Page 80 of A Sea of Unspoken Things

I followed the hall back the way I came, finding the darkroom and flipping on the light. Johnny was gone. The chemical trays were empty and turned upside down, the water bath turned off, but the prints hanging on the line were still glistening. I smiled, realizing that they must be Olivia’s.

I took a step inside, scanning the series of photographs. At first, I couldn’t quite tell what they were. But slowly, my eyes began to make sense of the intricate shapes. They were shots of ice taken with a macro lens, so close that the patterns looked like something else entirely. Or maybe it was snow, I thought.

I was happy that Olivia was still shooting. There was something that was almost romantic about the idea—producing work just for the sake of creating it. Not for show or display or even the world’s consideration. Away from opinions or opportunities. It was just…free.

The smile melted from my lips as I thought it. When was the last time I made art like that?

Olivia’s footsteps echoed down the hall, followed by the screech of the double doors that led to the parking lot. I found the piece of tape with Johnny’s initials on the row of built-in cubbies that covered the opposite wall. The manila folder was still there.

I let it fall open, sifting through what was inside. There were some pieces of scrap photo paper, a tattered notebook that had exposure and developing times jotted down, and a few homemade dodge and burn tools.

I closed the folder and tucked it under my arm, then I reached up, flipping the switch just for old times’ sake. The stale white fluorescents flicked off and the safelight clicked on, painting the room in a saturated red. I turned in a circle, taking it in. My hand skipped along the edge of the cold counter as I walked to the enlarger and turned it on, just to hear its hum.

I stood there for another few seconds before I turned the light back on. The colors of the space instantly flattened, and I let myself look around the darkroom one more time, then opened the door. But just before I stepped into the hall, something made me pause.

I let go of the knob, eyes pulled back to the photographs drying on the line. I reached out, fingertips brushing the intricate constellation of lines. Not quite ice or even snow…it was frost.

A sense of familiarity was itching at the back of my mind, like I’d seen them before. I took out my phone, opening Instagram, and immediately pulled up Autumn’s account. I tapped the comments on the last post. When I spotted the one I was looking for, the thought was already forming.

@firstfrostchronicle Bright and early!

I clicked the handle and the profile’s grid populated, filling my phone screen with pictures that mirrored the ones hanging before me. They were Olivia’s. They had to be.

She’d told me she was working on her own photography series, and this was it. Olivia Shaw was @firstfrostchronicle.

The profile had no identifying information, but the handle interacted with Autumn’s account constantly. She liked all of Autumn’s pictures and they followed each other. But it was that comment that chimed like a bell in my head.

Bright and early!

The realization settled slowly, like stones in my gut. Autumn was posting about leaving for school the next day. When she saidAt dawn, we ride,maybe it hadn’t been a figure of speech about the future that awaited in San Francisco. Maybe Autumn was talking about actual plans early the next morning. Plans with Olivia.

I snatched one of the photos from the clips on the line and opened the door, my steps quickening as they took me back to the empty classroom. I walked straight toward Olivia’s desk, letting the folder slide from my hands before I cleared the clutter from the calendar. Olivia’s looping handwriting was everywhere, spilling outside the lines of the boxes, notes jotted down in every color with every type of writing utensil there was. I flipped back through the months, findingAugust, and my finger stopped on the eighteenth, the day of Autumn’s last post. Beside it, there was a scribbled note written in the corner of August 19. The day Autumn left for school.

Shoot with—5:30 am

The night Autumn went to Johnny’s house wasn’t the last time she was seen. That was the next morning, with Olivia.

The jingle of keys in the hallway made me flinch and I dropped the calendar, heart lurching in my chest when I saw Olivia in the doorway again. She looked surprised to see me still there.

“Oh!” She laughed. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you. Just forgot my…”

Her words slowed with her steps as she looked down at her desk. “What are you doing?” Her tone was still light, but her gaze turned probing.

“You’re first frost.” I could hardly hear my own voice, still working it all out in my head.

Olivia laughed again. “What?”

“On Instagram. Are you @firstfrostchronicle?”

She relaxed a little, but now she was blushing. “Oh, yeah, I am.”

Bright and early!

The words echoed in my mind again.

“How’d you know that?” She was smiling now, almost proudly.

I lifted the print I’d taken from the darkroom between us.