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1800titz · 3 months

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HI. HELLO. Here is my Valentine’s Day contribution. POTTERYINSTRUCTOR!HARRY!! POTTERY MAN! WOOO. Basically almost 7K of clay sexualization and sexually charged fluff (ish). Enjoy! :D

CONTENT/WARNINGS: ridiculous sexualization of clay (I think I’ve managed to fetishize clay in this one??? OOPS), overly suggestive usage of pottery terms, a red-hot, hands-on tutorial for wheel throwing, and embarassingly long descriptions of Harry’s fingers coated in wet clay.

WC: 6.6K

slip: small bits of dry clay mixed with water to create a thick, creamy consistency

Clay is innately erotic.

Wheel throwing is, arguably, the most pornographic art form, its only competing opponent being, maybe, literal body-painting. And that latter one still falls as a close second. Close, but second.

Y/N decides that when she wanders into a little ceramics shop tucked away in a busy plaza downtown. There’s no method to her exploration, but the broad glass windows are adorned with dripping, colorful graffiti and its innards call to her. GLAZED, reads the large sign over the awning in blocky, white lettering, stippled with un-glowing light bulbs that she’s sure light alive in the night.

It’s a cute shop.

Upon entrance, the young woman discovers tables, as if set up for arts and crafts, crackling, clay covered wheels with shorter stools, and long, tall rows of shelving brimmed with colorless sculptures lining the walls. Despite its packed interior, the studio seems empty of people and quiet besides the soft notes of RÜFÜS DU SOL leaking from the overhead speakers. She roams beside the line of wheels over to a shelf by the door, admiring the myriad of statues there, some obviously crafted with expertise and elegant artistry, and others lopsided efforts that probably deserve a pitied gold star for effort.

Her eyes are caught on an unpainted little ashtray that’s got a crooked sort of bee in the center when her gaze breaks away to the sound of footsteps. Maybe the shop isn’t as abandoned as she’d previously believed — a man appears from behind a row of white shelving stacked with more unfinished pottery.

He’s a pretty man, that much she can decide from the downturned slope of his nose and his distracted lash line, focused on twisting the navy rag in his left hand over the tip of his right index finger. A dark baseball cap shrouds his hair, but little brunette tufts sneak out in curled bunches around his ears. That’s where Y/N finds a fun, little red-tinted pearl dangling from one lobe. He’s tatted in patchwork art — a mermaid with its tits out peeks at her from his forearm, soaked over and shining. She assumes he must have just been rinsing clay from that forearm, from his hands, no longer visible over his skin. However, streaks of dried gray stain over his white tee in crackling lines, like an old lamination on a well-loved t-shirt that’s been cycled through the washer one too many times. When he pulls the rag away, she discovers a shade of bright red that’s been painted over his nails.

Almost as if he can sense her presence without looking, his sneakers pause on the tile and he steals a peer up. Yes, he’s quite a pretty man, even when his features shape something caught off guard.

“Hello.”

His voice is rich — this smooth, bass-deep sort of sound driving a foreign lilt, and Y/N thinks that if it weren’t for his lengthy fingers and his cherry polished nails, if it weren’t for his handsomely sculpted face, if it weren’t for his seemingly innate effortless demeanor and style, that voice alone could make her fold.

“Hello,” she returns, aware that a nervous note plucks at her cadence, unlike his own casual greeting. I promise I’m not shoplifting clay pots in silence, she nearly tells him.

Thank fuck for the ability to physically bite your tongue.

“What can I help you with?” the man asks, sauntering forward a bit. It’s probably sort of a polite manner to say what the fuck are you doing here, and the longer the young woman stands in the middle of the empty shop the more out of place she feels, almost like this a private, little haven and she shouldn’t be in here right now.

The song shifts into its choral bass drop of electric keys. That fills the void of the silence as she swallows and fixes a little smile onto her face, fingers tightening over the strap of her tote.

“Oh, I’m just looking.”

The man purses his mouth and walks over to the counter, where the register is littered with paperwork and an eclectic collection of faux plants. He sets the rag down beside a floppy one with its green tendrils dangling over the edge.

