The Gift

A story about some pictures in a restaurant.

“Here, look at this one.”

My young friend put another photo down on the table. There were a whole pile now, at least five or six. I looked around. No one was paying attention to us. Silverware clinked amiably. Still, I wished he would talk more quietly.

I picked the photo up and looked at it. It was the inside of someone’s house. The living room, probably. I didn’t recognize it. It wasn’t a place that I had ever been in. There was a sofa and a coffee table with an overflowing ashtray. A big empty space on the rug. There was a floor lamp in the corner, but it wasn’t turned on. There weren’t any lights on at all; it was a flash photograph. There was a window on the far side of the room, next to a beige-colored rocking chair. Through it, I could see snowflakes falling.

All the pictures were like this. A room I didn’t recognize, at night with all the lights off. Always in someone’s house, but always a different house. The first picture he had shown me had been of a bedroom. Two others had been kitchens. The rest had been living rooms, like this one, or at least that’s what they looked like. The rooms were never occupied. It was always snowing outside.

“I don’t know what you want me to do with this,” I said, putting the photo back down.

“I’m not asking you to do anything with it,” he said.

“I don’t know what you want me to do with any of this.”

“I’m not asking you to do anything with it.”

“Then why are you showing it to me? Why are we here?”

“I just want you to look at it.”