The Glassblower's Daughter – Part 1: The Furnace on Murano

The furnace on Murano had burned without stopping for a hundred and forty years. Chiara had grown up beside it, sleeping on a cot in the corner of the workshop while her father and grandfather blew glass into bowls, bottles and the delicate, impossible shapes that tourists bought and carried home across the lagoon.

Now the furnace was old, and the family was tired, and a man from Milan had arrived with a leather folder full of drawings.

"A new studio," said Luca, spreading the plans across the workbench. "Glass, steel, light from above. You'll be able to show visitors the whole process."

"Visitors will get in the way," said Chiara, not looking up from the glory hole.

"That's the point," said Luca, cheerfully. "They'll pay to watch."

She turned, slowly, and looked at him for the first time. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with a sunburnt neck and a rolled-up shirt that had clearly never been near a furnace. His eyes were grey and curious, and he was watching her as though she were the most interesting thing in the room.

"You don't know anything about glass," she said.

"No," said Luca. "That's why I'm asking you."

"Nobody asks me anything."

"Then I'm asking," said Luca, and smiled. "Show me how you make a bowl, and I'll tell you what I'd change. You can tell me I'm wrong."

She told him he was wrong for a week.

He stood in the corner of the workshop every morning, sketchbook in hand, sweating in the heat, watching her and her father work. He asked endless questions about temperature, sand, the way the glass turned from red to gold to clear. He never complained about the burns on his arms, or the way the molten glass sometimes spat across the floor. He drew everything: the furnace, the tools, the scars on her father's hands.

On the seventh day, Chiara found him sitting on the step outside, a glass of cold water in his hand, his face pale with heat.

"You're going to faint," she said.

"I'm fine. The furnace is very dramatic."

"It's supposed to be."

She sat down beside him, the stones of the quay warm beneath them, the canal glittering in the afternoon sun.

"Why do you really want to change it?" she asked.

Luca turned the glass in his hands. "Because my grandfather was a carpenter in Brescia," he said. "He built a workshop with a window that faced the mountains, so he could see the weather change while he worked. I wanted to give you the same thing. Light. And a view."

Chiara was quiet. The water lapped against the quay.

"Can I ask you something?" she said.

"Yes."

"Do you want to design the studio, or do you want to design something for me?"

He looked at her, startled, then slowly, honestly thoughtful.

"I think I've been designing for you since the first morning," he said. "And I didn't know it until you told me I was wrong about the furnace."

She laughed, a little shaky. "Then tell me what you'd change, Luca. Not the furnace. Only the things that matter."

"The door," said Luca at once. "The old one sticks. And it lets the cold in when it's winter."

"That's true," said Chiara.

"And I'd put a window in the back wall, so you can see the lagoon when the sun sets. Just for you."

Her throat tightened. "That's very presumptuous of you."

"It's very honest of me," said Luca. "I'd like to ask you something else, though."

"Ask."

"Would you let me take you to dinner, tonight, on the other side of the lagoon? Somewhere with no glass at all, and no furnace, just cold wine and very bad jokes?"

Chiara's heart thudded hard. "Yes," she said. "But only if you promise to let me choose the wine, and to tell me when you're being presumptuous."

"Deal," said Luca, grinning.

"Green?" she asked, teasing.

"Green," said Luca. "Very green, with a slight tint of sunburn."