“Okay, tracksters,”–significant pause as she looked up at Astrid. “Here goes.” Jeff could on occasion be the gentleman his parents had tried to nurture, so, before he gathered ‘round, he offered Meg his soda. (“You okay for a minute or two?” She swatted his rear end: “Go, go.”) She sidled over to a couple of other abandoned dates and fell into some lively but pointed chat about “guys.”
Shell opened her files to the first shot, two of her relay partners. LaShonda was handing off a baton to Janey—their specialty, the half-mile relay. (Shell had labeled each photo only by event, not names—advice from some manual she’d bought at the Wash. U bookstore.) Her cameras zoom lens, which she’d bought the week after Astrid gave her the album, focused on the two women’s hands, just as one was extendin