“See anything you like?” his hand pinches over his nose, like he’s scratching an itch, before he sniffs and pivots to apparently decrease their proximity, “We’ve got loads — you can make something yourself, or,” another step, and Y/N’s eye bounce from his shorts to his tattooed knees to the hems of his white socks. “…If you know sculpting isn’t your craft, we’ve got ready-to-paint-one's on that shelf there.”

Her gaze follows the direction of his finger, where pasty ceramic bunnies, and angels, and cars line the shelving in multiples.

“I think—“ the young woman’s tongue peeks out to swipe over her mouth, words growing drier the longer she captures his stare. She focuses back on a lopsided rendition of strawberry, its leaves cradling over as a disconnected lid and its stem a crooked handle. “I like these. They’ve got so much character.”

She blinks back over to him and watches a soft smile shape over the cushiony pink of his mouth.

It only takes a moment — one where her sight draws back to the strawberry jar for a smidge of a second, before he’s so close that she can smell his cologne, spiced and clean. She ogles his arm, his hand, the way he reaches out between them to cull the piece, mildly appalled by the way he palms the sculpture and dwarfs it in his easy grasp. It’s such a casual maneuver, made almost as if he’s not fondling over something it’d take anyone else two hands to hold. Y/N imagines the dimpled form of clay coated over to match the color of his nails.

“They do, don’t they? I like this one, too. S’a little …ugly, but, s’in, like, a…” the man’s features twist into something silly and pinched, and the young woman rolls her lips into her mouth to avoid exposing her amusement at the brutal candor. His words catch in his throat and bubble as a short laugh, “I dunno. It’s art.”

He sets it back onto the shelf with a light clink, and turns to face her, posturing against a post in the shelving where the tiers have a break. An exhale becomes paired with his nonchalant lean, arms crossing over his pecs, and Y/N tries intensely not to stare like a hawk at the muscle there.

“I’m afraid people are coming back for these, though. This row came out of the kiln…” forest green skids to the assortment and then bounds up to the ceiling like he’s in thought, before he casts his gaze back onto her, “…yesterday. And there’s a month-and-a-half window for someone to come back and glaze before we toss or sell them to be painted.”

He’s chewing gum. Y/N realizes it when she admires the soft stubble coating his jaw, his cheeks — that’s when she notices the work of his jawline over the minty piece. He tips his head. “Did you want to try sculpting something?”

The edges of her lips break bashfully. “I don’t know if I’d be any good at it.”

One corner of the man’s mouth curls up lopsidedly, and the beginnings of a dimple nudge into place. He blinks and chews a little slower, “Have you ever worked with clay before?”

Her delayed, little no is met with the lopsided beam growing even. He nudges with his chin, deliciously bulging arms still tucked over his chest, his playfully raised eyebrows like a wordless notion of have more faith in yourself, “Then you may just be the next Magdalene Odundo. We’ll make a pro sculptor out of you, yet.”

Magdalene Odundo. Somehow, the name isn’t familiar, but simultaneously, somehow, it feels like a compliment.

Y/N inhales as his digits shift over his tri’s. “Okay.”

“Okay,” plush pink shapes a handsome smile, bordering bright white teeth in straight lines. The man tips his head towards the curved berry vase, and then looks back at her, “Did you want to do something like this? All these over here were made on the wheel.”

Y/N muzzles telling him that she’s no inkling of an idea how someone can morph a lump of clay into a vase, nevermind on a big, spinning platform that moves faster than her eyes can keep up with. The man seems to pick up on the hesitation in her silence.

“S’easy, I promise. I’ll show you how to throw.”

Show her. Okay. At least she’s not going to head into vase-sculpting or wheel-throwing or …whatever he’d called it blindly, fumbling over a block of clay on a twirling tray like a slapstick skit personified. At least it means she’s going to stay in his presence. After a moment of thought, though, (and the way she notes that his eyes make unwavering, relaxed contact with her face the entirety of the silent pause), Y/N decides she’s not sure whether that last bit is actually a good thing, considering she’s probably milliseconds away from, like, bracing a hand onto a the shelf to match his level of coolness, or something. And then subsequently sending ceramic pots spilling and shattering over the tile.

She blinks. Her shoulders rise on her nervous inhale, and he makes one of those playful faces, like he’s waiting for her to agree. The young woman’s eyes wander to the line of chairs pressed to its counterparts of wheels.

