Smiling pictures of the lost might make the viewer more sympathetic, but she couldn’t bring herself to use the photo in her wallet, so Izzy took the wooden box out from under the bed. There wasn’t much inside—most of the more current shots were on the computer, and neither Izzy nor Cyrus kept many family pictures. But there were a few photographs.

An elementary school portrait of Cyrus. Dimples. Missing teeth. Hair slicked back, a button-down shirt, even a tie. “I hated that tie, but now I see why Jody made me wear it. Damn, I looked like a little girl,” he said, years later, laughing.

One high school picture with hair in his eyes, a Nirvana T-shirt, and a fierce scowl. “Such a tough guy,” she teased.

Izzy and Cyrus at the waterfall oasis at 49 Palms. In spite of the drought, that day water had spilled over the rocks, pooling brightly among the rocks at their feet as they stood in the shade of the ragged palm trees after hiking for almost an hour.

Izzy and Cyrus at his West Shores High School graduation with their arms around each other’s shoulders. As soon as the ceremony was over, he ripped off the gown and put the mortarboard on her head, called her “Professor.”

Cyrus with his new Silverado. Both of them shining. He’d named the truck Plata. “We will travel the continent in her,” he’d promised.

Cyrus, bare-chested, revealing the still-raw tattoo of her name. “My best ink ever.”

Izzy and Cyrus in front of the shack they had built together. She wore overalls with the bib hanging down around her waist and a white tank top. He wore white painter’s pants and a black T-shirt. They posed with a rake. “Desert Gothic,” he titled the photo, but she called it “Home.” When you grew up with parents like theirs, you were always looking for a place to feel safe.

A photo of Izzy and Cyrus on vacation at a little motel in Desert Hot Springs. The pool was encased in glass and filled with natural hot spring water. Izzy and Cyrus made love so often on that trip that she’d been sore and euphoric for a week or two after. “Someday we should get married here,” he’d told her.

A few strips of black-and-white photo booth images of Izzy and Cyrus clowning around, kissing. The last image of one strip was of them, side by side with their eyes closed, faces like masks. They’d taken these at a roadside carnival. Cyrus had showed her a journal entry he’d written when he was a kid, when he kept records of things to help feel alive. He described a dream of riding a carnival Ferris wheel “with a beautiful woman with dark flowing hair.” He and Izzy took it as a sign.

She shuffled through more pictures.

One had been taken the night she and Cyrus had met at Seth and Nephy’s. Some girl on the yearbook staff had snapped it and given a copy to Izzy. The girl said, “It was crazy how much I could tell how into each other you were.”