time.”
She did. A long, long time, punctuated by furtive glances outside.
She sure didn’t seem in a rush to get back in that fancy SUV today.