Faye nodded, and the two of them sat side by side. The album had a green plastic cover.
This was why Ali had held back. If she was going to see her mother, she wanted to do it with her sisters.
At least one of them, anyway.
Ali carefully opened the cover. And there she was, Joetta Kelly, in lovely, petite blonde glory.
“Oh, that has to be you,” Faye said, pointing to the baby in Joetta’s arms.
“Wow, yeah, I’m sure. This looks very 1975, doesn’t it?”
Their mother had a big hairpiece coiled on her head. Blonde, glamorous, and probably way too flashy for Bruce Kelly’s vibe.
“Look at Dad, smiling. Wow, so he did know how,” Faye quipped.
“Yeah, at least in the 1970s,” Ali replied. And they laughed.
Their dad was handsome; she’d never thought of him that way. But in this yellowing photo, he clearly was. Maybe that’s how he landed their mom, his square jaw and fit physique?
They turned the pages; they saw a similar posed shot for each of the girls. They were at the front door, with the house behind them. These were the first day or week back home after the hospital photos.
It is easy to forget that there was a time, not so long ago, when photos cost money. Bruce Kelly didn’t have a camera that they knew of. What pictures they had back then must have been taken by someone else. And then he would have had to pay to have them developed. Ali had asked for a Kodak camera when she was in the fifth grade. She got it for Christmas.
“I’m taking photos of these photos right now to send to Blair.” Faye snapped them with her cell phone.
“Maybe wait a second. Let’s call her and warn her. We’re together and can help each other process, and she’s all by herself.”
“True, true,” Faye said. They turned another page.
They were around a Christmas tree.
And then another one.
“Oh my gosh!”
Faye was in diapers, and Ali was in a little red, white, and blue jumper. Their mom had both of them in her arms.
They turned the page again.
“What the heck isthis?” Faye asked.
The fire hydrant was decorated to look like a minute man. The top was a blue hat, the body red and white striped.
“It’s the bicentennial! Mom painted the fire hydrant like that. It was when I was a baby. Mom told me she did it.”
Memories were clicking into Ali’s mind. It was like a View-Master reel.
Click, Mom at the hydrant. Click, Mom, painting the bedroom. Click, broken glass. Broken glass?
“The fire hydrant that’s out there, now, yellow?”
“Yes.”
Click. Bruce, angry, painting over the minute man in bright yellow.Ali remembers crying then. Ali tried to tell her dad not to do that. She was more upset than when her mother died.
“Dad painted over it; I had forgotten all of that. He painted over it.” Ali wiped away a tear.Where was all this coming from?
“Bruce sure wasn’t one to let us sit in our feelings, was he?” Faye wrapped an arm around Ali, and for a moment, they both just processed the flood of memories and, worse, the lack of memories. It was hard to pin them down, these moments from their past.
