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confusion, it doesn’t help that Ben swears it wasn’t him in front of my house the other night. So, is he lying? Was I imagining things?
    Could it possibly have been Matt?
    I look toward the back of the studio, wondering if I should turn around and head out the door. It’s not like anyone’s actually seen me yet. The place looks empty, and Spencer’s work light is switched off.
    I turn to leave, only to find that I’m not alone after all. There’s a boy standing just inside the door, staring right at me.
    I take a step back, my heart beating fast.
    “Are you okay?” he asks. He’s about my age or a little older, with wavy brown hair and olive-toned skin.
    “Sorry,” he says, approaching me slowly. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
    “Where’s Spencer?”
    “Downstairs, loading the kiln. Are you okay?” he repeats.
    “Where did you come from?” I ask, bumping into the worktable behind me. I look toward the door, knowing I would have heard him come in.
    “Medland, originally.” He smiles. “It’s about a three-hour drive from here.”
    “You know what I mean.”
    “I was behind the counter. You walked right by me.” He extends his hand for a shake, but I don’t move an inch. “I’m Adam. Spencer hired me to pull molds.” He flexes his muscle to be funny.
    “How come Spencer didn’t mention a new hire to me?”
    “I don’t know; why don’t you ask him?” He gestures behind me. Spencer’s there.
    “I take it you two have met,” Spencer says, wiping a smear of slip on his jeans.
    “Not really,” I say.
    “Camelia, Adam; Adam, Camelia,” Spencer says, still wiping. There’s a streak of green glaze down his scruffy face.
    “Well, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Camelia.” Adam extends his hand again. This time I shake it, noticing his sweaty palm.
    “Camelia’s an ace at throwing bowls,” Spencer says. “Don’t let her demure demeanor fool you.”
    “Hardly demure,” Adam says. “For a second there, I thought she was gonna take my head off.”
    “You startled me.”
    “No worries,” Adam says. “We’re working together now; I’ll let you make it up to me somehow.”
    “You’ll let me?”
    “Sure,” he says. “I’m new to the area, so I might be needing a tour guide.”
    “How new?” I ask.
    “This is my first semester at Hayden.”
    “The community college?”
    He nods. “And you?”
    “I’m a junior, actually . . . at the high school. That’s where Spencer and I met. He was subbing for my pottery teacher.”
    “And I couldn’t take my eyes off her soup bowls.” Spencer winks. “I’m telling you, this girl’s got talent.”
    “Can I see some of your work?” Adam asks.
    “Maybe some other time. I have a soup bowl to throw,” I joke.
    “Well, be sure it has big round coils.” Spencer winks again. “The extruder’s all fixed, by the way.”
    “The extruder is for wusses,” I say, referring to pottery’s version of a pasta maker, complete with various attachments that can transform even the biggest wads of clay into long noodlelike strands.
    While he and Adam head off to the back room, I use the wire cutter to slice myself a fist-size clump of clay. I’m determined to sculpt something simple and predictable today—something, ironically, exactly like a soup bowl.
    I know exactly the way I want my bowl to look: a bubblelike base with a tulip-turned rim, big enough for flowers, but not for a full bowl of fruit. I end up working for well over an hour, rolling my coils out by hand, stacking them atop the oval base, and then weaving them together to form ripples along the sides. The whole familiar process of it helps me relax—to concentrate on something simple—even though, for some reason, despite how supposedly foolproof coil pots are, I can’t seem to get mine the way I want it. It looks more like a bottle than an actual pot. The tulip spout has more of a screw-cap look. And the pot’s much taller and thinner than I’d imagined—more like