“I don’t wanna, like, trouble you—“

“You’re not. S’my job,” he tells her, crimson fingertips drumming. She catches sight of his fabric-clad pectorals flexing when he leans forward a little to tack on, “…And to be honest, it’d give me something to do besides fucking around with clay, which is what I’ve been doing for the last hour.”

Her mouth purses and then settles. “Okay.”

“Okay,” he says again, and then winds around through a row of little tables that resemble the set up of an art classroom, like the kind she’d have in school. She’s ashamed that her gaze wanders down the back of his arm to ogle the rest of his ink.

“You can have a seat at one of those wheels,” he tosses over his shoulder as he heads, she assumes, to wind back around the same shelf he’d surfaced from behind, “Just give me a mo’, and I’ll be right back with some clay.”

It takes Y/N a moment — mostly because she admires the view of his stature from behind as he migrates to a back hallway, irises roaming down the projection of muscles in his back showcased through his tee. They skim down his legs, down the backs of his knees, rest on toned calves. He’s gone far too quickly for her viewing pleasure. The young woman takes another glance at the uneven strawberry-esque vase, and then she pivots to step around the crowded assortment of wheels to crouch into one of those little roll-y stools, feet crossing and uncrossing in the cramped space.

He’s a sexy man, Y/N decides. That’s the word she’d been looking for all along, although pretty would match the descriptors of his long lashes and his pouty pink mouth. He’s sexy, though, in his baseball cap and his little six-inch-inseam shorts (which show off the sculpt of his tanned thighs and the ink over his kneecaps). He’s sexy when he comes out from the back over to her wheel, a gunmetal gray ball of clay cradled in his palm like it’s not the size of two of her own. He’s sexy in the green eye contact he makes when he settles into a stool similar to her own, right across, when his thighs splay because he doesn’t have enough room to sit otherwise, when he rests his elbows over his knees and stretches one arm out to pass off the clay. That’s when their digits brush, because it’s sort of unavoidable. He manages to make eye contact through that, too. Sexy.

“Okay. Clay,” the chilled ball the man hands off weighs her hand down, and Y/N’s gaze flickers up to meet his own when he instructs, “Toss it onto the wheel. Aim for the center.”

The young woman pauses like she’s calculating her aim, gearing up without visibly gearing up, and a little smile tugs at the instructor’s mouth as he waits. The clay lands with a thud onto the plate.

“Great,” he tells her, monitoring the centering, and then jade bounces back up to her face as he coaxes, “Smack for good luck.”

Y/N curbs the corners of her mouth out of mirth, hesitating for a moment before her palm lands over the smooth, gray lump in a halfhearted pat. She blinks up, hoping for assurance. The handsome man’s mouth purses like he’s restraining a grin.

“Harder,” he encourages after a second, the corners of his muted raspberry mouth seeping up a smidge, more openly, “S’not gonna cry. You can go a little harder than that.”

The young woman rolls her lips into her mouth, raises her hand, and follows his request, molding it flatter under the solid thud of her palm. Evidently, it’s a better attempt, because she earns a, “Very good,” in response from him.

She casts her gaze up to find him dipping his hands into the pot of murky water beside the wheel before a fist knocks lightly at the pedal-resembling lever on the opposite side, sending the wheel into a speeding twirl. And to add to her list of shame, the liquid that coats his fingers — that’s.

Yeah.

Y/N swallows and watches those wet hands cup over the clay, partly mesmerized by the way he coaxes the priorly deformed lump into a symmetrical cylinder, stroking up from the base up and back down, and partly mesmerized by the way the cherry polish becomes daubed with slicked clay.

“I’m just gonna get it nice and easy for you, and then you can get to the fun bits,” the man tells her as if he isn’t currently awakening some deep, deviously sexual desires in her by fondling clay. Jade flickers up. “M’Harry, by the way.”

“Y/N,” the young woman tells him in response, unsure whether to focus on his searing eye contact or the gentle press of his hands over … oddly erotic artistry in motion.

Harry unwittingly makes the decision for her by breaking the eye contact and glancing down at his work.

