The Rule of Thirds

Chapter Sixteen

24 HOURS UNTIL VANTAGE POINT

So many headstones. Tall ones, ominous ones. Flat stones, nestled in the grass, that have prob- ably been there for hundreds of years. Which one is his? It’s only been three months, but the last day I was here was so crazy, there were so many people and so many cars, that the cemetery where my dad is buried seems like a different place today. Coming out of the meeting with Mrs. Edmonson I just wanted to talk to my dad about what to do, and my first instinct was to go see him in my room. But Mom’ll be home by 1. The last thing I want to do is have to relive the morning.

It seems easier to bear, this place, from behind my camera. It’s a clear day that we get only rarely in October, and I set up a couple of headstone shots, but my lens keeps getting drawn to the signs of life all around here. Someone’s spent the summer going nuts with the Miracle-Gro. Red impatiens contrast with the green of the lawns and the gray of the head- stones. Strange how the thing that pops out of cem- etery photos are images of life. I’m so distracted, so in the frame, that I’m taken by surprise when I recognize my dad’s name on a monument.

I kneel down in the grass, keeping the camera to my face and focus on the headstone. I zoom in on the pebbled texture of the stone, snap some photos, then slowly zoom out, taking in the headstone against the grass. Then I rest the camera in my lap and fold my legs over so I’m sitting cross-legged on the ground.

“Hi,” I say finally. “So . . . this is weird, huh? We never talk here. Which uh, OK, kinda my fault. It’s not like you have much choice in the matter. But I just . . . I don’t know. I have no good excuse. Pain to get here on the bus? Lame, I know! Like, you died, and you’re stuck out here by yourself—or I guess there’s other people around but it’s not like you know them, right? And I can’t be bothered to get on a bus? It’s totally not that. I guess it’s just . . . Mom comes all the time and I thought, like, maybe in the same way she doesn’t know how we talk in my room, maybe she doesn’t want me here? Like it’s her place to be with you, alone? So don’t tell her I came, OK?”

My camera is resting in the space between my crossed legs, and I keep my eyes on the grass that’s, I guess, six feet above him.

“You know what I hate?” I continue, grabbing my camera again, and shooting around the headstone. “When we’re in my room I can just pretend you’re in New York for work. That you got a studio there like you always wanted and you’re living the dream. And I’m—just at Dace’s or school or whatever when you come home. Like I just missed you. When I go to Tisch camp, we’ll hang out for the whole two weeks, just like we used to. I know it’s crazy but it’s part of why I want to win so badly. But then what? I get there and where are you?”

I wait for Dad to answer, to tell me that it’s normal what I’m feeling, or that he’s glad I’m here, or that yes, he is actually in New York and we’re going to have so much fun when I’m there. If I’m there. But he doesn’t say anything. I lower the camera again.

Silence. Not my dad’s voice, solving my problems for me. Not like I was hoping. I stand up to take it all in. The grass that tops my dad’s final resting place. The annual flowers decorating his headstone. Everything but the words.

“I don’t think I’m going to Tisch camp, Dad. Remember Vantage Point? The photo contest that was going to be my in to get into Tisch? Memories— that was going to be my theme, but it can’t be, not anymore.”

I focus on the front of the headstone now, on the words visible above the tall grass, inscribed in stone.

Evan Alexander Greene
July 24, 1976–June 18, 2012
Loving husband of Holly, father of Philadelphia Gone but not—

The rest is a blur through my tears.

There’s no hurry. If you can’t cry in a cemetery, where can you cry? The tears finally stop their steady stream maybe 20 minutes later. There’s a soft white cloth in my satchel, the one I use to wipe my lenses, and it serves as a Kleenex. It’s only as I give myself one last blow that I notice it, partially obscured by taller grass around the headstone: a tulip, Easter yellow, still in full bloom. An impossible sight in October. Isn’t it? The flower stands out among the grass, bright petals against the gray stone.

It looks so beautiful, this vibrant symbol of life against so many symbols of death. Uplifting. A light- ness in a dark place. I snap a shot that frames the tulip against the backdrop created by my dad’s headstone. And all at once, I have my Vantage Point theme. I grab the Nikon from my bag and snap one more.