Page 61 of Lemon Pound Cake Club

She turned to me one last time.

"Keep it."

She closed my fingers around the photograph with care.

"It belongs with you."

She walked away in silence, and I stood alone on Camille’s porch, left with more questions than answers.

Camille looked up from across the yard. She noticed the photograph in my hand and met my gaze. Her face stayed the same, but her eyes seemed different. I wasn’t sure what it meant.

I slipped the photograph into my purse before she could say anything. The deputy kept circling the yard, sometimes stopping to take pictures of the empty flowerbeds.

The women began gathering the uprooted flowers and stacking them in neat piles.

"What did Evelyn give you?"

Camille’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts. I looked up and saw she was only a few feet away. She must have left the others while I wasn’t paying attention. I closed my purse without thinking.

"Just an old photograph."

She glanced at my purse and then looked at me again.

"A photograph of what?"

I smiled politely.

"Someone I loved."

It wasn't a lie, but not the whole truth. Camille had a strange look on her face.

"Miss Evelyn doesn't usually hand out keepsakes," she said.

"I suppose today is full of surprises."

She laughed, but there was no humor in it.

"I guess it is."

Finally, Camille looked back at what remained of her flowerbeds.

"I've lived here for years. Nothing like this has ever happened."

I followed her gaze. The rich brown mulch was scarred with long jagged trenches where bright flowers once grew.

"It feels…" She hesitated. "Personal."

I turned to look at her.

"What makes you say that?"

"Seriously, I’m the only house on the block this has happened to."

Her eyes swept over the untouched porch furniture. She looked toward the pristine lemon trees standing proudly behind the ruined beds.

I stayed quiet. She wrapped her arms around herself again.

A light breeze brushed a strand of her hair across her face. For the first time since I met Camille, she didn’t look like the confident woman who greeted newcomers with lemon pound cake and a bright smile.