“Y/N,” he says, as if testing the taste of her name on his tongue.

Y/N takes a breath, smoothing her hands down her thighs.

“Y/N,” his strawberry mouth parts a tad for a soft breath in, honey smooth cadence glazed in concentration as he presses a flat palm over the top of the clay, keeping his other hand cupped over the length.

She watches the cylinder mold under his grip into something shorter, and then back up. She watches the way his arms flex, anchored to his body as he presses with the heels of his palms to sculpt.

“This is called coning. Makes the clay centered so your grip stays nice and even when it spins. Otherwise, s’gonna wobble, and you’ll feel it when you’re trying to work with it.”

Sure enough, after a few moments, when the man takes his clay-sullied palms away, what’d priorly been a lopsided hunk twirling over the platform stands symmetrically, shining post his wet grip. When he balls his hand into a fist and punches over the lever a handful of times, the plate slows to a stop. He blows out a breath and the music shifts to the next track in the background.

“Take your bracelet off for me.”

The comment is made totally innocuously. Its purpose is solely to preserve the condition of her jewelry — she knows that when his eyes go to meet hers again and he mentions, “Otherwise, it could get covered with clay, or break. Wouldn’t wanna ruin such a pretty piece.”

But it’s the way he says it, right? Two little words, so easy off his tongue. So nonchalant, so purely intended with no ulterior motive. For me. For me, for me, for me.

It’s shameful — she’s ashamed. She’s no better than a man, Y/N decides, as she peers to the silver bangle with the sliver of warmth slithering through her chest and snaking to her tummy. She’s no better than a man, objectifying this poor, effortlessly sexy ceramics instructor and his casual commentary on a Wednesday. She swallows.

“Right. Thanks— thank you,” the young woman tells him, her tone garbled with nervous enthusiasm as the fingers of her opposite hand wriggle under the clasp to pop the piece off.

She’s still feeling dubious about the morality of her thoughts once she’s slipped the bracelet into her tote by her feet and sat back up.

“Alright,” Harry starts again, elbows braced to his sturdy thighs, “We’re gonna go over what this little thing over here does, because it’s good to know. It sets your speed. We’ve got options—“

Y/N watches the way his arm stretches, she eyes the tail of the mermaid, the lines of scales etched into his skin. His eyes meet her own again.

“…Fast,” Harry knocks over the lever again with the butt of a vertical fist, a couple more nudges rocketing the wheel into a motion that dissolves priorly visible remnants of clay rings into fast-moving swirls with no decipherable borders.

Another few nudges has the wheel skidding to a full-stop, and then stuttering back up into a spin when he taps over the pad once more.

“…Slow,” Harry fixes his gaze back onto her face and watches the curious concentration there. The man sits back up a tad, elbows bracing over his splayed thighs and fingers crooked and lax, coated with slippery wetness and clay. “Find what feels good for you. S’different for everyone.”

Despite the way the directions are made so innocently, so obviously stated as a tutorial that’s not intended to be taken as something suggestive, Y/N finds a heat teeming over her cheekbones.

“But, I recommend—“ her teeth lodge into the inside of her cheek with subtlety as the instructor hunches a little again, just a tad, to rap over the lever in a pair. The wheel speeds. “—Sticking to something around this.”

The pace of the wheel settles into an easy spin — something that’s still too quick for her eyes to keep up with, but apparently not the fastest setting, judging by the higher speeds he’d displayed moments prior.

“Alright. Here’s where you come in with your undiscovered ceramic talents,” the instructor tells her, the edges of his mouth so obviously restrained, like he’s amused with his own playful banter. His eyes glinting softly under the buttery light cast by the overhanging lanterns,”M’gonna show you how to drill, but you’ll need to get your hands wet first.”

Harry sits back, elbows still braced to his thighs, hands now coated with slippery clay as he waits for the young woman to douse her own into the bucket. The liquid greets her palms with a welcome chill, and when she lightly cups over the cylinder, it slips under her hands with ease. The man clears his throat, and their digits graze again when he touches over her fingers to guide her grasp. Y/N tries not to focus on the way his hands make her own look as if they belong to a child.

“You’re gonna take your thumbs—” Harry coaxes, all concentrated seriousness now, and the pad of his own brushes against the knuckle of her left, “—and press over the top, here. Right in the middle, just like that.”

