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Outer Banks, the Chateau July 10th, 2020 10:24pm
"John B, look what I've found," I said while I entered his bedroom and sat on his bed, next to him.
The storm was raging on outside, and I could hear the raindrops tapping against the windowpane. The sound of the thunder was deafening, and goosebumps grew on my skin every time lightening stroke outside. I tried not to think about it and instead I opened the heavy photo album I was holding. John B sat closer from me and smiled when he realised what it was. "Where'd you find this?" he asked me.
"In dad's room," I admitted.
John B didn't respond, he just let his fingers softly caress the material of the book and waited for me to open it, which I did. We stared at the first pictures, which were our birth pictures, still at the hospital, in our mom's arms. We laughed and turned the pages, staring carefully at all the pictures our dad had chosen to keep forever. "We looked so much alike," John B chuckled, pointing at our baby faces on a picture.
"Yeah, look at you," I giggled, showing him a picture on which he was crying.
We bursted out in laugh and kept admiring pictures of our peaceful childhood. Our mother was sometimes appearing on some of them, and pretending I didn't look like her would have been a lie. On other pictures of us, back when we were toddlers, a small blond head began to appear, more and more frequently, to the point where we could have thought he was really part of the family.
"We were already surfers," I stated, pointing at a picture on which we could see both him and JJ.
I kept turning the pages until one caught our attention. There was a picture of me, maybe 5 or 6 years old, in my father's arms, holding a teddy bear. The picture was very cute but it wasn't what caught our attention. Stuck with some scotch tape on the page, was a very pretty necklace, which apparently, my dad had kept for me. "For my baby girl, I can't wait to see you wearing our family's heirloom," John B read out loud what my father had written, making me open my mouth in shock.
"Damn," I expressed.
John B grabbed the necklace gently and looked at me, smiling proudly. "Come on, let me help you out," he placed my humid hair on my left shoulder and I bit my lip, so emotional.
I didn't think I'd ever get to wear this, because I had heard about it for so long but always thought my turn would never come. "Thank you," I mumbled when John B finished placing it around my neck.
"Dad would be so proud of you," he said and I smiled.
I pulled him in a hug and he wrapped his arms around me, reminding me how lucky I was not to be alone going through this shit. I tensed up in his arms when the thunder rumbled outside, very loudly, making him burst out in laugh. "Hey, it's just the storm," he said.
"I know dumbass, I'm not scared of the storm," I lied.
