Missymodel.com Gallery 038 -

He looked back at photo five. The girl on the bed. The red eyes.

The backdrop was gone. She sat on the edge of a rumpled bed in a room with floral wallpaper. No teacup this time. Her eyes were red-rimmed, fixed on something just outside the frame. Her hands were clenched in her lap. The timestamp read: April 13, 2003. 2:17 a.m. MissyModel.com Gallery 038

The fifth image was different.

He opened the file properties. Buried in the EXIF data, a GPS coordinate. He copied it into a maps window. It pointed to a small cemetery in upstate New York. A grave marked with a name he didn't recognize and a date: April 14, 2003. He looked back at photo five

But as he stood there in the dark, breathing hard, he realized he’d already archived one thing he couldn't erase: the image of a girl with a teacup, laughing one day and gone the next. The backdrop was gone