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 Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2024 2:57 pm
Jaina’s first creation had gone to Chloe, and the girl had been delighted for the shiny suncatcher, proudly putting it in her window and loving the rainbow prisms that filled the room when the sun…did its job.
The second creation had gone to Eloise, and she was also pleased with it, copying her older sister and putting it right up in her window. It didn’t make as many prisms due to where her room was in the house, but it was pretty regardless.
The third one, she thought that the third one was good enough to give to Sasha. It still wasn’t perfect...but it was more thought out and more carefully put together than the first too, and she had tried to cater to what Sasha had said she liked.
The top was a piece of rose quartz in the shape of a rose, and then the ornament branched into two chains, each filled with small crystals that were faceted to catch as much light as possible. At the bottom of the three clear crystals the piece branched again, and the bottom was a rainbow of different faceted gems. Hopefully…she liked it as much as Jaina did.
Making her way back to the store, she slipped inside and grinned when she saw her pink haired…friend? Acquaintance? Whatever. Sasha was here and that was what mattered.
“Hey! It’s Jaina! I was here a few weeks ago…I finally made a suncatcher that I think you’ll like!”
Holding out a small paper bag, she grinned, looking so very pleased with herself.
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Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2024 2:30 pm
Sasha hadn’t forgotten about the girl with the red hair, but people came into the store asking for things all the time, including red heads. (Maybe especially red heads. Some natural, some not. A lot of them seemed to be into the mystical stuff, which meant many of them frequented the store for one reason or another.) Sasha never really had any expectations. People came and went. Sometimes she saw the same faces, and sometimes she saw new ones. Which the girl with the red hair would be was up for debate until she came back.
She’d been behind the register last time. This time Sasha was toward the front of the store, straightening some shelves a group of young Hillworth boys had decided to make a mess of. She’d let them do it because it was easier to clean up after them than it was to talk them out of it.
The bell above the door hardly attracted her attention with how often she heard it throughout the day. Sasha only glanced up when she heard the voice. Even then she did so slowly, like she wasn’t sure if she was the one the customer was talking to (which perhaps didn’t make much sense, seeing as Sasha was the only one currently in the store).
Then she realized who it was.
“Oh…” she said, not quite surprised, but not as if she’d expected to see Jaina again either. “Hello.”
She put down a few books she’d been sorting and went to greet her, peering at the bag being offered.
“I didn’t know if you’d actually come back with one. I thought you were just being nice.”
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Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2024 12:41 pm
“No! I fully intended to come back, I wanted to make a nice one first though, I gave the first two to my nieces, they’re just kids so anything shiny appeals to them! But, I tried to like, get rainbow vibes? I know I’ll get better as I keep practicing, but this one? I don’t know. I wanted to bring you something so you knew I wasn’t a liar!”
She nodded at the bag and stretched her arm just a bit, so that it was closer for Sasha to grab.
“It’s not…I mean. It’s not what like, I envisioned...but I’m pretty sure I’m envisioning things that are absolutely and completely beyond my skill set which…honestly tracks with me so. Here we are. But…I hope you like it, seriously…I tried to use things you said you liked…”
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Posted: Sat Sep 14, 2024 4:32 pm
Sasha took the offered bag and peeked inside, then pulled out the colorful suncatcher to hold it up in the light. The faceted gems twinkled, throwing spots of color onto her face.
“It’s really cute,” Sasha said with a small smile. Her voice was never exuberant even on the rare occasions she tried to make it so, but there was a lightness to it that at least couldn’t be mistaken as anything negative except for maybe by someone intent on seeing everything from a negative lens. Jaina didn’t seem as if she’d be like that.
“This was your third try?” Sasha asked, so distracted by the play of light off it that she wasn’t sure she’d heard right. “I don’t think I would’ve been able to tell if you hadn’t told me. It’s nice. Better than anything I could do.”
It wasn’t empty flattery, even if Sasha wasn’t a particularly passionate talker. As much as she liked crystals, she probably would’ve mangled something like this if she’d tried to make it herself.
“Thank you,” she said. “Now I’ll have to figure out which one of my windows gets the most sunlight.”
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Posted: Sun Sep 15, 2024 3:24 pm
Jaina looked so pleased and grinned at Sasha, nodding. “Yeah! The first two I gave to the kids that I live with, and they were both super excited to have something so pretty, but…I’m so glad that you like it!”
Her mind was whirling though, and she half wondered if she should…well. Maybe visit Sasha and give her a real magical crystal…it could be fun. It would be risky but honestly…she didn’t seem like she was in any way involved in…the war and all that was going on, so. Maybe.
“I think the hardest thing was trying to get my big hands to twist the tiny wire? Like, I kept missing and it would poke me or the gems would go flying.” She snickered. It was funny now but it had been absolutely frustrating while she was working on it.
“I figured out that pliers are absolutely my friend, but even then my hands are too big for the pair I got. I swear, Sasha, all jewelry makers have doll hands. Tiny and nimble and honestly? They might actually be real elves.”
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Posted: Sun Oct 06, 2024 8:34 am
Sasha nodded along, still with the same small smile on her face, not particularly buoyant but still friendly and open enough to encourage conversation. She didn’t laugh, but her eyes sparkled in a way that showed a bit of amusement.
“I appreciate the trouble,” she said. “I don’t usually do much crafting so I can’t speak from experience, but it sounds like it could be a hassle.”
She continued to admire the suncatcher, adjusting her position to catch more of the light streaming in through the shop window. The crystals really were pretty. They glimmered radiantly, refracting light over her face.
