365 Ficlets - Day #245 ~ "Throwing"

The grit in the clay was biting into his hands as he centred it, elbows locked on the rim of the wheel to make a triangle with its point over the centre. Even now, doing this simple task that he had done a thousand times before he could not push his anxiety away. It was going to be another six days before he would hear about the test results, and he needed to be able to live for those six days.

The clay centred, he started to create a simple bowl, pulling the clay from the centre between finger and thumb. He focused in on the bands of clay that he needed to flatten as he raised the wall of the bowl between his hands. The muscle memory, like the wisdom of his body, his hands, guided his movements and allowed him to perform this delicate task, while his mind raced with the whats and wherefores of his condition.

He finished the lip of the bowl, the wheel moving at half speed as he curled the edge down in a movement that reminded him of the way that a tyre is rotated onto a rim; if he had cancer he would fight it.