Catchfly: Seeing Stars

Chapter 25: Photo Albums

October 10 – 9:17 AM

I peer through the windows of the Carolina House. My eyes gaze past the dozens of elderly in the communal room. Grandma's right where I'd expected her to be: at her usual table with Helen, playing cards. They always have morning tea together.

I head inside. For the first time ever, I'm disappointed when I see Rhonda's face behind the service desk. None of the other workers would care about what I was doing here.

"Paisley, sweetheart!" She flashes a bright smile. She puts away some files to give me her full attention. Bully.

"I didn't expect to see you here so early."

"I know, I couldn't sleep." I fake a smile and hurry past the reception. I can feel Rhonda's eyes following me.

"Your nana's in the communal room, honey."

I eye her. "I know! I'm just going to the bathroom." I hurry out of her sight before she can ask questions. I skip past the restroom and hop up the stairs to grandma's floor.

Her door is unlocked. It always is. Grandma never remembers where she puts her keys. When she first moved into the Carolina House, the nurses had to break open her room five times over the course of two weeks, before they ordered her to keep the door unlocked.

I open up her closet and dive in for the photo albums. With Sienna safe and sound in Atlanta, I shouldn't even care about this any longer. My parents are cooling on my involvement with Jace. Danny is in jail, unrightfully, but that's Cyrus' problem now. They're building a case against Levi's father for selling and using drugs, and as weird as it feels to say, that's Levi's problem now.

And my problem? Well, maybe my problem is exactly that Levi's problems aren't mine anymore. That I can't take care of Sienna anymore. I like being close to things, being on top of things. It distracts me from what I don't know.

Now, all that's left is what I don't know.

I recognize the first few photo albums I pick up. Grandma and I have looked at them before: they're ones of her and grandpa when they were young, or ones of me as a baby. But I know there's one of my dad when he was young that I've never really looked at. Maybe as a child, but I didn't know what to look for then.

I flip open a blue album. The first picture is of my dad as a kid, holding a baby on his lap. His sister, aunt Nora. The album dates back roughly to when he was going to kindergarten. Bingo.

I don't have to go very far before I run into the same exact photo I found in my parents' office: dad, Ricardo Rayas and another boy named Joel. There are more photos of the three of them together. I watch them grow up as I flip through the pages. Playing baseball, camping, eating ice cream, dressed up in Halloween costumes. It's always the three of them together. I recognize the background in some of their pictures to be my grandparents' house.

The next photo album is of the mid-eighties. My dad's in high school. Ricardo disappears from the pictures. My dad and Joel stick together, though. Some more guys make appearances. When I see a guy with a mustache that looks familiar, grandma's handwriting tells me it's a young officer Carl Hawkins. Guess he's always had that mustache.

The album ends at my dad graduating high school. I fish another album from the stack. It seems to follow up right behind it: dad's college years. Dad started growing a beard, Joel started growing his blonde hair out. They both went to Syracuse, I guess.

Huh. Dad seemed awfully close to this guy.

Mom starts to pop up when I'm about halfway through. She was a freshman in college when dad was a senior. When I was a kid, I used to dream that I'd be just like them and meet the love of my life in college.