“Did you need anything?” she asked. “Maybe something for your next project. If you’re going to keep making them. We’re never running low on crystals. I actually think we got some new ones in the other day…” Sasha paused to glance around but gave up quickly. “I couldn’t tell you which ones, though. Maybe it’s a quartz. It looks kind of glittery. Not faceted, but like actual glitter. Or like it’s got a coating of sugar on it. I don’t know if it’d be good on a suncatcher, but if you were thinking of branching out to other things…”
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Posted: Sun Oct 06, 2024 1:00 pm
“It was certainly a learning experience, but I’m super glad that I did it, and I have absolutely no regrets with them!” Jaina felt so pleased seeing that Sasha really did seem to enjoy the suncatcher, and her resolve to show the girl a real magical crystal absolutely intensified.
Though, when she heard of the glitter covered stone, she blinked. “...Wouldn’t that get messy, do you think? I’m sure it’s pretty, but…quartz is pretty on its own and doesn’t need bits of plastic on it. The kids nowadays wanting everything to be super shiny…”
She clicked her tongue and shook her head slightly but craned her neck, trying to see if she could spot the crystal that Sasha was talking about. “...I’ll still take a look at it. I’m not really looking for anything specific, but if I see anything, I’m sure I’ll juse impulse buy. It’s a curse, after all…”
Crystals. They were a curse because they were so pretty…and when you started to collect them, you just wanted more.
Thought…
“What kind of other things? What could a glitter covered crystal even really be used for other than a pretty bookend or paper weight…depending on the size. I’m sure it’s nice to look at though…Ugh. What has this place done to me, Sasha!”
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Posted: Sun Oct 27, 2024 2:06 pm
“I don’t think it’s real glitter,” Sasha said. “More like a feature of the stone. Like, it’s cut that way. Or… I don’t know, comes out of the ground that way? Grows that way? Or… however rocks become rocks.”
She turned to look through some of the displays, trying to find the one she was talking about, still carrying her suncatcher with her. The front windows mostly held the larger decorative prisms and orbs, so she made for the shelves of smaller stones and containers of loose rocks.
“Oh, it’s these,” Sasha said when she found what she was looking for. She grabbed a pear shaped stone in a vibrant blue color and held it in the palm of her hand. “Looks like it’s called drusy quartz,” she read the sign. “You see how the surface has tiny bumps like sugar? I don’t know what people use it for. Maybe jewelry? Like a pendant. Oh, this is kind of expensive though. Thirty dollars for this one stone? Sorry, I know I’m supposed to be making a sale or whatever, but that’s kind of ridiculous.”
The entire time she spoke, Sasha’s voice stayed flat, without much inflection, not unkind or unwelcoming in the least, but like she wasn’t used to showing much emotion.
“We also sell strings of beads if you’re into that,” she tried, setting the glittery quartz back down. “I know making friendship bracelets and stuff like that's really popular nowadays.”
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Posted: Sun Nov 03, 2024 2:02 pm
Jaina nodded, glad that Sasha found what she had been trying to describe, because honestly, Jaina couldn't have pictured it otherwise, and honestly even with seeing it, it was nothing that she had imagined. “Huh. That’s.” It wasn’t...ugly. That wasn’t the word she wanted to use, but it wasn’t…she couldn’t figure out a practical purpose for it off the top of her head, and when Sasha spoke of the price, Jaina shook her head. “It would be heavy…but. It is pretty…not for that much though, you’re absolutely not wrong.”
The idea of beads made her pause, but she shook her head after thinking it through. “I think I’m going to stick to the smaller crystals and see what else I can make. If I manage to get better, I’ll absolutely bring you more…are you at all interested in more suncatchers? Or are you mentioning the friendship bracelets because you’re hoping for one?”
She was teasing, but grinned at Sasha. Hoenstly, if there was any kind of interest expressed…Jaina would try it. It couldn’t be that difficult.
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Posted: Wed Jan 01, 2025 2:02 pm
Sasha didn’t pick up on the fact that she was being teased. Or if she did, she didn’t show it.
“People come in looking for beads sometimes,” she explained, “so if you ever decide to experiment with other stuff, we have some. I usually direct people to the bead shop down the street if they’re seriously into it and looking for charms and stuff. But for anyone who’s just getting started, the basic beads you can get here work fine.”
But if Jaina wasn’t into that…
Sasha shrugged. Her smile was small and didn’t quite reach her eyes. It wasn’t that she didn’t look happy, she was just reserved about it. Maybe she was a little absent-minded.
“If you make more suncatchers I wouldn't say no to them,” she said. “My apartment’s kind of dumpy and bare, so they’d make it look a little more colorful.”
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Posted: Wed Jan 01, 2025 7:54 pm
“No, that sounds really neat. I’ll definitely think about it. And I’ll be sure to make you some more suncatchers. There’s no sense in having a dumpy apartment.” Giving another smile, encouraged by Sashas, Jaina tucked some hair behind her ear.
“If you don’t mind me asking, what are your normal days off, so I don’t end up coming here when you’re not.” Sasha was the best part of the store.
“I think I’ll have another look around and then head out for the day, but I will be back again. You’re nice, and I hope that maybe, if it’s not too strange we could end up friends or something.”
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Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 7:46 am
“Oh, I don’t know, to be honest,” Sasha said. She seemed to think for a moment, racking her brain for a decent answer. “My days off tend to change. They’re usually during the week, though. I don’t think I’ve ever had a Friday or a weekend off that wasn’t a holiday.”
Her small smile remained. “I don’t think it’s strange. Come by whenever you like, even if you don’t want to buy anything. It’s just me out front a lot, so I could use the company. And if you come bearing gifts…” Sasha’s smile grew a tiny bit wider. She held the suncatcher with delicate fingers, caught once again by the sunlight glinting off the crystals. “Who am I to say no?”
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