I sidestepped and opened the door. Inside were more photos like the first. All in black and white, mostly of kids, each one asked a question, told a story, tore at my heart.
Perhaps because of his supernatural ability—Jimmy saw what others did not—he had always been beyond talented. Sanducci was famous, and he deserved to be. However, none of the pictures he’d taken for money deserved to be in the same room with these.
I met his gaze. “Why didn’t you ever show me?”
An emotion flitted across his face, one I couldn’t put a finger on before he glanced away. “Baby, I’ll show you anything you want.” He put his hand on his taut stomach and rubbed, tugging his shirt up, trying to distract me with a six-pack.
“Don’t.” I put my hand on his arm. He jerked it away but not before I’d seen the truth. He might pretend the photos meant nothing, but I knew better. Each one held a tiny piece of his soul.
“May I help—?”
I turned, and the eyes of the slim, white-haired man widened. “It’s you,” he said.
I shot Jimmy a glare. “Show me,” I ordered, and the salesman scurried toward the back.
“Fuck,” Jimmy muttered, but he followed.
I stepped into a separate room and slowly turned in a circle staring at so many varied versions of me, I got dizzy. Also taken with black-and-white film, these shone with one huge difference from the others—the brilliant, sapphire blue of my eyes.
Talk about artsy. But they didn’t seem contrived. Instead their beauty was haunting.
Me right after I’d come to Ruthie’s—twelve years old, far too skinny, yet already developing and horrified by it. My legs stuck out like kindling beneath a skirt that was too big; my shoulders were all bones; my breasts softly curved beneath a sweater that looked to drown me. A child hovering, both eager and petrified, at the cliff edge of womanhood.
Me on the balance beam in high school, my pole-dancer body outlined in a skintight leotard, the expression on my face reflecting my love of the first thing I’d ever been any good at.
The next a silhouette in the second-floor window of Ruthie’s place. My window. I was lifting my arms, taking off my shirt. My skin appeared gilded by moonlight. I had my head turned just enough so the camera caught my face. I’d been thinking of him.
“Perv,” I muttered.
“Lizzy, let’s—”
I lifted my hand to make him stop, and he backed up as if I might hit him, which caused the salesman to cast us a quick frown.
“Great,” I whispered furiously. “Now he thinks I beat you.”
“You do,” Jimmy said.
I narrowed my eyes. “I might.”
In the subsequent image, glancing back at the camera, I walked down the stairs at Ruthie’s. My shirt was twisted, my skirt wrinkled from being hiked to my waist, my hair—long now—was ratty, messy, as if I’d been dancing outside in a tornado. But I was smiling just a little, a smile that said, There’s no one in the world but you.
I expected the next photo to reveal the gap in years between when Jimmy had left and when he’d come back. Instead I took one glance and caught my breath.
Me sitting in the window, rain cascading down the glass, making it seem as if tears ran down my face. I’d just discovered Jimmy was gone.
The next picture made my heart lurch. Me in my uniform, frisking some skid, kicking his legs apart as he leaned over the Milwaukee Police Department cruiser. My hair was short—I’d chopped it off, impatient with the gum perps kept spitting into it—and my mouth was the thin, frustrated line of every city cop.
Several more photographs followed—all taken during the period when Jimmy had been lost to me. Me laughing at one of the Murphys’ barbecues, testifying in court, wearing a ball gown to some charity event and black to Max’s funeral. The photo of me alone at the grave after everyone else had gone brought that day back so sharply my eyes burned.
Jimmy had been there. He’d watched over me. I wasn’t sure if I should be happy or sad, glad or really, really mad.
“I don’t like the idea of people hanging pictures of my life on their living room walls.”
“These aren’t available for purchase,” the salesman said hurriedly. “This is our showroom.” He pointed to several signs that said not for sale spaced every few feet between the displays. I hadn’t even noticed them.
I glanced at Jimmy, but he’d moved to the back window, where he appeared fascinated beyond all understanding with the view of the alley behind the gallery.
“You thought they were here because of the colorization?” the man asked.
“Not exactly,” I said.
Anyone with a heart could see that the difference in the portraits stemmed from a difference in the photographer. He’d cared about his other subjects, but this one—
This one he’d loved.
CHAPTER 25