Jordan’s father sat holding a piece of sandpaper, looking over one shoulder. The image shimmered through the fixer bath, ghostly in the red light. Jordan heard his voice from that afternoon, as clearly as if he were standing here in the darkroom. What are you up to, missy?
Pretend I’m not here, Jordan remembered answering. I want a picture of you in the workshop.
These were some of the last pictures of her dad she’d taken. Jordan felt a tear slide down her chin, wiped it away. She’d been crying on and off for the last hour, since she’d come banging down into the darkroom at eleven at night to develop the prints. Why not? She couldn’t stand the thought of lying in bed staring at the ceiling. Couldn’t bear to think about tomorrow, another day working in the shop now that it was open again, helping train the new clerk and coming home to one of the funeral casseroles Anneliese had pulled out for them to eat in total silence. Just three of them around the table, not four . . . Jordan blinked hard, standing back from her row of prints.
“That one.” A low-angle shot of her father peering down at a tarnished card tray. “That’s the real you.” Daniel Sean McBride at work, the essential Daniel Sean McBride. It was him. It was good.
Jordan realized the tears were coming fast now. She let them fall, going on to the roll of shots she’d taken at the tiny airfield the day Garrett took her flying. She knew she should call Garrett; he’d been leaving messages. So had his mother, gentle hints about springtime dates for the rescheduled wedding. The thought of plunging back into wedding plans made Jordan want to shriek.
“I’ll call you tomorrow.” She sighed as she cleaned up her chemicals and trays.
As Jordan let herself back into the house, a slim pale figure moved out of the darkness at the foot of the hall stairs. “You couldn’t sleep either?”
Jordan started violently at Anneliese’s voice. “You scared me!”
“I’m sorry.” Anneliese pulled the sash tighter on her pale blue dressing gown. “I was going to make some cocoa. Would you like some?”
“Sure. Did Ruth wake you up again?”
“Her night frights are getting worse.” Anneliese moved into the kitchen on those soundless feet, pulling down two mugs. Taro padded in, keeping a watchful eye for any food that might hit the floor; Anneliese scratched her black ears fondly. “I don’t know how to deal with Ruth when she’s in such a state. She’s always been so biddable, I don’t know what to do with her when she’s not.”
“She just misses Dad.” Jordan sighed. “Is she asleep now?”
“Yes, finally. Now I’m the one tossing and turning.” Jordan’s stepmother looked fragile in the bright kitchen light, dark hair loose for once, face naked without its smoothing of powder and lipstick. “No, sit down,” she said as Jordan began to help with the stove. “You must be so tired, all those shifts you’ve been working at the shop.
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