Page 82 of The Shots You Take

“It’s beautiful here, with the fog and stuff,” he said instead. “I should take a picture.”

He fished his phone out of the pocket of the hoodie he’d left on a rock, then walked toward the glistening mud-like sand that stretched way out to where the tide had pulled back. He snapped a few photos that didn’t do the place justice at all—he was a terrible photographer—but he decided to send one to Lucy and Cole anyway.

They had a group chat together, years of photos and earnest declarations of encouragement and love from Adam, which were sometimes followed by replies of a single word from one of the kids. More often it was a single letter:k, ory. More often than that, even, there would be no reply at all. Adam tried not to take it personally, even when he watched his kids type endless messages to their friends. There were days when they stayed with him that they barely looked away from their phones. It wasn’t like they weren’tseeinghis texts.

Maggie had told him teenagers were just like that these days, but when he’d asked her if they ignored her texts too, she’d changed the subject.

Now he typed out:Wish you were here, then immediately deleted it because it was cheesy as hell, and also because it wasn’t exactly true. He loved his kids, and he’d be happy to explore a beach with them another day, but today was for him and Riley.

And also Lucky, who was going absolutely bananas barking at something.

“Hermit crab,” Riley called out to Adam, as an explanation.

“Ah,” Adam said, then, “Wait, really?” He’d never seen one before.

He crossed the short distance to Riley, then looked where he was pointing. There, just in front of Riley’s damp sneaker, was a little curly shell scooting along the sand.

“Oh wow.” Adam crouched down to get a better look. “Look at that.”

“The beach is full of them.”

Lucky barked again, and Adam held his arm out to protect the crab. “It’s okay,” he told the dog, “we like him.”

Lucky huffed, which sounded to Adam like exasperation. Adam held his phone over the crab and took a short video.

“You a filmmaker now?” Riley said.

“I thought the kids might like it. They’re hard to impress.”

“I heard teens are pretty wild about hermit crabs, yeah.”

Adam elbowed him in the shin. “They’re always watching animal videos on the internet. So I’m making one.”

Above him, Riley chuckled. “Do you even know how to send a video?”

Adam ignored him. Sure, he’d always been shit when it came to technology, but he wasn’t a hundred years old.

“Can I send them a photo of Lucky?” Adam asked. “Do you mind?”

“Go ahead. Lucky loves a camera.”

Adam took some slightly blurry photos of Lucky, then sent the best one to the kids. He wrote,This is my friend Lucky.

“I regret that I didn’t get to see Lucy and Cole grow up,” Riley said.

Adam’s head whipped around to stare at him. “You do?”

“They were great kids. I loved playing with them. I kind of always assumed I’d never have kids, so it was nice, being Uncle Riley.”

“Why did you assume that?”

Riley shrugged. “Seemed at the time that I would be living life in the shadows, y’know? If I wanted to keep playing hockey. And by the time I quit I was such a mess I couldn’t even imagine being in a relationship with someone, let alone raising kids.”

“And now?”

Riley looked out to sea. “I’ve made my peace with it. I don’t think it was ever my destiny. I’m okay with that, and I have my nieces now.”

“I wish you’d seen Lucy and Cole grow up too. I wish my kids knew you.” Silently, he told himself that they still could get to know Riley. There was time.

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