The Photographer's Return novel · Chapter 14 of 24

Chapter 14: The Darkroom

I came back and sat down on the bottom bunk.

I couldn't see him.

Just the slats of the top bunk, and one bare foot hanging over the edge.

"Can I tell you the true thing?" I said. "Even the hard parts?"

The foot went still.

"Okay."

"I didn't leave you. I left the house."

"That's the same thing."

"It's not. You were in Bali. I was always coming back for you. I just wasn't coming back to that house."

"Why?"

I picked my words.

"Because the grown-ups in that house weren't being kind to me. And I got sad. Sadder than you could see. So sad I forgot how to be anybody."

"You mean me. I wasn't kind."

"I mean the grown-ups. You're seven. Seven-year-olds laugh when the grown-ups laugh. That's how kids are made."

He didn't say anything.

The foot went back and forth, slowly.

"Did you find the box?" he said. "In my backpack?"

"Yes."

"Are you mad?"

"Not at you."

"If I eat your food, Dad knows. He always asks me. And then he does the quiet."

"You can tell him the truth. Whatever the truth is. That's never going to get you in trouble with me."

"What if the truth is I ate it?"

"Then that's the truth."

He thought about that for a long time.

"Why did you take your camera?"

"Because before you were born I took pictures. Really good ones. And I stopped. And I missed it so much I forgot what I sounded like when I laughed."

"Like a goose."

"Like a goose."

"Are you going to stop being my mom so you can be a picture lady?"

"No. I'm going to be both. Lots of moms are two things at once."

The foot disappeared.

He rolled over and looked down at me through the gap at the end of the bunk, upside down, his hair hanging.

"Do you love me?"

"I loved you before you were born. I loved you every time you spat. I loved you when you told the man in Bali to call me. I'll love you if you never eat one thing I cook, ever, for your whole life."

He looked at me upside down for a long time.

"I knew your number," he said.

"I know you did."

"I didn't forget it. Not even once."

"I know, baby."

He pulled his head back up.

A minute later he said, very sleepy, "Can I sleep at Bean's aunt's on Friday? She has a trampoline. Bean said."

"I'll ask."

"Bean says her aunt makes waffles in the shape of..."

He didn't finish.

He was asleep.

I sat on the bottom bunk in the dark until my legs went numb.

On Friday I drove both kids to Kings Beach.

Bean's aunt met us on the lawn with a spatula in one hand.

Milo was on the trampoline before I'd turned off the engine.

He didn't look back.

This time I didn't mind.

I drove back along the shore to the shop with the windows down.

Casey was behind the counter, closing out the register.

He looked up when the bell rang.

"They're fine," I said. "She made waffles shaped like dinosaurs."

"She does that."

"I have a roll to develop."

"It's nine o'clock at night."

"I know what time it is."

He looked at me over his reading glasses for a second.

Then he flipped the sign to CLOSED.

On Wednesday I'd shot a whole roll of the kids without them noticing.

Bean's braid flying. Milo holding the string. The laundry basket coming down over Casey's head.

I developed it by the old wind-up clock and hung the strip to dry.

Then I made a print, while Casey leaned in the doorway and watched.

The darkroom was small enough that he couldn't help being close.

The red safelight turned everything the color of the inside of an eyelid.

I slid the paper into the developer and rocked the tray.

The picture came up out of the white, slowly, the way they always do.

The basket. Casey's shocked mouth under it. And on the steps, my son, doubled over, laughing.

I'd never once had a picture of him laughing.

My hands stopped on the tray.

Casey came up behind me.

He didn't touch me at first.

He just stood there, so close I could feel the warmth of his chest through the back of my shirt.

"That's a good one," he said into my hair.

"He ate two grilled cheeses."

"He did."

"He told me a joke about a jay on the way to Kings Beach. It didn't make any sense."

"Jay jokes never do."

His hands found my hips, very lightly.

I leaned back into him.

His mouth touched the side of my neck, just under my ear, and my whole body went hot.

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