He takes his hands away and the clay rolls under her fingertips, a divot forming from the pressure of her thumbs.

“Good. Now what you’ve done is you’ve indicated where you’re going to make the opening. And to do that—“ his hands return, unintentionally persuading her own to fall away and sort of hover stagnantly mid-air, in sullied awe, as he dips the tip of his index into the cleft they’d created together.

As if hungry for the finger, the clay parts to swallow the pad of the digit. It broadens its starving mouth, and Harry steadies the spread with his thumb, his pointer delving against the inside of the deepening wall. His opposite hand cups over the body as he molds the opening wider.

Anyways, what Y/N manages to learn from the impressive showcase, before Harry steals a glance to make sure she’s been observing (which she has, very focused, actually), is that clay-working is a dirty, dirty, lustrous art form. Especially under his fingertips. This is all very educational stuff. Perhaps the most impressive step of his tutorial, thus far, is the way that, in mere moments, he cups and strokes and caresses over the clay, drawing the opening tighter. It shrinks until it disappears, and when he smooths his hands over the rounded edges a few more times, the vessel that’s left is an entirely clean slate. Almost as if she hadn’t just spent the last few seconds ogling a weirdly pornographic display of a clay cavern opening in response to the touch of his long finger. This was a horrible mistake, Y/N thinks pitifully — she’s getting aroused by clay working. If there was ever a blaring red indicator that she needed to get laid, this is it.

“I want you to try now,” Harry directs, totally nonchalant. This is just a casual Wednesday for him, Y/N realizes. He casually fingers clay with his sexy, long fingers, and thinks nothing of it. Maybe she’s just a horribly wound-up pervert.

Still sort of stunned, she reaches out and cups over the cylinder, clumsily positioning her thumbs in a replication of the manner he’d shown her, aiming for the center and driving a divot into the top.

“Mm. That’s good. Keep your elbows closer to your body,” he prompts, eyes flickering from her posture to her hands. “Like this.”

Following his body language, Y/N mimics, ducking a tad and tucking her arms to her torso. After a few moments, she lifts her thumbs to find a centered indent, one that’s similar to the one they’d created together.

“Lovely. Now,” the chair makes a little rolling sound over the tile as Harry shifts forward, clay-slicked hands (warm, despite their cool coating) cradling over her own to position, “You’re gonna cup here, and then take this finger and push here. Yep. Jus’ like that.”

The instructor takes his grip away and encourages, “If you need more water, get your hands wet. You can tell you need it if there’s friction — you want it a little wet.”

She wants it a little wet. Y/N decides, as she dunks her hands into the bucket and returns to the clay, she in fact does not want anything wet right now. This is the last place she wants something wet. Her thoughts are disturbed by the way he grasps her at her hands again and repositions — twisted by the slippery feel of his own wet fingers. The clay over his palms has begun to dry now, morphing lighter and crackling, but the tips of his digits are still soaked and darker in shade. She’s awed when the cylinder gives under her touch, the same way it had for him to encompass her finger. It’s like magic, sort of. Very slippery, wet, weirdly erotically undertone-d magic.

“There you go,” Harry tells her, baritone soft, “You’re a pro.” Then, after a moment, “You can go a little harder. Don’t be shy. Open it up.”

She’s not blushing. She’s not blushing, because that would be silly. She presses harder, and the opening widens until it gapes.

“How long have you worked here?” the young woman asks, naturally trying to change the subject from wet and hard things. Hopefully in an organic enough manner that doesn’t imply how affected she is by said wet and hard things.

“I bought this place a few years ago,” Harry responds after a second, tone concentrating as he reaffixes the firmness of her grasp (she tries not to verbally apologize, glancing up), “…Both units. It was a smoke shop before, I think.”

“Oh!” her hands stutter again in surprise, “Are you the owner?”

He fixes them again, brows pinched, and when he glances up, his brow bone is smooth and there’s a soft smile playing over his mouth. “Indeed I am.”

“It’s …beautiful in here,” Y/N tells him, gaze walloping from shelf to shelf for a moment, lantern lined ceilings to vine-coated crown molding, trusting that his hands will keep her own grounded to the piece.

