Noa was eager for Friday evening. This time, they were going to hang out at home where it was safe. Peter suggested it and Noa agreed.

Noa had learned from his mistake last time. The lake was dangerous. He shouldn’t – couldn’t – go there.

Even though things were awkward between him and Rion, he needed to see him again. Waiting for time to pass so that they could hang out made the day go by slowly. He was busy in the morning with his aunt, doing schoolwork, but the second he was free, he sat down with his sketchbook and drew several sheets of hands in various poses.

He knew it bothered people. He knew it was weird. But Noa kept his eyes down and noticed people’s bodies before their faces. Especially their hands.

Different people had different gestures and different ways of showing their moods. When Peter was bothered by something, he’d pick at his nails. Celeste fidgeted constantly. Jesse tapped his fingers on things and Danny liked to talk with his hands, waving them all over.

Rion held onto things really hard when something bothered him. When he couldn’t hold onto something, he would clench his hands into fists. Noa always noticed. Rion had long fingers and when he used to play the piano… Noa missed that. His fingers used to move so fast and fluidly… It was pretty.

Hands were expressive. And yes, faces were more expressive, but Noa preferred drawing hands. If he drew someone’s face, especially someone he knew, they would be recognized. Drawing someone’s hands was different. So many people couldn’t tell whose hands were whose.

Noa was brought back to reality when the doorbell rang. He immediately closed his sketchbook, springing to his feet as Aunt Elaine went to get the door. He followed her.

“Hi, Danny,” his aunt said, welcoming him in. “You’re early.”

“I planned on it,” Danny said with a smile, holding up a bag. “Mom sent me here with some stuff. In the move, we found a bunch of old things and we dug up some ancient duplicate pictures that she meant to give you guys. There were some of Amber…”

“Oh! Oh, that’s really nice of her,” Aunt Elaine said. “Come in.”

Danny stepped inside and then smiled and waved. “Hi, Noa.”

“Hi,” Noa said before he could stop himself.

He quickly turned and headed back into the living room. It was getting harder for him to hold his tongue. But really, saying something like ‘hi’ was so innocuous. It was fine, right? It was safe.

He knew he should be more careful. He’d said more than he’d wanted to on Monday when he’d seen Dr. Maes. It was nothing specific, but… He’d tried to explain his difficulties with Rion. Trying to word it ambiguously was hard and she kept asking him questions that threatened to fish out the truth.

“My friend and I had an argument and I’m right, but he won’t listen to me.”

That was the most he could tell her without talking about who said what, without mentioning how serious things were. Even saying which friend or what they argued about…

Noa couldn’t do it. He couldn’t tell her what happened, that things were all his fault, or that Rion said…

Noa couldn’t.

Aunt Elaine barely welcomed Danny in when there was someone else at the door. This time, there wasn’t a ring at the doorbell. It was just Peter, coming home from college.

“Hi, Peter,” Aunt Elaine said. “Danny’s here.”

“I’m early,” Danny said.

“Oh, hey,” Peter greeted him. “Sorry. I just have to drop off my stuff in my room.”

“No problem,” Danny said.

“Here, Danny. Why don’t you come in and I'll get you something to drink,” Aunt Elaine said.

Noa retreated back to the couch with his sketchbook while Danny chatted with his aunt. He wanted to see Rion, not anyone else. He didn’t care if they weren’t getting along that well. Rion was Rion.

“Hey,” Danny said as he came back with a glass of water. “How’s it going?”

“Okay,” Noa said.

He’d flipped his sketchbook back to his pictures of hands. He wasn’t drawing anything, just studying the proportions to make sure everything looked right. He wanted to shade them, but he needed to make any corrections or additions first.

“Can I see what you’re working on?” Danny asked.

Noa shrugged and then tilted the sketchbook to show him. He saw the way Danny’s expression shifted as he glanced over the page.

“More hands, huh?” Danny said.

Deciding that maybe it would be mean to stay silent, Noa leaned in a little closer, pointing out a set of hands that were gripping a GameCube controller.

“These are Peter’s,” he said.

“Oh…oh, really?” Danny asked.

“And these are Celeste’s,” Noa said, pointing out another set.

“Did you draw my hands?” Danny asked, a little more interested now.

Noa flipped back a page to point out a hand that was holding a fistful of popcorn. He’d been inspired after they watched movies together.

“Oh, cool! Nice,” Danny said and smiled. He compared his own hand to Noa's art before looking up. “So, you’re drawing the hands of people you like?”

“Not just people I like,” Noa said.

