The final photograph

Source: an original fiction extract.

“At the top of the hill, the view disappeared. For most of the climb, Leo had been promising his sister a photograph of the bay, the islands and the lighthouse at the end of the point. Now cloud surrounded the summit shelter. He could see a bench, a wet information board and the first few metres of the path they had climbed. His sister took off her rucksack and said she was hungry.

Leo checked the weather forecast on his phone. It still showed a small yellow sun. He held the screen towards the cloud as though presenting evidence in a dispute. His sister opened the sandwiches. Around them, water gathered on the shelter's roof and fell at irregular intervals onto a metal bin. The sound made the waiting seem longer than silence would have done.

After twenty minutes, a gap opened in the cloud. Leo jumped up. For a second, a strip of blue water appeared, then the curved white edge of a beach. He raised the camera. The gap closed. His sister laughed, and he told her it was not funny. She said she was laughing at the timing, not at him. He sat down again and noticed that she had saved the larger half of the last sandwich.

They began the descent. Below the shelter, the path passed a patch of tiny purple flowers growing between stones. His sister stopped to look. Leo waited, impatient at first, then crouched beside her. Each flower held a bead of water, and in one bead he could see a bright, distorted version of the grey sky. He took a photograph. It required him to hold the phone much closer than he had expected.

At the car park, the summit had cleared. The lighthouse was visible from the road, small but unmistakable. Leo took the promised picture through a gap in the hedge. Later, when his sister asked which photograph he liked best, he chose the flowers. She said the lighthouse one was good too. He looked at both before agreeing, relieved that he did not have to pretend the disappointing part of the day had been necessary.”

Consider the whole source. Analyse how the writer structures the text to create a change in Leo’s attention without a simple rejection of his original aim. You could consider the opening focus, changes in focus or pace, the order in which information is revealed and the ending. Support your explanation with references to the source.