“Thanks. It’s a little crowded, but if you manage to get lost among the …phallic statues and the clay bongs,” he cocks his head, blatantly bridling a simper as he shrugs. At the response of her snort, jade flickers up and the plush of his mouth curls more obviously, “…You’ll find your way out of the maze soon enough.”

As the walls of the clay grow thinner, the instructor takes his grip away, swiping at his forehead with the back of his hand. “Alright. What are we going for here? A mug? A vase? A bong masquerading as a vase?”

Y/N takes the lack of his touch as an indication to lighten her own. She purses her lips thoughtfully. “A vase.”

“A vase,” the instructor parrots, voice low, and then he hunches back over and cups the clay. The young woman returns her hands to meet his own. “I can work with that. We’re gonna build it up. You’re gonna squeeze and lift. Right—“

If his fingers keep brushing hers for the duration of the next …half hour? Hour? (How long does throwing take?), Y/N decides she’ll simply combust. His hands cup lightly over her own, two digits pressed to hers, and hers pinned to the inner wall of the clay in sin.

“—Here. That’s it. You can be a little aggressive. We’ve gotta get it tall.”

Y/N swallows.

“You said you own both units?” she ponders aloud, “Is there …more?”

“My place,” Harry tells her nonchalantly, as if it’s the most casual, normal, every day thing to live over a ceramics studio, “S’just over on the next floor.”

“That’s—“ she realizes her grasp has lightened again, the integrity of the structure mostly only crawling up under the pressure of his own (steady, firm) grip over hers, “…so cool. To have, like, a whole studio right under you.”

“Mm. I think right now…” Harry cranes his neck to peer up at the ceiling, “We’re under my kitchen.”

A little breath of mirth tumbles from her when he grins and tacks on, “I think this is way cooler, though.”

This is The Turning Point.

And if it was a scene title in a play, Y/N thinks it would be capitalized to denote the importance. It’s important, because somewhere along the trail of her perversions, as Harry had guided her hands into the innards of the clay — fittingly describing it as the body — when he’d pressed his hands against her own to widen its base, when he’d shown her the sponge, things had clicked. It had clicked because she realized she wasn’t fucking crazy. Because Harry then said this thing — this one little thing that would have launched her into a frenzied, internal mess of dubious morality on the basis of her perversions—

But then it clicked.

“Careful with the amount of water you’re using now, yeah?” he’d told her, maneuvering her grip over the sponge as they’d smoothed over the lip together, “S’all about balance. …If you go too hard, you’ll make a wet mess.”

Y/N had glanced up. That’s when she’d noticed the way the instructor gnawed into his cheek, almost immediately, almost as if he was amused by some sort of devious inside joke. And then his blocky front teeth had dug lightly into the plush of his pink bottom lip. It was nearly unnoticeable — but she had noticed. Clay was innately erotic, and he was doing it on purpose. It was one, or the other, or both.

For a little while from there, they work in blatantly charged silence. It’s a very short while, all things considered, and she’s willing to clam up altogether and daydream about his digits for the duration of the lesson, but the tone of his next words nearly gives her whiplash.

“So what are you doing on this lovely Valentine’s day?” Harry breaks the silence, once again, his tone so even and nonchalant that Y/N can’t begin to fathom where his composure comes from.

The young woman clears her throat, “Oh. Y’know. Trying my hand at ceramics. The yuzh.”

Jade doesn’t immediately jolt up when he ponders aloud, “Dinner plans?”

“Not any on the calendar …that I’m aware of.”

His touch doesn’t lighten, but he does glance up, mouth all (apparently) disbelieving mirth, “You’re telling me you’re not being wined and dined tonight?”

Feigning offense, the young woman sets her mouth into a line and nudges with her chin in a nod, joking, “Thank you for the reminder.”

Harry laughs softly, one of those little breaths expelled through his nostrils, and he looks back down to the vase-in-progress, gentle grin undeniable. Y/N matches his amusement, faux indignation crackling.

“You’re too pretty not to have a Valentine,” the instructor tells her, then, decibel low, almost like it was meant to be under his breath but also entirely not, and all Y/N can do is sit there with instant heat seeping to her face. Because that’s flirting. That’s definitely flirting. Her sexy ceramics instructor is helping her craft a vase out of clay on a wheel with his sexy hands, and he’s openly flirting.

