There’s a beat of silence. “And you’ve kept this to yourself this whole time? You could have called me, Sloane.”
I deserve the reproach in her voice. I open my mouth to explain that I didn’t want to put her in the middle of it. The words die on my tongue. It’s what I’ve been telling myself, but the truth is, I’m used to handling my problems on my own.I’musedto not having help, to having to rely only on me, myself, and I at all times.
It’s part of why this all hurts so much. Wes dangled the possibility of something better in front of me for weeks—and then snatched it all away.
“It’s just been a lot,” I say. “I was going to tell you. I…needed to get my head on straight about it first.”
“What the hell happened?”
Tracy groans when I finish telling her the whole ugly story. “Goddammit, Wes.” She mutters something else under her breath too low for me to hear, and then I catch a muffledThey broke upfollowed by the faint sound of Matt’s swearing. “Did you tellNature Shotswhat happened?” Tracy asks, her voice clear again. “I can’t believe he did that to you. I’m so sorry.”
“He called them. They were gracious about it, but…” I blink away the fresh burn of tears that I don’t have the energy for. “I can’t get past it. That he went behind my back like that.”
“What did he say when you talked to him?”
That photo is stunning. The concept, the composition, the technical pieces. It belongs on that cover.Youbelong on that cover. I was trying to help.
When Wes first said those things to me, they sounded like nothing but excuses. Even his apologies sounded like excuses.
Except rather than using those words as an opening salvo in the manipulation Olympics, he quietly backed off. No lavish gifts designed to blind me to his crimes. No endless phone calls and texts to wear me down. No overblown promises. No volatile flip-flopping from nasty name-calling to begging.
In short, none of the standard behavior I’ve come to associate with the wordsI’m sorry.
“He said he was trying to help,” I tell Tracy. “It’s all just words.”
“That sounds very…final.”
“It doesn’t really matter anymore. I’m going to put my energy into this adventure wedding thing and try not to think about it,” I say firmly.
Tracy’s silence is loud as the seconds tick by, but eventually she must decide not to push me. She tells me about her shot, and eventually, our conversation turns toward our usual topics without any further discussion of the Wes-shaped elephant lurking on the line with us.
The first halfof July melts away in a frenzy of weddings and arranging bookings for my new business model. As exhausting as it can be, I’m grateful to fall into bed too tired to do much more than pass out.
My social media does respectable numbers most days—everyone loves a glamorous wedding—but when I put up a shot of Tracy and Matt, along with details on my pivot to smaller, more intimate ceremonies in nontraditional locations, my DMs and inbox explode. Wes was right. There’s an enormous market for this sort of thing.
Except I’m not thinking about Wes anymore. A two-week pity party is more than enough.
If only my heart would listen.
The morning in late July when the winners are set to be announced via a live-stream presentation, I take out myfrustration and anxiety on some poor, hapless chicken breasts, pounding them into thin cutlets and then tossing them into a homemade marinade. My brothers are coming over for dinner tonight. It may not be the best move with the contest announcement, but things have gotten better between us.
The very long talk we had after I finally lost it on Mom helped. She’s not speaking to any of us at the moment, which is just as well. I think we all need the break. I’m not sure I’ll ever stop feeling somewhat parental toward Eric and Sam, but we’re trying to figure it out.
Besides, Sam always brings the strong microbrews he likes. I can drown my disappointment in expensive beer.
Still, I can’t help wondering if I even have a real shot at winning. Amelia’s words have dogged my steps for the last three weeks, rattling around in my thoughts on late-night drives back from venues.
I want to win. Badly. Not just for the money. Not just to prove myself to the chasing community. Not even for the bragging rights of being the first woman on theNature Shotscover.
I want to win forme. To prove to myself that I’m the woman in the photo. Brave. Capable. A force of nature.
Unable to sit still, I pace my office like a caged beast while Carter Walsh starts the video call and runs through the preliminaries. Just to torture everyone a little more, the sponsors take turns expressing their appreciation for our art and the unique challenges that go into photographing storms, blah, blah, blah.
I’m about to crawl out of my skin when they finally get tothe part we’re all here for. Tracy takes third place with her rainbow and tornado shot. I grab my phone and quickly send her an all-caps text that’s mostly exclamation points.
My breath stutters when I hear Wes’s name next. He’s come in second with a shot I recognize from our time together. If I wasn’t standing next to him when he took it, it would be hard to believe he didn’t photoshop the lightning bolt crashing down, perfectly centered between the ruins of old farm equipment.
Some part of me expected him to win the whole thing. The fact that he came in second is so much of a surprise I’m barely paying attention to the rest of the announcement—until I hear my own name.
