“Show her some of your pictures!”
I looked at Bay, who looked at me in an encouraging way. My hesitation came from the fact that I only ever really showed my pictures to my best friend or anonymously to my Instagram followers.
“Yes, please!” it escaped Grace enthusiastically.
So, I gave in. “Fine.”
I held the camera out to Grace and Julie, and they looked at my last eleven pictures. I had changed the memory card, which is why they weren’t supposed to find anything private.
“Oh, wow, you’re really good!” Grace gasped.
“It’s a hobby.”
“You study it, Larissa!” My best friend corrected me.
“You’re studying photography? Here, at Vanderwood?”
“Yes...” I answered Julie’s question and took the camera from Grace’s hands again.
My fingers cupped the already slightly older bridge camera.
My savings had gone to pay for the Vanderwood, so I actually had to get another job. A new camera was the last thing on my mind. But I still had a noble compact camera in my suitcase. With that, one could not make such good pictures as with this Nikon model. However, it should be enough for emergencies.
“And you want to do this professionally later?” Julie sounded skeptical.
“Yeah, why?”
She hesitated. “That’s a bit unsafe, isn’t it?”
“Haven’t you seen her photos? They’re insane! She can easily become independent with those,” Grace said.
I myself was relatively uninterested in what others thought of me and my photos. I had already had to take a lot of criticism in my life. That little bit only strengthened my resolve.
“What are you two going to major in?” I tried to divert attention from my hobby to something else.
“Economics major,” Grace yawned. She apparently hadn’t slept as well as the rest of us.
“Economics? Both of you?” Bay asked in disbelief.
“Yes, it’s the most popular major here. But we have different minors.” Grace looked at Julie, who had a habit of blushing quickly. “I’m minoring in administration, while Julie is actually trying to struggle with molecular biology.”
God, I wonder if they were really interested in those minor courses. Grace didn’t sound that convinced, but I could at least imagine that economics was popular as a way to get out of here. Personally, I wasn’t that interested in it now, yet I had minored in business to get a foothold in the photography industry.
I turned my attention back to the camera. It was easy to look at the surroundings through the lens.
“You’re a literature major, right?”
Julies looked questioningly at Bay.
“Yeah, how did you know?”
“It was on your list on the university server yesterday.”
“But how did you know which list you -”
Bay stopped mid-sentence as the loud squeal of tires became audible.
I pointed my camera at the parking lot, where a black sports car came to a full stop in the very first parking space next to the fat Jeeps. To be more precise, the driver slid his vehicle into the space so elegantly that he even parked straight.
What the...
Through the camera, it looked almost perfect and even though my knowledge as well as enthusiasm for cars was very much limited to just these photos, I held my breath and pulled the trigger.
Just intime, because shortly after all four doors went up and in the front two men in fancy suits got out.
The passenger, a handsome man in his mid-thirties with short brown hair and a neat three-day beard, looked around scrutinizingly. He radiated coolness but, at the same time, something elegant through his black three-piece suit.
The athletic-looking driver on the other side wore the same tailored suit, but this time with sunglasses. He took them off and put them in his chest pocket. He had to be in his late 30s, and somehow, with his dark blond hair and three-day beard, he reminded me of Chris Pine.
I took a photo. To my surprise, the men immediately turned his head toward me. Jerkily, I lowered the camera, but they were already looking somewhere else again.
Had they noticed that I had taken a picture? From that distance? Impossible.
“Oh my God!” I heard Grace murmur darkly beside me.
Her words made me look around. Of course. Absolutely everyone had stopped what they were doing a second ago and was now looking at the sports car. Even the topless guys under the biggest oak tree. They looked like they were facing a comet flying toward them.
I took a picture. Simply because I found it amusing.