Sometimes he drew his father’s hands or his mother’s hands. Or at least, how he remembered them. Sometimes he drew his own hands, and he didn’t like himself at all.

“That’s pretty neat,” Danny said. “So–”

There was another ring at the doorbell. Noa sprung up again, almost knocking into Danny. He made for the door at the same time as Peter, who was just coming down the stairs. Peter got there a second before him.

This time, it was Rion on the doorstep.

“Hi,” he said with a little wave.

Noa wiggled right past Peter, slipping under his arm so that he could pull Rion into a tight hug. Rion hugged him back, just as tight.

It was the only way Noa could communicate how much Rion mattered to him. He didn’t have the right words to express his feelings, not without saying too much in front of everyone else.

“It’s good to see you too,” Rion said as they pulled away.

“Geez, Noa. You don’t have to run me over,” Peter said.

“Oh! Rion! Hey!” Danny said, having wandered over. “How are you?”

“Okay,” Rion said. “It’s good to see you guys. I brought some games and stuff.”

He was wearing a very full backpack. He pulled it off and Noa took it from him.

“I’ll go put it by the TV,” he said.

“Uh…sure. Okay,” Rion said. “Thanks.”

They got comfortable in the living room. Aunt Elaine made sure everyone had drinks and once they were settled, she disappeared and returned with an old shoebox.

“Here,” she said. “There’s lots of room in this one for more pictures. We can add the ones you brought in here, Danny.”

“Oh, cool! Thanks,” he said, grabbing his bag.

“Pictures?” Rion said.

“Yeah,” Danny said. “We found some old ones in the move. Here.”

He started pulling out envelopes of photos. Most of them were from ’97 or ’98. Noa, who was sitting next to Rion on the couch, leaned into his side. He felt Rion press back against him.

Noa didn’t want to see pictures of Amber. It was uncomfortable. It made his stomach twist in knots just thinking of seeing her.

“You might already have some of these,” Danny said as they opened up the shoebox. “Everyone liked to take pictures of the same stuff, you know?”

“That’s okay,” Aunt Elaine said. “Why don’t we take a look.”

The pictures in the old shoebox were mostly loose, but a few sets were still in the envelopes. They’d probably never been pulled out after being developed.

“These are all from ’97 to ’99,” said Aunt Elaine. “I think we have some good ones here from spring and summer… Oh, Danny, there’s some of you and Sarina jumping into the lake.”

She picked one off the top and showed it to Danny who grinned.

“Yeah, I remember that,” Danny said. “Oh my god, we were so tiny back then! …Oh, yeah. Here! Take a look at these.”

He handed over the envelopes he brought with him. Aunt Elaine accepted them, flipping through the contents.

“Oh, this is… I remember!” she said. “These are from the school Christmas play. We forgot the camera… Danny, it was so nice of Althea to do this. I’m going to have to thank her.”

“It’s no problem,” Danny said.

“There’s some good ones in there,” Peter said, peeking over his mom’s shoulder as she flipped through the pictures. “Oh man, check out Jesse’s bad hair day in that one.”

“That one’s so good!”  Danny grinned.

Rion didn’t make a move to look at anything and neither did Noa. Rion smiled stiffly next to him as they looked through everything, adding in a ‘yeah’ or ‘you’re right’ here and there as they talked. Noa stayed silent, looking at anything but the pictures.

There was already a picture of Amber in the living room that he avoided. He didn’t want to look at old pictures of her. It hurt too much.

“There’s a lot of stuff in here,” Danny said, starting to leaf through the old shoebox. “Looks like you’ve got some old packs of photos too. Are they doubles?”

“I think a couple of them are,” Aunt Elaine said. “Here, let’s see… These are doubles for sure. You should maybe take them back to Althea. She can have them if she wants. And…”

Her hand stilled on the next envelope of photos. Noa stared at it, seeing the date hastily scribbled on the outside. Rion tensed, leaning fully into Noa.

“September fourth…” Danny read aloud, looking up with wide eyes. “Were those from the day that Amber…?”

“Most of them didn’t turn out…” Aunt Elaine said. She cleared her throat. “They… Noa and Rion took pictures of the lake that day…”

“There’s a couple of Amber,” Peter added. “But yeah.”

“Oh…really?” Danny said with wide eyes. “So, this was… Oh, ah… Maybe we should just put it back.”

There was an awkward pause. Noa looked down. He could feel eyes on him and he knew why.

Both he and Rion had been in charge of the camera. They’d taken some random pictures. None of them were memorable to him. It was nothing worth looking at, considering what happened that day.

