Free Yield by Jenna Howard

ran her thumb over the tip, studying the edge then down the narrow neck. Beside her the phone chirped a few times. Pressing her thumb against the pale wood, she shut one eye as she looked at a child’s ukulele on the wall. “Well, hi,” she said as she picked up her pencil, frowning at her phone when it nagged her again.
    Kate.
    Second. I gotta do this before it’s gone.
    What?
    Kate.
    Kate.
    She bent over the sketchbook and put the piece down before it was gone. Not that it would disappear, but yeah. Once it was in her head, it was there, but now…now it was tangible. “Fun,” she said as she looked at the drawing. The cherry red of the ukulele’s sound hole with the tip of the drum stick dangling in the middle. Fishing wire, she thought, so it looked invisible. She’d keep the chipped paint surrounding the sound hole because it had musical notes and she’d carve on onto the drum stick. The nylon strings braided to make up the chain for the oversized necklace. “Jamboree.” Not done. She drew a fine line at the bottom followed by a musical note that would sparkle there. Red? Oh yeah, red.
    Smiling she tapped the drum stick on the floor and picked up her phone. Sorry. That was rude.
    Hm.
    Do you still want the secret?
    If it’s that you brat, not really a secret.
    That made her grin. I don’t brat. Do I?
    My hand. Your ass. That’s what bratting gets you.
    A shiver moved down her spine and she flattened her hand on her stomach. You keep saying that and yet…
    My hand. Your ass. Tell me.
    Kate exhaled and realized she was nervous. Really nervous. You know that ring on your left thumb? I gave that to you.
    She shook out her hands and hunched over her phone. I made it.
    I know.
    What? How… You know?
    Now I have a secret.
    Kate stuck her tongue out at the phone and went to retrieve the ukulele. In the bedroom upstairs she had all her heavy-duty machinery. A band saw was against the wall, while a lathe was along the other, and a table saw sat in the middle of the room. Just your normal loft decor.  
    Really, she probably should’ve found an industrial workspace, but here she had a view out the large windows of the harbor. The space didn’t feel like a shop class. It felt like a studio. And it was hers. While there were no pictures of her family and she was no longer hoarding images of Jace, this space had Kate Jace Jennings all over it. Her bedrooms at the apartment and the mansion were just for sleeping in. This was where she lived.
    She pulled on her work apron and grabbed her safety glasses. Her phone was set on the low wall that opened up the workshop to the loft, music playing from it. Not Cyanide. Sitting on her stool, she unstrung the ukulele and set the small tuning pegs in a little bucket to be added to the storage shelves. Next she took the ukulele to the table saw, adjusted everything and with a small prayer to the machine gods that she didn’t cut off anything that needed to stay attached, mostly to her, she neatly sliced off the front of child’s instrument.
    Next she dug out a compass, marked her cut line plus her destination line and slowly cut the circle out. Sitting on the floor, with music filling the space with happy beats, she began to sand. Forget meditation, this was her zen. When the light began to fade from the windows, she finally turned on her lights and returned to smoothing the wood. She loved it when the circle became a true circle, when the broken edges were gone. Finally no marker remained and she blew off the wood dust. She turned it around to see the hand painted musical notes frame the inner circle. In some places the gold notes were faded, perhaps where the heel of a small hand had rested. Resting her elbows on her bent knees, the smell of sawdust tickling her nose, Kate felt at one with the world.  
    This was where she belonged. Here there were no doubts, no insecurities. No one judged her. No addict mother haunted the corners here, no uncaring father, no snotty