Oh, fuck. He just asked her to take his end-of-life photos with his kids. Fuck me. I jump to my feet and walk to the tiny closet that serves as a pantry. I reach onto the top shelf and retrieve the camera, and take it back out to her. Her eyes meet mine as she takes it from me.
“I haven’t seen this in so long,” she says, but she smiles at me. And my heart does that plummet again, the one where it feels like my brains are falling into my toes. All because she graced me with an elusive smile. It’s kind of like I just saw Bigfoot, her smiles are that rare.
She blows the dust off the dials and uses her shirttail to wipe the lens. “There’s a half a roll of film in here.”
“So, is that a yes?”
Aaron asks. He might be acting casual about it, but I can tell this is important to him. He wants photos so his kids can remember his last summer at Lake Fisher.
“What do I get if I do it?” She puts her hands on her hips. There’s the woman I fell in love with. There she is! Holy shit, this is the woman I married.
“My never-ending devotion?” he tosses back.
She snorts. “Like I would ever want that.” She blows an errant lock of dark hair from her eyes.
“Come up with something you want. I’ll see if I can make it happen.”
“I’ll need three very capable men to clean out the shack out back so I can develop the pictures.” She looks at the three of us each in turn.
Her mother had a small shed in the back corner of the tiny lot that she used for developing the pictures she took. Through the years, it got filled with junk, but it’s still there. It just needs to be cleaned out.
“So, is that a yes?” she says, parroting what Aaron asked before. She glares at each of us in turn again.
“I didn’t want any pictures,” Jake says as he shoves half a sandwich into his mouth in one bite. She glares at him. He pretends to deflate. “I’ll help,” he grumbles, mouth full.
“I just need the junk moved out. And for somebody to get rid of the spider webs.”
“Consider it done,” Aaron says.
“And somebody needs to clean off the little table so I can set up the developing trays.”
“Also done,” Aaron says.
“Okay, I’ll do it,” Bess chirps as she walks toward the front door, camera in hand. She goes out, and I hear her laugh when Katie teases her quietly about her camera.
“She just laughed,” I say quietly. I shake my head in wonder. “I haven’t heard that in years.” I look at them. “I’ve missed it. I’ve missed her.” I swipe my hand down my face. “Jesus, I’m a sap.”
“I still don’t want any pictures,” Jake says, as he reaches for another sandwich and shoves it into his mouth.
Aaron throws a grape at him. It bounces off his shoulder and rolls onto the floor. Jake bends over, picks it up, and pops it into his mouth. “Five second rule,” he says around his already full mouth.
“You’re disgusting,” Aaron says on a laugh.
“Katie likes it when I do disgusting things.”
“Like eating ass?” I ask. I shove his shoulder. “You should keep that shit to yourself, dude.” But I’m laughing. I haven’t laughed like this in a very long time.
He waggles his brows at me. “A gentleman never tells.”
“Mr. Jacobson didn’t raise a gentleman,” Aaron says.
“Thank God for that,” Jake replies with a chuckle.
11
Aaron
The kids stay awake way too late after eating their sandwiches, mainly because they went on a mission to catch lightning bugs. We’d migrated over to my cabin after the kids finished eating. Mr. Jacobson had shown up on his red golf cart after he’d come home from bingo, and he’d brought a few empty jars with him. “Perfect lightning bug catching night,” he’d grumbled as he’d passed out the jars.