The trouble with photographs is that over time, they lose their meaning and become only pictures.
There hadn't been much left of his personal effects the first time he'd left Midgar. Packed hurriedly, everything sealed into boxes and thrown in the back of Maur's pickup truck. It helped to have friends in high places; Maur was a rookie then, trying to make detective in Costa's PD.
Costa would be a nice change of scenery. He'd thought briefly of going back to Junon after Roxy and Laurelei died, but no – he needed to be further away. On a completely different continent from where it had happened.
They loaded up Maur's truck that day – just three days after the explosion that took Legend's wife and child – and took the ferry from Junon to Costa.
No looking back, he couldn't look back, only forward. Midgar held nothing but painful memories for him. But then he got to Costa – bought a small bungalow near the beach Laurelei had so loved – and the memories found him despite his concerted efforts to fight them off.
Finally, he was too exhausted to will them away any longer, and just let them come as they would. And they did; a morning walk on the beach, watching kids with their plastic pails collecting shells, might remind him of Laurelei. A beautiful sunset – two lovers embracing, hand in hand on the boardwalk – made him do a double take, Roxy's face full and fresh in his mind.
Eventually, Legend found an anomalous sort of peace here, remembering while trying to forget; living while trying to grieve.
Years later he would sell the tiny bungalow, and upgrade to a bigger one, this one with a private beach. He fell into his old patterns and habits of drinking and carousing with women. Lots of women. Some of them stayed in his life for a spell, most of them were gone the next morning after breakfast.
The Turks recruited him, imprisoned him, then recruited him again; then, just after the world nearly ended with Meteor, he was recalled again. In time, Legend would settle down again, finding someone who did not vanish into the dawn after a one-night stand; this one stayed, stole his heart. Not in the same way Roxy had, it was of course different. One could have more than one love of a lifetime, after all; or so Legend felt.
The hard part was letting someone cut through all of his philandering bullshit, and get to his heart in the first place; putting up walls around it for years had been an act of self-preservation, an involuntary defense mechanism. Somewhere, beneath the flirtations, beneath the reputation as a philanderer, was a good man.
He would marry again, and years later, on a lazy Sunday afternoon, puttering around his garage working on his cars, Legend would go through some of those hastily packed boxes he'd brought from Midgar to Costa, and back again. A flicked open switchblade slit through the packing tape, unearthing a potpourri of things he hadn't set eyes on in over a decade. Piles of purloined cardboard coasters from various dive bars in Midgar; hanging from a gold chain, his wedding ring and Roxy's (he'd gone back to retrieve the ring from the scene); the pile of take-out menus from Roxy's favorite restaurants that she held onto no matter what; a single little girl's Mary Jane, red leather with pink stitching.
Laurelei's shoe, and a plain gold band. That was it – that was all he had left of his family, two little things. He slipped the chain around his neck, fastened the clasp, shuffled the box in his hands, gazing somberly into the detritus of his past life, wishing he had something more.
Something rattled around at the bottom; he poked through the contents of the box, pulled out three canisters of 35mm film. He laughed, thinking of what an anachronism this little find was – film? Actual film? Then wondered, briefly, if anyone local in Midgar even developed film anymore. Twenty or so years ago, there was a Photohut on every corner; now, everything was digital.
Legend remembered quite suddenly the last time he'd used a non-digital camera. He stuck a wrench back in his tool belt, retrieved his phone from the pocket of his coveralls and flicked through the directory. A few calls later, and he'd located one of the few one-hour photo places left in Sector 8.
He went back into the house to get cleaned up, kissed his wife good-bye, telling her he was running to the store and would be back in an hour. Except, he didn't go straight home once the photos were developed; he sat down at a bench at the playground, hands trembling only slightly as he flicked through the grainy photos, breath caught in his throat seeing them again. His family, nearly eight years of living compressed into twenty-four frames per roll. Roxy, young and beautiful, painting the nursery; Roxy, hand held in front of her face, hugely pregnant and not wanting a camera in her face.
Then the newborn, noisy, red-faced little bundle held in a weary Roxy's arms, an unexpected joy in his life, one he'd been so scared of; shouldering that responsibility at a relatively young age, being tethered like that as a husband and father. He hadn't wanted any part of it at first, hadn't even wanted to marry Roxy, but did so thinking it was the Right Thing To Do.
Laurelei's first birthday, cake mashed in her face, frosting in her eyelashes and her hair; her second, her third, her fourth. Her first day of school, Legend standing next to his daughter, towering over her, a hand resting protectively on her shoulder trying to settle her nerves before she got onto the school bus.
The last photo in the roll was a double exposure; half Roxy's face when he'd snuck up on her and taken her picture when she was least expecting it – the other half was Laurelei, giggling madly, charging toward her father, threatening to tickle him.
It was the best photo in the batch; this one, Legend would have framed, and place it on his desk. He put the photos back in order, placed them in the envelope, tucked it under his arm and headed back home.