Everything else—wrong. The war-torn backdrop, rubble spilling into the streets, buildings shattered and covered in a layer of dust. The weathered sign, half-obscured but unmistakably French. She’d shown me pictures of the trip she and Grampy took to Paris for their thirtieth anniversary. She’d said that was her first time in France, but this photo told a very different story.
“What’s the truth, Didi?” My throat tightened. “And who or what is Delphine?”
Silence answered.
In the year before her death, she’d started so many stories she didn’t finish. About people I suspected weren’t real, her brain blurring faces and names from TV shows with her past. Or maybe theywerereal, and she’d had more secrets than I’d expected.
The photo had no date, no location, no explanation about what she was doing there. Just the one word:Delphine.
I slid my phone out and called Dad.
“Hey, sweetheart. What’s up?” His voice was warm but distracted. Papers shuffled in the background, likely from essays he was grading. He never could leave work at work.
I hesitated. How much did I want to tell him when I didn’t know what it was all about yet? Would it stress him out toomuch? Would he worry I was in danger when I really wasn’t? “I have a quick question. About Didi.”
“What about her?”
I stared at the photograph, with its bombed-out street. “Did she ever mention France?”
“France?” Dad laughed, and the rustling on his end stopped. “She and Grampy visited several times. Always said she loved Marseille best. I’ve got...” He paused and let out a grunt. “I’ve got photos somewhere of the two of them.”
“What about earlier? Before they met?” I compared the photos for the hundredth time. Didi was younger in the Russian’s photograph than in the one on the wall. Late teens, maybe? She’d married my grandfather when she was twenty-two. “During the war?”
“Definitely not during the war.” The sound of boxes moving came from his side. “She talked every once in a while about the Blitz, the nights in the Tube stations. She used to say she wasluckythat was all she witnessed. And France would have been much closer to the action.”
“You’re sure?”
“Grace.” His tone shifted, and the background noises stopped. “Where is this coming from?”
“I just…” I swallowed. “With the London trip, I was thinking about her stories.”
“She’d like this.” He chuckled. “You, visiting her old haunts.”
I touched the framed photo. She’d talked about the two of us going there someday. About showing me Buckingham Palace, the Tower of London, and taking the train to Europe to explore. “She would.”
“You okay? You sound?—”
“I’m fine,” I cut in. “I miss her. The shop feels... empty sometimes.”
“She’d be proud of what you’ve built.”
“Thanks, Dad.” The lump that had been stuck in my throat all day grew a bit bigger. “Tell Mom I love her.”
We said our goodbyes, and I slipped the phone into my pocket.
If Didi didn’t go to France during the war, how did this exist? And why did the man have it?
Questions churned as I gathered my things, getting ready to leave.Close up. Lock the register. Go home.
Normal tasks. Simple.
I was reaching for the last light switch when movement at the front door caught my eye.
A man tried the handle despite the ‘CLOSED’ sign clearly displayed. Tall, dressed in a charcoal suit that fit so well it was obviously bespoke. His hair was dark and elegant, reminding me more of the bankers I’d worked with in Detroit than most people who strolled the streets of Brenton.
I pointed at the sign and mouthed, “We’re closed.”
He didn’t nod and walk away like a regular person would. No, this guy knocked on the glass. He didn’t smile, didn’t frown, didn’t give any indication of his mood at all, but something about his dark eyes sent a chill down my spine.
