For some reason, she thought about Constance’s room with the photos of the people from her past. And Elliott’s room with the photos from the night Charlie died.
Once again, in her mind’s eye, she saw herself on that street in Menlo Park, looking at the camera.
That was it. The world as a quilt of photos. All of history was a sort of photomosaic, waiting to be seen. And so was her life. More than ever, Adeline was sure there was a larger montage here. And she felt that there was a missing piece—a missing scene—that would join all the strips of film together, creating a loop with a beginning, middle, and end that all made sense once you had seen it all and zoomed out.
That’s what she had been missing. That seminal scene. That piece of cloth that tied the others together.
She was going to find it.
*
The next day, Adeline was sitting in the office of another company in Palo Alto, one named after the seeing stones in The Lord of the Rings.
The man across the table was one she had known for years from her time as a venture capitalist in the Bay Area.
“What can we do for you, Adeline?”
“I need a piece of software, one I believe you specialize in.”
“What kind is that?”
“One that can take a photo as input and find it in a supplied data source of images and videos.”
He smiled. “Sure. We can do that. Most of our clients sign an annual operating contract. We can notify you in real time when we identify matches. Until you’ve found the person.”
“That’s not what I’m looking for. I’d like you to create the software, and I want to be able to operate it. I supply a photo, and it searches the data sources for matches. And speaking of sources, I want to license any that you’re able to supply. I’d also like intros to government agencies and any other organizations you think might be willing to sell data.”
*
That evening, Adeline was thinking about all the pieces in her life, of the past, the present, and the future, and the piece that was missing, the one that might tie it all together, when the doorbell rang.
She rose and opened the door, and on her stoop, under the glow of the porchlight, was Nora, standing in a three-quarter length black trench coat, a floral dress on underneath, smiling at her.
“Hi.”
“Hi,” Adeline said. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
An awkward pause passed as Nora stared at her, and Adeline finally swung the door open. “But come on in—of course. Good to see you.”
She wondered if the tension was obvious to Nora.
As the door closed, Nora shrugged. “I figured it was time we talked.”
Adeline swallowed. “About?”
“I thought we could start with all the things we haven’t talked about.”
FIFTY-SIX
A?deline studied Nora’s face. Slowly, terror was growing inside of her. Did Nora know her secret?
Had she finally figured it all out?
Nora must have seen the fear in Adeline’s eyes. She held up her hands. “I just meant that it feels like maybe you and I got off on the wrong foot or something. All these years, the group has become so close, but it’s just—it just feels to me like there’s a gulf between us.” Nora smiled, eyebrows rising. “Am I imagining that?”
“You’re not imagining it,” Adeline said quietly. She knew she was on precarious ground here. Where it led, she wasn’t sure she wanted to go.
“Can we sit?” Nora asked.
In the living room, Adeline took Nora’s coat, and they sat by the fire.
“Do you ever get this sense that everything around us is a slow-motion catastrophe?”
Adeline didn’t trust her voice to speak. She nodded, still wondering if Nora knew more than she was admitting.
“It’s not just this crazy pandemic. It’s closer to home. For Sam and Elliott, the things they love are slipping away. Hiro and Connie are fighting their demons—different demons but both soul-consuming.” Nora took a deep breath. “And then there’s you and me. Two islands in the middle of the storm. Both single women. Career-oriented. It seems like we have a lot in common, but I don’t really know much about you, Dani. And I was sitting at home thinking, why is that? And why don’t I do something about that?”
Adeline swallowed. This was dangerous. The more she revealed about herself, the more likely it was that Nora would figure out her secret. If she did, she might alter the past.
But that was only half the issue. Adeline knew that in seven years, Nora was going to die—possibly at Adeline’s hands. Getting close might make the things she had to do harder. Adeline knew what it was like to lose someone close to her. Instinctively, she knew she was scared of getting close again.