But Mary was stunned. Her mother never looked less than perfect and here she was, so young it was almost painful to look at her, her blond hair messily pulled back, her cheeks red, her eyes swollen, staring at a little bundle in her arms in utter amazement. She’d never seen so much emotion on her mother’s face before. Mary dug through and found two more. All of them were obviously taken within the same few minutes. Because there was Mary’s wrinkled, mutinous face poking out from the hospital-issued pink-and-blue blanket, there were Mary’s parents beaming for the camera, looking like they’d been through the ordeal of a lifetime. And then, lastly, there was a photo of Naomi asleep with Mary on her chest. Naomi’s hair was sticking out every which way, her mouth gaping open she was sleeping so hard.

“I can’t believe you let someone take these,” Mary mused. Naomi did not approve of candids.

“I didn’t let anyone take them. Tiff insisted.” Naomi sniffed.

“She was at the hospital the day I was born?”

Naomi nodded. “She told me I’d treasure these photos one day.”

“And now they’re in a box in the attic,” Mary said drily.

“Well, I didn’t throw them away, did I? Here, put them back in. It’s not what I’m looking for.”

Mary did as she was told, but she watched her mother carefully. It was true that her mother hadn’t thrown the photos away. In a house with not an extra ounce of fat on its bones, maybe that really did mean that, in a way, her mother treasured these photos. It just also meant that her mother couldn’t bear to display a photo where she didn’t look Hollywood-ready. Mary reflected on all the photos in frames downstairs, family portraits taken by professionals, all of them. And even the ones in the albums were all particularly flattering to her mother.

There was a series of photos lining one hallway of her mother’s pageant days. Glamour shot after glamour shot of Naomi looking utterly stunning, even with her outdated coif of a hairdo and sparkly, outrageous gown. The only photo they had of Naomi showing any emotion other than a beatific smile was the single photo of the Miss Connecticut crown being placed on her head. Tears streamed down her face as she stared in shock out at the crowd. Mary had seen plenty of media representations of pageants in which the winner delivered a sort of practiced shock in order to endear herself to the crowd. But anyone who looked at that picture would know that Naomi truly hadn’t expected to win the title.

“Here,” Naomi said, shoving a small stack of photos into Mary’s hand. “This is what I wanted to show you.”