A boy who wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“It was one of my first jobs.”
“You were there.”
He nodded.
“Yes.”
“I remember asking you whether I looked terrible.”
Arthur closed his eyes.
“You were there.”
“And I didn’t answer.”
“No.”
I remembered his silence perfectly.
The consultant had laughed and said, “Well, that’s why we’re here.”
“And I didn’t answer.”
I had wanted someone to tell her to stop.
Nobody had.
“Why do you still have this photograph?” I asked.
Arthur rubbed his hands together.
Nobody had.
“Years later, a former colleague contacted me while clearing out an old storage room. He’d found a box of photographs and consultation cards that should have been destroyed long ago. Your name was written on the back of the photograph. I remembered the appointment when I read it, and I asked to keep it.”
“He’d found a box of photographs.”
I turned the photograph over.