Y/N stuffs down how initially stunned she is to chew into her bottom lip and volley, “I bet you say that to every girl that comes in here.”

Harry shrugs. It’s still almost an enraging level of cucumber-cool and composed.

“Just the pretty ones.” He tacks on, after a moment, “And only on Valentine’s day. Don’t think that line would fit well on a random Wednesday.”

Y/N snorts. She’s still basking in the pleasant warmth of the flattery when the man peers up and tells her, “I do accept tips, by the way, so. Feel free to leave a tip for the friendly service.”

“I will—“ she snorts, restraining her open amusement at the way his brows crinkle in concentration as he helps her grip, “—definitely do that.”

“Sick,” his tongue peeks out to swipe over his lips, disappearing back into his mouth as quick as the pink had showcased. Jade flits up, the corners of his mouth curled up in a little pause of silence, almost he wants to make it crystal clear he does not actually want a tip for hitting on her.

Anyways, this is all a flustered mess. All of it. Y/N, the pot she’s sure will grow off-center and wobble under her shaky grip, all of it.

“What about you?” the young woman takes a deep breath, hoping some sort of breathing exercise will help slow the buzzy flutter of her heartbeat, “Any wining and dining? For Valentine’s day?”

“Not on the calendar,” Harry responds, sliding her own words back to her, his gaze still honed on the work ahead of them, now impressively morphed from a lumpy, shapeless ball into the beginnings of a vase, “As for how I’m spending my Valentine’s day, I did just show this one pretty girl how to shape and smooth. And now, …m’gonna show her how to shape some more.”

Y/N bats her lashes, and then she observes the work of his clay caked fingers, the way they curl and press over the vase in different points of the body, some motions widening the rim and some drawing it more narrow. He bids their tutorial a pause shortly after, explaining, “I’m gonna give you some creative freedom now. Figure out what shape you like.”

Despite the slight disappointment budding at the close of their conversation, for now, the daunting task of unsupervised throwing is what probably surfaces on her face, more. The instructor catches it when he rolls back in the stool and stands, ogling her for a moment, mirthy mouth caving up in a way that suggests she must look like a deer in headlights.

“It’s intimidating, but I believe in you. I’ll just be in the back for a sec, give me a shout if you need me.”

Y/N shifts her legs, pressing her thighs together when he adds, “Play around with it.”

All in all, they manage to end the wheel session with (Y/N thinks, impressively) only a couple of hiccups, both being opportunities presented with unsupervised sculpting. When she’d played around with it (his words) a little too much and had coaxed a priorly even shape into something lopsided and petrifying, it’d swung around on the wheel, each turn quickening its slow but sure collapse. She’d called out for the instructor with a frantic note to his name. Of course, both times, Harry had come out from the back and patiently squeezed over the clay, hands and forearms jolting and flexing deliciously as he’d encouraged it back into something centered (yet another opportunity to stare at slick clay glazing over his fingers all over again), reassuring her that it was normal to struggle, especially with her first time.

Y/N wonders if he’s constantly full of innuendos, or whether a ceramics studio is just innately an opportunity for double entendres.

She tries not to make it too obvious when she stands on wobbling legs, when she brushes past him and catches soft notes of his cologne, clean and musky. When he directs her to the bathroom where she rinses clay from her hands into one of those artsy, utility sinks. When she sits at one of the tables, waiting for him to bring the vase over to her, torched and ready for additions, when he gives her another colorless lump. She tries not to make it obvious when she ogles more of his arms, the peek of his nipples through the white, clay-stained fabric of his tee shamelessly. She fears it’s utterly obvious how affected he’s made her, though, when she blinks up at his face, when he shows her what the different little tools in the cup do for sculpting. Y/N doesn’t even look away from him at the introduction of the first tool. She thinks that’s the one that must cross-hatch, driving little lines into the clay.

“This is called slip,” Harry explains, dipping the tips of his index and middle fingers into the cup near the brushes with no hesitation. The consistency over his fingers, when he pulls them out, is like a wetter, creamier, sloppier variation of the same clay she’d worked with.

