Chapter 24: One Last Look

The next June, the university hired me for graduation day.

I wore a black jacket with a staff lanyard, and two cameras on straps.

Nell had cried when I told her.

"They put you in the same jacket," she said. "That's insane. I love it."

I stood at the edge of the quad at eleven in the morning, with the ceremony tent behind me.

The lawn lay green and wide in front of it.

Gideon stood a few yards to my left.

He had taken the day off to carry my second bag.

He had told the dean it was the only job he wanted.

My mother sat in a folding chair by the hedge with a hat on.

She had come in on the train the night before, and she waved at me with both hands.

I waved back.

Nine hundred graduates came out of the tent in black gowns, squinting in the sun.

I raised the first camera and started to work.

A father hoisting his daughter off the ground.

Two roommates screaming.

A boy kissing his grandmother's hand.

I photographed all of it, and I looked at each face while I did.

It was nearly noon when a girl in a green gown came across the grass in new heels.

She was talking to her mother on her phone and not watching her feet.

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