Like me and—like Max. I thought of her secret smile the night before and the books in her office. Of course—the research was for her book. Nothing was off-limits. Not to Max—even when she had absolutely no right at all.

Telling this story would make her more than a lifestyle photographer from a rich family; more than a rich man’s daughter; more than a rich man’s wife. She didn’t even need the film. All she needed was a picture of the first and only page in the DROP OUT notebook, and if she couldn’t get permission, she could simply describe what she’d read. Maybe it was gimmicky—but nothing is a gimmick when the artist is already famous. And especially when the artist is already dead.

Then—it’s history.

Max was right. I was dying to read it. Without hesitating, I left the library, ran to her office, and wrenched open her computer.

Max foldered by project name, not year. I clicked through them impatiently. There was the project where she circled global industrial sites in a helicopter and blew up the photographs to billboards all around Los Angeles, titled There Is So Much Money in the World and None of It Is Yours. There was I’m So Authentic, the project where she’d tried on other people’s clothes, how the photos all looked awkward, like she was wearing someone else’s skin. There was Connect-I-Cut-Myself, where she took photographs of street corners in her hometown. First Kiss, one of them was called; First Time Someone Called Me a Whore. In the photos, the houses were tidy, the skies blue, the whole thing robotically sinister. I’d forgotten about that. I’d forgotten that she was a good photographer.

But I couldn’t find a folder with The Art of Losing written on it, or one called TAOL, or Book, or Memoir, or anything that looked like it. I tried opening Word and recalling recent documents, but they were about shows—edits on press releases for her gallery and drafts of emails and random notes—not book files.

One email, sent this morning, appeared when I searched TAOL.

To: Anneke Bice

Cc: Fleur Madrigal

Hi Anneke! We talked to the subject and she’s still hesitant, but ofc I have the original release so we’re clear to do what we want. Still, I would LOVE her support on this, so I’ll keep working on her and we’ll get there by pub day! Fleur is right—it’s still one of my best pictures. Talk soon—xmax