I smiled at this.
“I know you’re going to have to decide to join or not join the Amish church, and I just want you to know I will stand behind you whatever decision you make. You will have always have a home with Liz and Brady and me, but I don’t want you to ever think that to choose to be Amish means you’re not one of us. You’ll always be my son, Tyler. No matter where you live or how you worship God or whether or not you drive a car or use electricity or shave your beard. You’ll always be my Amish son.” He smiled, adding, “You always were, you know?”
TWENTY-NINE
I felt good about our conversation, but I still had one last request for my father, which I made as soon as we got back in the car and continued on toward Newport Beach. I reminded him of the box of photos in the storage unit that he had promised to me before leaving on his trip and asked if we could stop by there and get them on our way home.
He looked so exhausted, I felt guilty for even bringing it up, but I was afraid if we didn’t do this now, it might be days before he got around to it.
“We don’t have the key,” he said.
“Sure we do. It’s on Liz’s key ring,” I replied.
He must have sensed how important this was to me because he agreed without further protest. Fifteen minutes later, we were finally pulling into the facility I’d been so drawn to since the moment I’d learned of the photos’ existence.
Located just a few miles away from the house, the complex was protected by a thick iron fence. Dad pulled up to a little machine and punched in his security code, and then the gate slowly began to slide open. As he drove through and continued on inside, all I could see were rows and rows of separate buildings, each one alike, each one filled with what had to be at least a hundred separate units. The sign at the entrance had said there was no vacancy, but the further we went, the more astounding that fact grew. Every single unit was in use by people who, apparently, didn’t have enough room at their homes to store all their belongings. Incredible. Add that to the list.
When my dad finally pulled into a parking slot, he said, “Be right back,” and then he quickly climbed from the car.
“Need help looking for the box?” I asked, reaching for my door handle as well.
“Nope. You sit tight,” he replied, no doubt preferring to do this alone. As he shut his door and walked off toward the building, I realized that it really would have been an infringement of his privacy to come here without his permission. As difficult as it had been to resist the urge, I was glad I’d waited. If he didn’t even want me in there with him, I couldn’t imagine how he would have felt if I’d gone there without him.
I thought again of my list and had a sudden realization. There was simply no way I could record all the differences between this world and mine. There were just too many to count.
My father was back a few minutes later, sliding into the driver’s seat with the highly anticipated box in hand. I’d been expecting something along the lines of a shoebox, but this thing was made of solid metal, not cardboard, and was closer to the size of a boot box. It was also quite heavy for its size, which I commented on as he handed it over.
“It’s a strongbox,” he replied, sliding the keys into the ignition.
“A strongbox?”
He started the car and put it in gear. “You know, fireproof. Most people use them for documents, but they’re good for pictures too.”
We reached the gate and he again pulled to a stop and typed in the code, this time to let us out.
“She was always taking photos and getting them developed,” he continued once we were on the road. “Used to make me nuts.”
“It did? Why?”
“Oh, not the picture-taking. The part that happened afterward. She would always come back from the store with a packet of pictures, spread them out on the table, and study them for a while, and then end up throwing most of them away. Said she was saving just the good ones. Those she kept in there, where they would be safe.”
He gestured toward the box in my lap, seeming perplexed at the thought of such waste. I totally understood, though, thanks to my time with Lark. Like her, my mother had approached photography as an art, I felt sure, bracketing each photo the way I’d been taught and then pulling the wheat from the chaff. For a moment I wondered how she might have known to do that. Had she hired a tutor too? Or perhaps researched photography at the library? Regardless, judging by what my father was saying now, she must have learned the technique and used it as well.
“When was the last time you looked through these?” I asked, holding the box firmly in my lap and gazing out at the houses we were moving past.