Chapter 4: First Light

I picked up the key.

"Monday," I said. "I start Monday."

"Monday the shop's closed," Casey said.

"Then Tuesday."

Bean let her breath out and punched the air.

I didn't sleep much Sunday night.

At three-forty on Monday morning I gave up and loaded the Hasselblad on the motel bed by the light of my phone.

My fingers forgot the film path twice.

The third time they remembered.

It was June fifteenth.

Ten years to the day since I'd stood on a granite ledge above Emerald Bay and waited for the light.

I'd told Casey on Sunday, when Bean asked where the picture was taken.

He hadn't said anything then.

At four-fifteen there was a knock on my motel door.

He was standing in the parking lot in a fleece jacket, holding two travel mugs.

"I have a boat," he said. "It's ugly. It's also faster than walking."

"Where's Bean?"

"Asleep at my sister-in-law's. She made me promise to wake her if you cried."

"I'm not going to cry."

"I'll tell her you said that."

The boat was a dented aluminum skiff with a search-and-rescue sticker on the console.

He volunteered on the lake rescue boat, he said, two nights a month.

That was the last thing he said for an hour.

We motored south along the west shore in the dark.

The water was black glass. The air was so cold it hurt my teeth.

He didn't ask me anything.

He didn't point at the stars or tell me about his boat.

He just drove, and handed me the mug when my hands started shaking, and took it back when they needed the camera.

The coffee was still terrible.

At the mouth of Emerald Bay he cut the engine.

We drifted in.

Fannette Island was a dark lump in the middle of the bay, the old stone teahouse on top of it.

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