Her father took her to the library and checked out grown-up books about glass and glasswork, because he said the children’s books on the subject weren’t detailed enough. Lucy learned that when a substance was made of molecules that were organized like bricks stacked together, you couldn’t see through it. But when a substance was made out of random disorganized molecules, like water or boiled sugar or glass, light found its way through the spaces between them.
“Tell me, Lucy,” her father asked as they glued a diagram to the trifold board, “is glass a liquid or a solid?”
“It’s a liquid that behaves like a solid.”
“You’re a very smart girl. Do you think you’ll be a scientist like me when you grow up?”
She shook her head.
“What do you want to be?”
“A glass artist.” Lately Lucy had started to dream about making things out of glass. In her sleep she watched light glimmer and refract through candy-colored windows … glass swirling and curving like exotic undersea creatures, birds, flowers.
Her father looked perturbed. “Very few people can actually earn a living as an artist. Only the famous ones make any money.”
“Then I’ll be a famous one,” she said cheerfully, coloring the letters on her trifold board.
On the weekend, her father took her to visit a local glassblowing shop, where a red-bearded man showed her the basics of his craft. Mesmerized, Lucy stood as close as her father would allow. After the glassblower melted sand in a high-temperature furnace, he pushed a long metal rod into the furnace and gathered molten glass in a glowing red lump. The air was filled with the scents of hot metal, sweat, scorched ink, and ash from the wads of wet newspaper the studio used to hand-shape the glass.
With each additional gather of glass, the glassblower enlarged the fiery orange mass, turning it constantly, reheating it frequently. He added an overlay of blue frit, or ceramic powder, onto the post and rolled it on a steel table to distribute the color evenly.
Lucy watched with wide-eyed interest. She wanted to learn everything about this mysterious process, every possible way to cut, fuse, color, and shape glass. Nothing had ever seemed so important or necessary to know.
Before they left the shop, her father bought her a blown-glass ornament that looked like a hot-air balloon, painted with shimmering rainbow stripes. It hung on its own little stand made of brass wire. Lucy would always remember it as the best day of her entire childhood.
* * *
Later in the week, when Lucy came home from soccer practice, early evening had turned the sky dark purple, with an overlay of clouds like the silvery wax bloom on a plum. Stiff-legged in her armor of plastic shin guards encased in tube socks, Lucy went to her room and saw that the lamp on her nightstand had been turned on. Alice was standing there, holding something.
Lucy scowled. Alice had been told more than once that she wasn’t allowed to go into her room without permission. But the fact that Lucy’s room was off-limits seemed to have made it the one place Alice most wanted to be. Lucy had suspected that her sister had sneaked in there before, when she’d discovered that her stuffed animals and dolls weren’t in their usual places.
At Lucy’s wordless exclamation, Alice turned with a start, something dropping from her hands to the floor. The resulting shatter caused them both to jump. A flush of guilt swept over Alice’s small face.
Lucy stared dumbly at the glittering mess on the wood floor. It was the blown- glass ornament that her father had bought for her. “Why are you in here?” she demanded with incredulous rage. “This is
Alice burst into tears, standing with the broken glass shards around her.
Alerted by the noise, their mother dashed into the room. “Alice!” She rushed forward and plucked her off the floor, away from the glass. “Baby, are you hurt? What happened?”
“Lucy scared me,” Alice sobbed.
“She broke my glass ornament,” Lucy said furiously. “She came into my room without asking and broke it.”
Her mother was holding Alice, smoothing her hair. “The important thing is that no one was hurt.”
“The important thing is that she broke something that was mine!”
Her mother looked exasperated and distressed. “She was just curious. It was an accident, Lucy.”
Lucy glared at her little sister. “I hate you. Don’t ever come in here again, or I’ll knock your head off.”
The threat elicited a fresh storm of tears from Alice, while their mother’s face darkened. “That’s enough, Lucy. I expect you to be nice to your sister, especially after she’s been so sick.”
“She’s not sick anymore,” Lucy said, but the words were lost in the sound of Alice’s vehement sobbing.
“I’m going to take care of your sister,” her mother said, “and then I’ll come back and clean up that glass. Don’t touch any of it, those pieces are razor-sharp. For heaven’s sake, Lucy, I’ll get you another ornament.”
“It won’t be the same,” Lucy said sullenly, but her mother had already carried Alice out of the room.
Lucy knelt in front of the shattered glass, glinting with the delicate iridescence of soap bubbles on the wood floor. She huddled and sniffled, and stared at the broken ornament until her vision blurred. Emotion filled her until it seemed to rise from her skin and pour into the air … fury, grief, and a craving, nagging, desperate wish for love.
In the dim smear of lamplight, little points of light awakened. Swallowing back tears, Lucy wrapped her arms around herself and took a shivering breath. She blinked as the glimmers rose from the floor and swirled around her. Astonished, she wiped her eyes with her fingers and watched the lights circle and dance. Finally she understood what she was seeing.
Fireflies.
Magic meant just for her.
Every shard of glass had transformed into living sparks. Slowly the dancing procession of fireflies made their way to the open window and slipped into the night.
When her mother returned a few minutes later, Lucy had gone to sit on the edge of her bed, staring at the window.
“What happened to the glass?” her mother asked.
“It’s gone,” Lucy said absently.
It was her secret, this magic. Lucy didn’t know where it had come from. She only knew that it would find the spaces it needed, take life in them, like flowers growing in the cracks of broken pavement.
“I told you not to touch it. You could have cut your fingers.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.” Lucy reached for a book on her nightstand. She opened the volume to a random page, staring at it blindly.
She heard her mother sigh. “Lucy, you have to be more patient with your little sister.”
“I know.”
“She’s still fragile after what she went through.”
Lucy kept her gaze fixed on the book in her hands, and waited in dogged silence until her mother had left the room.
After a desultory dinner, with only Alice’s chatter to relieve the quietness, Lucy
