The Locksmith Opened My Bus While Felix Watched From The Fence

Mara sent Felix the recovery time before she sent me the locksmith's bill.

Monday, nine in the morning. My service yard. The bus would stay there until its condition and contents were recorded.

"No surprise visit," she told me. "No argument at the door. If anyone blocks you, leave and call me."

I paid the locksmith's $285 charge in advance.

The yard lease was in my name, too. I had sent the landlord a copy of the title and asked him to meet us. He agreed to open the outer gate.

Nadine arrived at eight forty-five with a notebook and two empty storage boxes.

"For my film," she said. "Only mine. You can keep everything sealed until Mara says how to record it."

She wore a plain raincoat. Her silver hair was tied back with a black band. She looked at the bus, then at the fence, then picked a spot where she could see both.

"What did the man want?" I asked.

"A signature. He bought two portrait sets as a private archive lot. He wanted to display one in his shop."

"Did you tell him no?"

"I asked him to preserve the packaging and his messages. Then I told him no."

The locksmith checked my license against the title. He checked the vehicle number through the windshield. The landlord opened the gate and stayed beside his office.

Felix arrived while the locksmith laid out his tools.

"You can't take company property," Felix called through the fence.

I held up the folder.

"Mara sent you the documents."

"I'm talking to you."

"Please talk to her."

He shook the fence once. Then he took out his phone and began filming.

The locksmith stopped and looked at me.

"He's outside the yard," the landlord said. "Gate stays shut."

Felix made no move to enter. The locksmith finished, handed me two new keys, and wrote the bus number on his receipt.

When the door opened, I smelled old fixer and damp cardboard.

That smell hurt more than Felix's email.

I had left the bus clean the week before. Now a print tray sat under a drip from the rinse hose. The floor mat was curled against the wheel well.

I touched the outside of the tray. Cold. I checked the thermometer anyway.

The blue clothespin was still clipped to its cord. My mother had put it there when the thermometer kept slipping behind the sink during the build.

"Something cheap can save something dear," she had said.

I lifted it clear of the puddle.

We photographed the bus from the doorway first. Then each shelf, drawer, and counter. We wrote down what we moved and why.

Felix's jacket and headphones went into a box for him. Nadine signed beside the list. I did not open his backpack.

Mara had been clear about that.

The drying cabinet was part of my conversion. It held film on clean clips behind a dust screen. It was not a safe, though Felix had tried to make it one.

The locksmith opened the new hasp after I showed him the cabinet on my paid build invoice.

Inside hung several sleeves of dry negatives. At the bottom sat three unopened film cassettes, wrapped in paper and marked with Nadine's job codes.

"Those haven't been developed," I said.

"They should be in my return box."

Loose film did not belong beneath wet sleeves. Unopened film did not belong in a drying cabinet at all.

Beside the cassettes was a stack of prepaid mailers.

One had a label stuck crooked across its flap. Under the label, in Felix's broad writing, were the words PRIVATE ARCHIVE LOT 7. PAID $240.

Nadine put her pen down.

"Don't open anything else."

I called Mara on speaker. We described only what we could see.

"Photograph the labels," she said. "Seal the cabinet. Make a list of everyone present. Nadine, send me your storage contract."

"Every portrait negative stays mine," Nadine said. "Any transfer needs my written approval and the sitter's written permission. Felix knows that."

"We'll need the signed terms."

"You'll have them in ten minutes."

Outside, Felix stopped filming.

"That stuff was abandoned," he shouted.

Nadine turned toward the open door.

"I paid storage through September."

"I wasn't talking to you."

"You were selling things that belonged to me. You are now."

Mara told us to end the conversation. We did.

I sealed the cabinet with numbered paper strips and wrote the time across them. No faces went into our photos. Only labels, doors, and boxes.

At eleven, Felix left. His jacket waited in the landlord's office, with a receipt for collection.

I sat on the bus step while Nadine sent her contract.

Then a new email reached both of us.

The subject was RETURN REQUEST. Attached was a $480 invoice signed by Felix for two private portrait sets.