Page 123 of Slapshot Baby

"You've watched game film?"

"I've watched your ass, Kai. The game film was incidental."

Heat climbs the back of my neck. She grins and starts on a third.

The third figurine takes the longest.

She hunches over it, shielding it from my view with her forearm, her tongue pressed to the corner of her lip. Her shoulders shake once with a laugh she's trying to suppress.

When she turns it around, my mouth opens.

The naked figurine is lying on its side, propped on one elbow. The smirk on the face is unmistakable. And below the waist, she's sculpted anatomical detail that’s generous in both scale and specificity.

"Ava."

"What? This is art. Notice the muscles, the confident lounging posture? The faithfully rendered, proportionally accurate..."

Embarrassing heat is spreading on my face.

"Stop talking."

She leans in then smirks. "You're blushing. The stoic hockey captain is blushing over clay."

The instructor walks past, looks down at the table, and pivots to the far end of the studio without a word.

"You've broken the instructor."

Ava waves it off. "She'll survive."

I grab more material and attempt something female-shaped. It turns out looking like a traffic cone with a ponytail.

"Is that supposed to be me?" She picks it up, turns it over. "I look like a haunted carrot."

"It's impressionistic."

"It's criminal."

My next attempt at a figure finally produces something recognizably human. She’s standing, hands on hips, mouth open wide.

"That's you telling me my pasta needs more garlic," I say.

"My mouth does not do that."

"Your mouth does exactly that. Biscuit was there."

She grabs a ball of clay and throws it at my chest. It sticks to the front of my shirt.

She laughs, her head tilting back, the long line of her throat catching the studio light. The sound of her laugh fills the loft in a way that makes the studio and the quiet instructor at the far end disappear until there's nothing in the room but her.

My hands go still on the table.

This is what I'm afraid of losing.

Not the sex or the closeness or even the way she looks at me when she thinks I'm not watching.

This.

The uncomplicated joy on her face when she's laughing hard.