Page 371 of Safe With You

I zoomed in.

It wasn’t a picture I’d ever deliver to a client. The focus wasn’t quite where I’d want it, and the reflection caught too much of the street behind us.

But I liked it.

I didn’t remember taking it. Maybe I wasn’t trying to.

I sat there for a minute before minimizing the folder. My desktop came back into view, along with the anniversary gallery I should’ve been finishing.

Instead, I created a new folder.

The cursor blinked in the empty box while I tried one name, deleted it, then tried another.

That one didn’t feel right either.

“Man.”

I left it untitled.

Then I went back to the Open Mic folder.

The first picture I copied was the one of Luna laughing. The second was Mila on the floor with her book.

I hesitated over the next one.

Luna crouched beside her.

I copied it too, then added the reflection from the store window.

Four pictures sat inside the folder when I was done.

I looked at them together.

Luna laughing. Mila with her book. The two of them beside each other. And the last one with all three of us caught in the glass, me barely visible behind the camera.

Pieces of days I didn’t know would matter when I took them.

I thought about the couple from that morning.

Ten years.

All the small things that must’ve happened between the first picture they ever took together and the ones I took that day.

Things nobody would’ve known to call important at the time.

I looked at the photograph of Luna laughing again.

My camera used to be the easiest place for me to disappear.

I could stand behind it and watch everybody else’s life happen without having to think too hard about mine.

Somewhere along the way, that had changed. I’d started taking pictures of things I wanted to remember again.

I looked at the four photographs one more time before closing the folder and going back to work.

The bell above the door rang before I could respond.

I looked up.