It had taken me over a year to complete the thing. It was part photo album, part mixed-media art piece. As sentimental as I was, I had always kept a memory box full of mementos from my childhood. It had been stuffed full of photos, ribbons from various contests, ticket stubs, paintings, and so on. I pulled from that, photos I got from family and friends, and multiple trips to craft stores.

Each page of the scrapbook told a story. And those together, showed a life. The pages weren’t in chronological order. It would’ve been too depressing to flip through it, knowing when I was getting close to the end. Instead, I jumped around in a pattern that was my own. Violet’s ninth birthday, the day I was born, a family vacation to Disneyland.

Each page layered a varied array of photos, paint, memorabilia, stickers, doodles, and more. I grinned down at a picture of the two of us outside The Tower of Terror at Disneyland. I had a massive smile on my face, while Violet looked a little green. My parents had refused to accompany me on the ride, so Violet had gone, even though heights made her sick to her stomach. I’d made it up to her by using all my saved-up allowance to buy her a porcelain statue of Sleeping Beauty she’d been eyeing in one of the gift shops. It was one of Violet’s belongings I’d insisted on keeping after her passing.

I flipped a page, and my hand stilled. The photo I’d glued to the paper was gone. I’d decorated the area surrounding it with drawings of trees, marsh grass, and the pond where the picture had been taken. It should’ve been three smiling faces looking back at me. Violet, me, and Ford. My fingers skimmed across the page where the snapshot had been, the paper torn away just slightly. Had the glue dried out and the photo come loose?

I went to the drawer where I kept the book. Searching inside, I came up empty. I tried to think back to the last time I’d taken it out. Maybe a couple of months ago? My stomach twisted. It must have fallen out, and I’d thrown it out when cleaning up and not paying attention.

“It’s just a picture.” I knew I had a copy of it on my computer. I could always print it out and replace it. But something about it sent a chill skittering down my spine.

9

FORD

I took a pull from my beer as I flipped over another page of spreadsheets.

“Drinking on the job already?”