The gate groans opens, and I think he’s going to plead the fifth. But then he turns onto the street and says, “My dad died of pancreatic cancer when I was ten, shortly after he married Isabel. He didn’t tell me until after the wedding, but I think he knew before. Sometimes I think I’m the reason he married her. So I wouldn’t be alone.” He scoffs at the irony. As soon as his father died, Isabel shipped him off to boarding school, absolutely alone.
“And your mom?” I ask.
“She died when I was born.”
I may have braced myself for the answer, but it still comes like a wallop—an aggressive hit that knocks the world off kilter.
Jude doesn’t notice.
His grip is tight on the wheel, his attention fixed steadfastly on the road. “She died in labor. Or I guess, shortly after labor.”
He looks at me, then, and whatever he sees must be alarming. His foot comes off the gas pedal. “Are you all right?”
I don’t answer.
I can’t answer.
My breath is stuck.
“Selah?” The car slows to a near stop.
I tell him I’m fine. Everything’s fine. He can keep driving. Then I set my trembling hands on top of my knees and take a shaky breath. “I’m sorry,” I say. “It’s just … that’s really sad.”
It’s true.
But it’s not the full truth.
I can’t bring myself to tell him that.
It’s one thing to dream about long-ago tragedies in his family’s past. It’s quite another to dream about him and his parents.
“Yeah, well. I was just a baby, so … ” He lifts his shoulder, like not having memories of his mother means he’s not allowed to grieve his mother.
My breath gets stuck all over again.
He drives on, and I slide my hands beneath my knees, like burying them might bury the memory. Of that tiny little cap. Of the baby all alone in the plastic basinet. Of the woman, bleeding out on the delivery table, and the man, falling to his knees in the hallway of a hospital.
I can’t stop picturing it.
It plays on a loop in my mind until we reach Len’s house.
This time, his garage is closed. So we stand on the sagging porch and ring his doorbell.
Len answers holding a manilla folder with the words35mm, Oct 12, 28 exposureswritten on the front in neat script. “I’m sorry to say, only a few turned out decent. Most were either blank or warped. It could be light damage, or age.” With a shrug, he hands me the folder. “I guess that’s what old film will get you.”
“What do we owe you?” Jude asks, reaching for the wallet in his back pocket.
Len waves him off. “Don’t worry about it. It didn’t take long, and like I said, there’s not much there.”
We thank him and return to Jude’s car.
He drives us to a nearby park and cuts the engine.
I open the folder in my lap.
There’s a tissue-thin sheet between each photograph. The first several are blank. The ones after, warped. But are they warped because the film went bad? Or are they warped because they were taken in a different dimension?
Jude and I lean over his console, studying each one with care.
