“I’ve never done this before. Not like this.”
He didn’t argue with that. He just squeezed her shoulder once and went to unlock the front door.
The Art Walk crowd filtered in slowly. Starlight Shores didn’t rush anything, and the Art Walk was no exception. People drifted through the gallery, moving between Grant’s regular exhibits and the temporary installations. Melissa stood near the back and watched them reach her wall.
Sally found her own portrait first.
She stopped walking. She just stood there, looking at herself in the Bayview General doorway with a box of tea in one hand and a smile that was half for the camera and half for whoever had just said something funny off-frame. Sally in her element, as she actually was, not posed.
“Oh, honey.” Sally’s voice was thick. She turned to Melissa with wet eyes and pulled her into a hug that smelled like lavender hand cream and the cinnamon candles she sold at the store. “That’s me. That’s really me.”
“It is.”
“You made me look like someone worth looking at.”
“I didn’t make you anything, Sally. I just paid attention.”
Sally held her at arm’s length and studied her face, then hugged her again and walked away wiping her cheeks with a handkerchief.
Jan was next. She stood in front of her portrait for a full minute without speaking. In the photograph, she was wiping down the espresso machine at Harbor Brew, humming, her face caught in a moment of complete unselfconsciousness. Jan looked at Melissa across the room and pointed at it.
“I want that one. For behind the counter.”
“It’s yours.”
“I’m serious. I’ll pay for it.”
“No, it’s yours, Jan.”
Jan grinned and went back to studying the photograph, arms crossed, nodding slowly like she was agreeing with herself.
Bryan found his and laughed out loud. In the photograph, he was leaning over a cutting board in the Sandpiper kitchen, knife mid-chop, his face lit by the overhead fluorescents and completely focused. Flour dusted his forearm. A line cook behind him was blurred in motion. Bryan punched Melissa’s shoulder like she’d told a good joke. “I look like I know what I’m doing.”
“You do know what you’re doing.”
“Yeah, but I don’t usually look it.” He pulled Cassidy over by the elbow and pointed. Cassidy tilted her head and smiled at the image, then at Melissa, and the smile was the one she gave when she was genuinely impressed and didn’t need to say so.
The evening moved. More people came. Beth Ramsey brought two other artists from the co-op and they spent twenty minutes discussing Melissa’s composition choices with a seriousness that made her feel like a professional again. A woman she didn’t recognize told her the festival shots made her feel like she’d missed something important and wanted to make sure she came to more of the Starlight Shores festivals. Marty Fuller asked if she’d consider letting the Beacon run one of the behind-the-scenes images. She said yes before she could talk herself out of it.
She kept waiting for the other thing. The whisper, the sideways glance, the moment when someone recognized her name and connected it to the hurricane photograph and the woman whose life she’d wrecked. She’d rehearsed responses. She’d prepared herself to be honest and not defensive.
Nobody asked. Nobody brought it up. The people in this room didn’t see the photographer who had exploited Maria LaBelle. They saw the woman who had spent months walking their streets, sitting in their shops, and earning the right to point a camera at them. And tonight, nobody in this room was looking at her like she owed them an explanation.
Don’t cry. Not here. Later.
She pressed her thumbnail into her palm and turned toward the door to get some air, and Clint was standing right there.
He’d put on a collared shirt. Navy blue, sleeves rolled to the forearms, tucked into slacks that looked like they’d been ironed. She almost laughed. He looked deeply uncomfortable and completely committed to being there, and she loved both things about him in equal measure.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey.” He looked past her at the wall of portraits. His eyes moved along the row, stopping at each one. Sally. Jan. Bryan. Emily. Winnie. He came back to her.
“How long have you been here?”
“A while.” He shifted his weight. “I came in the side door. Didn’t want to make a thing of it.”
“You’re wearing a collared shirt. That’s already a thing.”
