The memory keeper's daughter - Kim Edwards [150]
“I like Stuart,” David said. “I’ll look forward to congratulating him too.”
She smiled. “Actually, I wondered if you’d give me away.”
He looked at her then, her pale skin, the happiness she could no longer contain shining through her smile.
“I’d be honored,” he said gravely.
“It’s going to be here. Very small and simple and private. In two weeks.”
“You’re not wasting any time.”
“I don’t need to think about it,” she said. “Everything feels completely right.” She glanced at her watch and sighed. “I’d better get going.” She stood up, brushing off her hands. “Come on, Jack.”
“I’ll keep an eye on him, if you want, while you get dressed.”
“That would be a lifesaver. Thanks.”
“Rosemary.”
“Yes?”
“You’ll send me photos now and then? Of Jack, as he grows up? Of you both, in your new place?”
“Sure. Of course.” She folded her arms and kicked at the edge of the step.
“Thanks,” he said simply, troubled again by the ways he had managed to miss his own life, absorbed as he’d been by his lenses and his grief. People imagined he had quit taking pictures because of the dark-haired woman in Pittsburgh and her unflattering review. He’d fallen out of favor, people speculated, he’d become discouraged. No one would believe he had simply ceased caring, but it was true. He hadn’t picked up a camera since he went to stand by the confluence of those rivers. He had given it up, art and craft, the intricate and exhausting task of trying to transform the world into something else, to turn the body into the world and the world into the body. Sometimes he came across his photographs, in textbooks or hanging on the walls of private offices or homes, and he was startled by their cold beauty, their technical precision—sometimes, even, by the hungry searching that their emptiness implied.
“You can’t stop time,” he said now. “You can’t capture light. You can only turn your face up and let it rain down. All the same, Rosemary, I’d like to have some pictures. Of you and of Jack. They would give me a glimpse, anyway. They would give me great pleasure.”
“I’ll send a lot,” she promised, touching his shoulder. “I’ll inundate you.”
He sat on the steps while she dressed, lazy in the sun. Jack played with his truck. You should tell her. He shook his head. After he’d sat watching Caroline’s house like a voyeur, he’d called a lawyer in Pittsburgh and set up those beneficiary accounts. When he died, they would skip probate. Jack and Phoebe would be taken care of, and Norah would never need to know.
Rosemary came back, smelling of Ivory soap, dressed in a skirt and flat shoes. She took Jack’s hand and hefted a turquoise backpack on her shoulder. She looked so young, strong and slender, her hair damp, her face concentrated in a frown. She would drop Jack at the sitter’s house on the way.
“Oh,” she said, “with everything else, I almost forgot: Paul called.”
David’s heart quickened. “Did he?”
“Yes, this morning. It was the middle of the night for him; he’d just come from a concert. He was in Seville, he said. He’s been there for three weeks, studying flamenco guitar with someone—I don’t remember who, but he sounded famous.”
“Was he having a good time?”
“Yes. It sounded like he was. He didn’t leave a number. He said he’d call again.”
David nodded, glad Paul was safe. Glad he’d called.
“Good luck on your exam,” he said, standing.
“Thanks. As long as I pass, that’s all that matters.”
She smiled, then waved and walked with Jack down the narrow stone path to the sidewalk. David watched her go, trying to fix this moment—the vivid backpack, her hair swinging against her back, Jack’s free hand reaching out to grab leaves and sticks—forever in his mind. It was futile, of course; he was forgetting things with every step she took. Sometimes his photographs amazed him, pictures he came across stored in old boxes or folders, moments he could