Dust

There is an almost-empty bottle

Of Aberlour on the oak shelf

In the front room of our

Family home.

Its singular shot of Scottish heritage

Sits in the bottom, arcing to the glass

Just below the label.

It smells of spice and fig.

Upstairs are two children,

Of 12 and 14.

Their father loved this scotch,

And the son looks just like him.

The daughter takes after her mother,

But she has her father’s humor,

And wit.

She does not share her brother’s temper.

In the mudroom,

There is an old leather bag.

Hidden away behind detergent

And boxes of lightbulbs.

The bag, she has found,

Has within it an old Pentax.

A roll of 35 millimeter still inside.

Memories undeveloped.

Her stepfather carried with him,

His own father’s love of

Cameras.

Capturing moments.

And for a moment,

The dust on the leather,

And the old oaken shelf

Floats upward.

It creates a ghost of a photograph,

One where a young redheaded girl stands,

Between her mother and stepfather,

Feeling as though she was unlike him.

These years later

The dust has settled.

On the curved glass of the bottle,

On the woven strap of the camera.

Hidden inside

The shelf

And the leather bag

And me.

She realizes they are not

So unlike one another.

Her stepfather and herself.

These snapshots in her close memory.

These strips of film,

Fragile and malleable underneath

The right chemicals,

The right amount of care.

Her siblings are his children,

And the old camera pulls at her heartstrings

When she sees it covered in dust

Much like the bottle of scotch.

Much like this memory

Of him that makes her heart ache,

When she finds her stepfather

Had more in common with her than she ever knew.