✓ Forget Me Not (Short Story)

Epilogue

I log onto her computer to get the gallery instructions. Supposedly, she has all the images picked out and edited, I'm just supposed to put them together for the gallery.

There's a read me document beside a folder labeled PICTURES FOR GALLERY. I click on it, my breath becoming heavier.

Dear Caleb,

I know I'm dead by now. Why else would you be reading this other than you're being nosy.

Yeah, that's a possibility too.

If I am alive, I'm going to beat you up for snooping on my laptop. To be honest, I really should password protect that thing.

Anyways, I need to tell you the real reason I chose you as my apprentice.

I stop breathing, my heart becoming faster.

People rarely see the photographer when they look at photography. I wanted them to remember me, after I'm gone. I don't want them to forget me, Caleb.

This is why I'm about to blindside you.

Open the pictures folder, and do whatever you want with the gallery. I trust you.

And I love you, Caleb.

-Felicity Grace Donley, also known as Felix

I don't realize I'm crying until a few drops of tears fall onto my hands. I quickly wipe them away. We have more pressing issues than my eye sweat.

My cursor clicks on the folder, taking a few seconds to actually load.

About fifty images pop up, stunning me.

No, she didn't.

A half-sob, half-laugh makes it's way from my throat.

"They're my pictures..." I murmur to myself like a mental patient, "of her."

No wonder she said I could do whatever with them.

They're mine.

And I knew exactly how I was going to use them.

·

"Oh, I'm so nervous," my mother says from beside me, clutching her jacket in her arms.

"I believe I'm more nervous, mom."

"Actually, I believe I win the medal for that," Ms. Donley says, coming up beside me. "So unfair that you wouldn't show me any of the works."

I shrug. "Felicity said not to when we discussed the gallery."

"She never shared her stuff before galleries with me anyways. Always worth a try," she replies, grinning.

Ms. Donley is asked to say a few words in honor of her daughter, since the main person of the gallery is Felicity. There's a few pieces by others, but not as significant.

I'm the last to be asked up to the podium.

"Hi, I'm Felix's apprentice. She decided to take one on to help with the photography here." I take a deep breath, grabbing a hold of the edges of the podium. "The theme of her gallery is Forget Me Not." I can hear Ms. Donley crying from the audience. I continue on. "And the main piece," I say, looking back towards the curtains pulling back to reveal one large photograph, "is titled Felicity Grace Donley, also know as Felix."

The audience broke out into applause, and the rest of the curtain was pulled back to reveal the whole gallery.

"I'd like to leave a quote from the famous Ansel Adams that she left me. 'You don't make a photograph with just a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, all the books you have read, the music you have heard," I pause, almost whispering the last part.

"And the people you have loved."