Anilyque made abalone jewelry by day, by hand. Sitting on the beach in a Brazilian thong and a silk wrap blowing in the breeze, cheap sunglasses and sipping on a cocktail, she always attracted a crowd, and managed a pretty good living via the abalone jewelry sales that she made as a result. Practically every man in town, and more than a few women, were deeply in love with her.
As a child she had learned how to polish the broken shards she collected from morning walks on the beach with her grandmother. Learning to make abalone jewelry came later, when her grandmother passed, and she longed for something to remind her of those times, and her grandmother's kind face and roughened fingers, showing her how to make the shell shards shiny without scratching them or cracking the thinner pieces. Making abalone jewelry made her feel like she was still there next to her, guiding her hand. Jealous would-be suitors spat resentful indictments of her, claiming she preferred the touch of abalone jewelry on her skin to that of the touch of a man. They were only half right, but the touch she preferred was not that of the jewelry, but of a girl she had once dived for abalone with, and indeed lived and died for, until one day they were discovered and her lover's family took her far away from there, only after beating the girl half within an inch of her life. Anylique never again took another lover, biding her time until she could sold enough abalone jewelry to set out on a journey to seek out her true love.
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