collapsed to the floor, his sobs first strangled and then silent, as if he could not gather enough air to express his anguish.
Grace’s father raised her until his heart, weakened from a childhood bout with rheumatic fever, gave out during Grace’s freshman year of college. An uncle out in Los Angeles volunteered to take her in, but Grace was of age by now. She decided to stay east and make her own way.
The deaths of her parents had been devastating, of course, but they had also given Grace’s life a strange sense of urgency. There is a left-behind poignancy for the living. Those deaths added amplification to the mundane. She wanted to jam in the memories, get her fill of the life moments and-morbid as it sounds-make sure her kids had plenty to remember her by when she too was no more.
It was at that moment-thinking about her own parents, thinking about how much older Emma and Max looked now than in last year’s apple-picking photo shoot-when she stumbled across the bizarre photograph.
Grace frowned.
The picture was near the middle of the pack. Closer to the back maybe. It was the same size, fitting neatly in with the others, though the backing sheet was somewhat flimsier. Cheaper stock, she thought. Like a high-end office-supply photocopy maybe.
Grace checked the next picture. No duplicate this time. That was strange. Only one copy of this photograph. She thought about that. The picture must have fallen in somehow, mixed up with another roll.
Because this photograph did not belong to her.
It was a mistake. That was the obvious explanation. Think for a moment about the quality workmanship of, say, Fuzz Pellet. He was more than capable of screwing up, right? Of putting the wrong photograph in the middle of her pack?
That was probably what was going on here.
Someone else’s photograph had gotten mixed in with hers.
Or maybe…
The photograph had an old look about it-not that it was black-and-white or antique sepia. Nothing like that. The print was in color, but the hues seemed… off somehow-saturated, sun-faded, lacking the vibrancy one would expect in this day and age. The people in it too. Their clothes, their hair, their makeup-all dated. From fifteen, maybe twenty years ago.
Grace put it down on the table to take a closer look.
The images in the photograph were all slightly blurred. There were four people-no, wait, one more in the corner-five people in the photograph. There were two men and three women, all in their late teens, early twenties maybe-at least, the ones she could see clearly enough appeared to be around that age.
College students, Grace thought.
They had the jeans, the sweatshirts, the unkempt hair, that attitude, the casual stance of budding independence. The picture looked as if it’d been snapped when the subjects were not quite ready, in mid-gather. Some of the heads were turned so you only saw a profile. One dark-haired girl, on the very right edge of the photo, you could only see the back of her head, really, and a denim jacket. Next to her there was another girl, this one with flaming-red hair and eyes spaced wide apart.
Near the middle, one girl, a blonde, had-God, what the hell was that about?-her face had a giant X across it. Like someone had crossed her out.
How had this picture…?
As Grace kept staring, she felt a small ping in the center of her chest. The three women-she didn’t recognize them. The two men looked somewhat alike, same size, same hair, same attitude. The guy on the far left too was not someone she knew.
She was sure, however, that she recognized the other man. Or boy. He wasn’t really old enough to call a man. Old enough to join the army? Sure. Old enough to be called a man? He was standing in the middle, next to the blonde with the X through her face…
But it couldn’t be. His head was in mid-turn for one thing. That adolescent-thin beard covered too much of his face…
Was it her husband?
Grace bent closer. It was, at best, a profile shot. She hadn’t known Jack when he was this young. They had met thirteen years ago on a beach in the Cote d’Azur in southern France. After more than a year of surgery and physical therapy, Grace was still not all the way back. The headaches and memory loss remained. She had the limp-still has it now-but with all the publicity and attention from that tragic night still suffocating her, Grace had just wanted to get away for a while. She matriculated at the University of Paris, studying art in earnest. It was while on break, lying in the sun on the Cote d’Azur, that she met Jack for the first time.
Was she sure it was Jack?
He looked different here, no doubt about it. His hair was a lot longer. He had this beard, though he was still too young and baby-faced for it to come in full. He wore glasses. But there was something in the way he stood, the tilt of his head, the expression.
This was her husband.
She quickly sifted through the rest of the roll. There were more hayrides, more apples, more arms raised in mid-pick. She saw one that she’d taken of Jack, the one time he’d let her have the camera, control freak that he was. He was reaching so high, his shirt had moved up enough to show his belly. Emma had told him that it was eeuw, gross. That, of course, made Jack pull up the shirt more. Grace had laughed. “Work it, baby!” she’d said, snapping the next photo. Jack, much to Emma’s ultimate mortification, obliged and undulated.
“Mom?”
She turned. “What’s up, Max?”
“Can I have a granola bar?”
“Let’s grab one for the car,” she said, rising. “We need to take a ride.”
• • •
Fuzz Pellet was not at the Photomat.
Max checked out the various themed picture frames-“Happy Birthday,” “We Love You, Mom,” that kind of thing. The man behind the counter, resplendent in a polyester tie, pocket protector, and short-sleeve dress shirt flimsy enough to see the V-neck tee beneath it, wore a name tag that informed one and all that he, Bruce, was an assistant manager.
“May I help you?”
“I’m looking for the young man who was here a couple of hours ago,” Grace said.
“Josh is gone for the day. Something I can do for you?”
“I picked up a roll of film a little before three o’clock…”
“Yes?”
Grace had no idea how to put this. “There was a photo in there that shouldn’t have been.”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“One of the pictures. I didn’t take it.”
He gestured toward Max. “I see you have young children.”
“Excuse me?”
Assistant Manager Bruce pushed his glasses up off the end of his nose. “I was just pointing out that you have young children. Or at least, one young child.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Sometimes a child picks up the camera. When the parent isn’t looking. They snap a picture or two. Then they put the camera back.”
“No, it’s not that. This picture had nothing to do with us.”
“I see. Well, I’m sorry for the inconvenience. Did you get all the photos you took?”
“I think so.”
“None were missing?”
“I really didn’t check that closely, but I think we got them all.”
He opened a drawer. “Here. This is a coupon. Your next roll will be developed for free. Three by fives. If you want the four by sixes, there is a small surcharge.”
Grace ignored his outstretched hand. “The sign on the door says you develop all the pictures on site.”
“That’s right.” He petted the large machine behind him. “Old Betsy here does the job for us.”
“So my roll would have been developed here?”
“Of course.”
Grace handed him the Photomat envelope. “Could you tell me who developed this roll?”
“I’m sure it was just an honest error.”
“I’m not saying it wasn’t. I just want to know who developed my roll.”
He took a look at the envelope. “May I ask why you want to know?”
“Was it Josh?”
“Yes, but-”
“Why did he leave?”
“Pardon me?”
“I picked up the photos a little before three o’clock. You close at six. It’s nearly five now.”
“So?”
“It seems strange that a shift would end between three and six for a store that closes at six.”
Assistant Manager Bruce straightened up a bit. “Josh had a family emergency.”
