The Accident Read Online Free Page A

another. The warmth creeps in slowly, lifts me. Rose-Marie can do what she wants. Let her make her plans, I don’t care anymore.
    Terry and his chocolate.
    Rose-Marie and her stupid plans.
    Tash.

before
after
later
     
    The darkroom is supposed to be empty, and it’s not. The safe lights are on, and I give my eyes a few seconds to adjust and pick out the form at the wet bench. A girl. Maybe my grade, probably a year or two younger. She lifts her paper carefully out of the stop and lowers it into the fixer, then gently rocks the tray so the chemical covers the print. Only once that’s done does she look up and notice me.
    ‘Hi.’
    I feel foolish, like an intruder. I still feel like an outsider, no matter how many names I learn or how many routines I now find myself flowing through, and it’s tiring. I was hoping this would be a sanctuary.
    ‘I’m Sarah. I’m in year twelve. I’m new…’
    ‘Morgan. Year eleven.’ She moves a second print out of the wash and shakes the water off it, holding it up to look at it.
    ‘Do you do this in art or as an elective? Photography, I mean.’
    ‘I’ve got a free period now so Miss Shepherd lets me come here to work. I do the two-unit elective. They don’t do it with art classes—too many idiots.’ She throws me a grin, and I feel a surge of gratitude. I need a friend.
    She puts her print in the drying rack and then moves the other one out of the fixer. ‘Are you doing photography for your major work?’
    ‘Maybe. Still deciding.’
    ‘My brother just finished year twelve. He didn’t do art, though. He was into the boring subjects—legal studies, that sort of thing.’ She pauses. ‘Are you going to do some photos?’
    ‘Yeah.’ I don’t know where everything is kept, though. ‘I’m new, so…’
    As a tour guide, she’s nothing like Sarah Bancroft. She shows me the fridge where the paper is stored, the cupboards where the mixed chemicals go, the squeegee for cleaning down the wet bench. She gives me a running commentary as she goes.
    ‘Processing tanks and black bags are in the storeroom. You have to peg the bags shut at the bottom because they’re all torn up. I usually bring it in here just to make sure no light gets in. And lock the door when you come in, if you’re by yourself. You’re not supposed to because of the chemicals—you know, in case you pass out from fumes or whatever—but if you don’t, there’s a bunch of guys who’ll come in and switch on the white lights. They think it’s funny.’
    I’ve brought in a sleeve of negatives from last year. I fish it out of my bag, pick a photo randomly and play around with the enlarger settings. It’s been almost a year since I’ve been in a darkroom, and I need to get my technique back before I can do anything else.
    Morgan chats as we work. Even though all I’ve wanted all morning is to be by myself and have peace and quiet like I’m used to, I don’t mind it at all. It reminds me of how Robbie and I used to talk, and it didn’t matter whether we were talking about McDonald’s or about God and the meaning of life, it just came easily. Even with the extractor churning and Morgan’s voice, it feels peaceful.
    I drop my first print into the developer, and Morgan leans over to watch as the image emerges.
    ‘That’s awesome. Where is that, Europe somewhere?’
    ‘Rome.’ It’s a narrow side street Robbie and I wandered into while Mum and Alan went for coffee. I loved the uneven cobbled road and the peonies in the window-boxes. There’s an old-fashioned bicycle leaning against a wall, and a bunch of motor bikes and scooters outside a gelateria.
    ‘Did you go over on exchange?’
    ‘Family holiday. My mum’s Italian. We go over every couple of years to visit all her relatives. She was born here, but you wouldn’t know it. She still talks in Italian half the time.’
    ‘You got brothers or sisters or anything?’
    It’s such a casual, normal question, but my stomach drops, and suddenly I