Christ.

“You put it over the lines you’ve carved to make more clay stick,” the instructor expands.

Y/N swallows when he smears the consistency coating his fingers onto the lines he’d drawn, his gaze bouncing from his touch to her face.

“Like, if you wanted to add a handle to a mug, you’d use this method. Or, alternatively,” the young woman focuses on the way the pads of the digits rub over the lines. They fade away. “It’s like an eraser. Careful with erasing, though. …Wet mess.”

The latter is tacked on as a reminder, and it wonderfully reminds her of the heat coiling in the pit of her tummy. Wonderfully. She swallows again.

“You can probably use that brush to apply the slip, though, if you don’t want to get your hands dirty again.”

Flowers. She sculpts flowers with a searing heat between her thighs, because his added little comment of, “I don’t mind,” as he glances to the slip still glazing his fingers, implying that he doesn’t mind to get his hands dirty, does that to her. Y/N sculpts flowers and they settle into a comfortable sort of silence. It’s one where the only sounds are the soft music playing over the speakers and the occasional noise of pages turning from behind the counter as he leans over it and works through some kind of paperwork. She draws lines into the vase, and brushes on the slip, and presses creased flowers to decorate the bulbous body, concentration etching her features.

She doesn’t notice when she goes over the hours of operation, and Harry doesn’t disturb her, doesn’t tell her that the shop’s been closed for nearly half an hour by the time she peers up and declares, “I’m done.”

“You’re done,” the man repeats and sets the paperwork down, making his way over to the table where she’d set up, “Let’s have a look.”

Y/N sits back admiring her artistry. All things considered, it’s sort of an ugly vase. Despite this, a sense of accomplishment buds in her chest as she stares at her creation.

“I like it,” Harry tells her, nodding like he’s proud of a promising protégé, “It’s quite sweet.”

“Thank you. What now?”

“Now—“ the instructor props one hand onto the countertop and the other against his hip, “You wash your hands, you take a picture, and you come back in three weeks to sand it and glaze it.”

Simple. It’s a simple set of instructions. Y/N brushes crackling, dried clay off of her fingertips against the cloth laid over the table, instinctively reaching for her purse.

She blinks up at him expectantly, “How much?”

Dimples wink awake with his soft simper, and he shifts his stance before he asserts, “Don’t worry about it.”

The young woman’s features shape into something crinkled, something bemused and unwilling of a discount. She shakes her head and glances back down to the tote, “No, I have to pay you. What about your tip?”

Harry crosses his arms over his chest, pecs flexing with the motion. Flexing, flexing, flexing, when will his muscles stop rippling? He sighs, cushiony mouth still smiling, “I think I’ll live. My tip was that I’ve helped you discover a hidden talent—“

Y/N snorts, eyeing the sloppy attachments to the shapely base, fingers still tucked over her wallet.

“—It’d defeat the satisfaction and all the pride I’ve got now,” the man declares, shrugging.

The unconvinced look she gives him coaxes him into a good-natured roll of his eyes, and Harry tuts before he compromises, raising his eyebrows, “But if you must tip me, you can tip me when you come back in three weeks, yeah?”

Begrudged, the young woman takes her hand from the edges of her wallet. “Fine. Okay.”

“Okay. Three weeks,” the man reminds her, a little smile playing over the plush of his mouth.

The world of ceramics is oddly pornographic, Y/N decides. But maybe clay isn’t innately erotic. Maybe it’s the way the man’s fingertips mold its shape, the way his digits look soaked in slip, the way his hands cradle over it as a wheel spins under his ducked stature. Maybe it’s the way his jade irises flit to her face when he makes an educational comment that’s obviously suggestive, Maybe it doesn’t have to do with clay, at all. Maybe it’s Harry.

Maybe it’s the way he tells her, “If I were you, I wouldn’t miss it. Glazing is my favorite part.”

#harry styles #harry styles smut #(ish)? there’s a lot of innuendos in this one #harry styles dirty one shot #harry styles writing #harry styles one shots #harry styles fluff #harry styles one shot #harry styles fanfic #harry styles x y/n #harry styles x you #harry styles x reader #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles valentine’s day fic #valentine’s day fic

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