Final Shot | ONC2022

Chapter 9: Ce-Ce's House

"How do you do that?" I asked, looking at the image on his view screen.

Leo looked puzzled. "Do what?"

"That photo is exactly like the one of Ce-Ce. Even down to the angle of the spoon."

Leo grinned. "They say I have an eye, you know."

"You do." 

Leo barely had to look at Ce-Ce's photobook before he recreated the image perfectly. I didn't look like Ce-Ce, but somehow he made us look alike. The angle of our heads. The brightness of our eyes. The gentle light and the thickness of the scones in front of us, piled with lashing of cream. There was a kinship that grew more apparent with every shot.

I took a bite of my scone, enjoying the sweetness of the jam and cream with the scone's soft blandness. "I could eat this forever," I said.

"Yeah, it's not bad."

"What, you're not a scone person?"

He shrugged. "They're okay, I guess. I prefer cake."

"No accounting for taste," I said, biting into my scone again.

Leo ignored me. "Look at this," he said, turning the back of his camera toward me.

I was sitting in the swing at Dru Point, leaning back as the wind streamed through my hair, my mouth open in a smile. I looked so fancy free, a young woman facing a future in which there was only sunlight. I looked like Ce-Ce did.

"You're amazing," I told Leo.

"No, you are," he responded, grinning boyishly.

"No, you are."

We gazed at each other in a way that could have elevated the blood sugar of everyone around us to cloying levels. He raised the camera, snapped off a shot and showed it to me. I was smiling happily with cream all over my lips.

"Delete it!" I squealed, reaching for the camera.

"No way. It's too cute." He held the camera beyond my reach, putting it back into its bag.

I didn't bother trying to get it from him. If he liked that shot so much, he could have it. Besides, it wasn't like he was going to put it on social media—he didn't even have any accounts.

"I guess it's Ce-Ce's house now then," I said as I wiped my mouth.

"Yep."

#

*** Warning: Sex Scene Ahead ***

We pulled up opposite a green weatherboard hidden in a backstreet of Blackmans Bay. I looked at the photobook and back at the house. The boards seemed a little more weathered and the banksia tree in the front yard was much bigger than it had been when Ce-Ce had stood on the front steps with her sister, but it was definitely the right house.

"This is it," I confirmed.

Leo nodded and opened the door. We walked down the front path together. There was no car in the driveway but there was a narrow, single garage. I knocked on the peeling door and waited.

Nothing.

I knocked three times, but there was no noise from within the house.

"We'll have to come back next time," Leo said. 

I nodded, feeling somewhat deflated as we returned to the car. Leo started the engine before taking my hand. "I'm not that upset nobody was home," he confessed. "I've been thinking about what I'd like to do next all afternoon."