“Can I see?” Rion asked.

Noa turned to him sharply. Why? Why would he want…?

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea,” Peter said.

“It’s just… You said most of them didn’t turn out?” Rion said. “I remember taking pictures, but I didn’t think we used up the whole roll of film. I… Did we mess up the camera, or…?”

“No,” Aunt Elaine said. “It was fine. It might have been… We should put these away.”

“Can I just…” Rion began then hesitated. Noa knew he was going to say something stupid even before the next words came out of his mouth. “I’d like to see Amber.”

No. He didn’t. Neither one of them wanted to see Amber. Noa knew that.

But the others didn’t, and it made them relent.

“Well…okay…” Aunt Elaine said, pulling the pictures out.

Rion accepted them and Danny leaned in, eager for a look. Rion started leafing through them.

Noa tried to understand why Rion wanted to look through those pictures. He felt queasy thinking about it, his thoughts jumbling. Rion lingered just long enough on each picture to seem interested but Noa could tell that he didn’t care about the first handful. There were two that Rion and Noa had taken of each other, and one of them together that Amber had taken.

Seeing his old jean jacket made Noa queasy. He could remember how it felt, how it smelled, how he’d like to burrow into it. He remembered how much he’d liked it, how it was his favourite. He remembered tossing it on the floor and never looking at it again. The fire ate it with the rest of the cabin.

There were a couple shots of Amber. She looked so happy and lively. The sleeves of her red hoodie were pulled up enough to make her intricate friendship bracelet visible, the colours matching Jesse’s. Her pale blue jeans were worn and scuffed at the hem, and she was wearing her old school shoes – white with black stripes… Her long, dark brown hair had been loose that day, falling over her shoulders.

It was the way Noa always remembered her. That was how he’d last seen her. It was his last memory of happy, vibrant, alive Amber, burned into his mind.

Looking at her made him feel so, so horrible.

The next picture was of the lake. It alleviated some of the pressure in Noa’s chest. Then there were two pictures of squirrels on the trail. The trail that…

The next picture was a dark blur, a smear of black and grey.

Followed by the next image – an out of focus weave of blue.

Another with an edge of black on the side, the blue further down, something past that…dark brown?

Noa knew what he was looking at. He understood. In his mind, he heard the rapid-fire clicking as the camera jostled, crushed against Rion’s chest. How had he forgotten? The camera… It…

Rion had stopped going through the pictures. He was staring down at them, eyes too wide, blood completely drained from his face. He turned slightly and their eyes met.

Rion knew, just like Noa did. They both knew what this was.

“Oh, wow. Those ones really are messed up,” Danny spoke up, taking the pictures out of Rion’s hand.

Rion tried and failed to grab them and then did his best to subdue the gesture, staring at Danny unblinkingly while he flipped through the rest of the pictures.

“It’s all blurry… Looks like it went off accidentally or something,” Danny said, frowning as he studied them. “Huh… Well, that happens a lot. I know my brothers and I messed up so many rolls of film that Mom and Dad stopped letting us use the camera. Well, okay, it was mostly Gabe’s fault. He set the standard.”

Danny might have been trying to make them feel better, but it had the opposite effect. Rion sucked in a breath that was painfully sharp.

“There was an accident…” Rion said. “I remember… The camera… I mean, we…”

He was breathing too sharp, eyes darting back and forth. Noa wanted to reach out to comfort him, or maybe to shut him up, but he couldn’t. He was frozen in place, sick to his stomach.

It was there. It was in the pictures.

Why didn’t anyone else see it? How could they look at that and not know what they were seeing? It was so obvious. It was so…

“It’s okay. These things happen,” Aunt Elaine said, taking back the pictures from Danny. She put them away in a hurry, sparing Rion a concerned look. “Are you okay? You’re pale.”

“Oh! Oh, I’m… I’ll be fine,” Rion said. “Maybe you were right. That was a bit much.”

“Don’t overdo it,” Peter told him, frowning. “If you’re not ready for something then you’re not ready.”

“Yeah…yeah, right,” Rion said, looking down.

His gaze was distant. Noa knew where his mind was. They were thinking the same thing.

“Noa? Are you okay too?” Peter asked.

Noa nodded but turned away. He couldn’t look Peter in the eye, not right now. He was nauseous, afraid he might throw up if he tried to speak.

He kept his eyes down, feeling overcome by the familiar heavy weight of self-loathing. He tried not to be sick or cry or show any sign of being upset, even while everything inside him fought back, the guilt hungry for control.

Noa was not okay. He was not okay at all.