From The Dead Read Free Page B

eyes.
With a gentle rub to her back, he said, “Sorry, babe. It’s nothing.
Jitters.”
    But he could pinpoint the suspicion in her autumn
eyes. When it came to fear detection, the woman had radar.
    Jesse leaned in and planted a kiss on her lips.
    He’d always adored her Italian lips.
     
     
    CHAPTER 4

     
    The next morning, Jesse grabbed the handful of film
rolls from the overnight drop-off bin and carried them to the room
behind the checkout counter, which housed a small processing
lab.
    A far cry from his high-school photography class, the
room contained the same fluorescent light that filled the retail
area. A mini-lab machine sat against a wall, where he deposited the
rolls of film, cartridge and all. The machine would handle the
rest.
    Unlike his film development in high school, minimal
human intervention occurred here: no need to remove strands of film
under the glow of an ominous red light, no gloved hands to immerse
film in toxic chemicals. While in the past he’d handled development
with the same tender care he’d given to the shot itself, nowadays
he treated the development phase like an afterthought rather than
an art.
    He removed a set of prints the machine had spit out
during its last run. In his days at the store, he had seen a vast
array of human behavior immortalized in photographs—some to his
detriment, seared in his memory with regret. But this set of
prints, a family gathering at a lake in a rural, wooded area, made
him grin. Jesse flipped through the shots.
    A proud young boy and his father posed with a silver
fish, its length almost that of the boy’s arm. A mother, dressed in
a brick-and-charcoal-colored flannel shirt, humored the amateur
photographer with a stare that implied, “I dare you: Take one step
closer with that camera.” Another photo showed the full family of
four enveloped in a hug, where the boy giggled as his younger
sister attempted to grab his nose. This last photo spurred similar
memories of Jesse and his sister, Eden.
    Jesse started to put the family photo down but took
another look. Intrigued, Jesse stared at the father, who tried to
kiss both kids at once.
    When viewed through a camera lens, fatherhood didn’t
seem an intimidation.
    After he matched the processed photos with their
negatives, Jesse assembled the final package and brought it to the
pickup bin on the sales floor. At ten thirty, ready for business,
he unlocked the front door to a waiting crowd of nobody. Jesse
maneuvered across the retail floor, wound around displays of
cameras and how-to books, slid between narrow rows of shelving. He
approached a row of sterling wedding frames and dusted them as he
pondered the prior night’s conversation with Jada.
    Jesse had resided in California for eleven years.
When he mulled this over, the banality of his status quo struck
him. At twenty-nine years old, Jesse anchored his hope on an
upcoming audition.
    Don’t you want to be an actor anymore? Jada
had asked.
    Jesse and Jada met at a Java Cup location a few
months after he moved to the L.A. area. Invincible at a haughty
eighteen years old, Jesse had made a swift departure from his home
in Hudson, Ohio. At that point, Jada herself had lived in the L.A.
area for a year already. Both starved for fame, both felt as though
they flailed against its odds as if in deep water, and they became
friends quickly. Their fear and vulnerability cemented their bond.
They confided their dreams. At the time, Jada’s personality
represented everything Jesse wished he could be—an image contrary
to that of his Midwestern roots, a previous life he had managed to
escape. Jada thought she’d discovered someone as independent and
driven as she herself was. And Jesse the actor played the part
well.
    A year later, the two friends moved into an apartment
near Hollywood and Vine—a shoddy location after dark, but mere
steps from the Capitol Records building, a shrine of industry
power. The pair sought opportunities with a vengeance and