“I know, but I have a big favor I wanted to ask. I know you might be busy getting ready for the storm and everything, but I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind developing these for me.” As with Bryce, I explained my theme, and I could see her studying me.
“You said you got one of Bryce, too?”
“I’m not sure. I hope so,” I said. “It’s the last photo on the roll.”
She tilted her head, no doubt intuiting its importance to me before holding out her hand. “Let me see what I can do.”
*
My aunt’s house was dark and cave-like, no surprise since there wasn’t a glint of light coming through the covered windows. In the kitchen, the refrigerator was pulled away from the wall, no doubt so it could be easily connected to the generator when the time came. My aunt was nowhere to be seen, and as I took a seat on the couch, I found myself replaying the moment when I thought Bryce might kiss me, still trying to figure it out.
Hoping to get my mind off it, I retrieved my textbooks and spent the next hour and a half studying and doing homework. My aunt eventually emerged from her room to start dinner, and as I was dicing tomatoes for the salad, I heard the unmistakable rumble of a vehicle on the gravel outside. My aunt heard it, too, and raised an eyebrow, no doubt wondering if I’d invited Bryce for dinner.
“He didn’t mention that he would be coming over,” I said with a shrug.
“Would you do me a favor and see who it is? I’ve got chicken in the pan.”
I went to the door and recognized the Trickett family van in the driveway, Bryce’s mom behind the wheel. The sky had grown increasingly dark and the wind was gusting hard enough to make me grip the railing hard. When I reached the van, his mom rolled down the driver’s-side window and held out a manila envelope.
“I got the feeling you were in a hurry, so I started developing them as soon as you left. You took some wonderful shots. You caught a lot of character in some of the faces. I especially liked the one of the man smoking by the store.”
“I’m sorry if you felt like you had to rush,” I said, straining to be heard over the wind. “You didn’t have to.”
“I wanted to take care of it before we lost power,” she said. “I’m sure you’re on pins and needles. I remember the first roll I ever took by myself, too.”
I swallowed. “Did the photo of Bryce come out?”
“It’s my favorite,” she said. “But of course, I’m biased.”
“Are they back yet?”
“I’m guessing they’ll be home any minute, so I should probably get going.”
“Thank you again for doing this so fast.”
“My pleasure. If I had my way, I’d spend every day in the darkroom.”
I watched her back up, waved as the van started rolling forward, then scurried back into the house. In the living room, I turned on the lamp, wanting as much light as possible as I went through the photographs.
As I’d suspected, there were only a couple of good ones. Most were close, but not quite perfect. Either the focus was off, or the settings weren’t ideal. My composition wasn’t always great, either, but Bryce’s mom was right in thinking the photo of the smoker was a definite keeper. It was the one of Bryce, however, that made me almost gasp.
The focus was sharp and the lighting dramatic. I had caught him just as his upper body had turned in my direction; the muscles in his arms stood out as if etched in relief, and his expression reflected intense concentration. He looked very much like himself, unselfconscious and naturally graceful. I traced my fingertip lightly across his figure.
It dawned on me then that Bryce—just like my aunt—had come into my life at the time when I’d needed him most. More than that, he’d quickly become the closest friend I’d ever had, and I hadn’t been wrong in reading his desire. Had we been alone, he might have even attempted a kiss, even if we both knew it was the last thing I wanted or needed. Like me, he had to know that there was no way a relationship between us could ever work. In a few short months, I’d leave Ocracoke behind and become someone new again, someone I didn’t yet know. Our relationship was doomed to failure, but even as that knowledge weighed me down, I knew in my heart that—just like Bryce—I longed for something more between us.
*
My thoughts continued to tumble and flop like clothes in a dryer throughout dinner and even as the storm approached. It howled as darkness overtook us, growing in intensity with every passing hour. Rain and wind lashed the house, making it creak and shake. My aunt and I sat in the living room, neither one of us wanting to be alone. Just when I thought the storm couldn’t get any worse, we’d be slammed by another gust, and rain would pound so hard it sounded like firecrackers. The power, as predicted, went out and the living room went pitch black. We bundled up, knowing we had to get the generator started. As soon as Aunt Linda turned the knob, the door practically flew inward; the rain stung my face as we hurried down the steps, both of us gripping the railing so we wouldn’t blow away.