Spin [Chapter Three]

You didn’t come back for your pictures that day. In fact, I woke up almost everyday for a week, expecting to see you. Of course, I didn’t. And it would be another week before I would be allowed to contact you about your pictures (I’d neglected to ask you for your name and phone number, but, thankfully, someone had known, and you were already in the computer. Dakota Safford, it said). 1

I’d long ago, illegally, I must admit, looked at and made doubles of your pictures for myself. Most of them looked to be shots of random people. An old homeless man on a bench in the park, a woman holding her baby impatiently in a grocery store. They were candid, beautiful, but the next ones were my favorite.2

One of you running, smiling, at the person holding the camera. As if you were trying to get it back. Another of you standing against a brick wall, looking away, your left leg bent to let your foot rest against the wall. You looked deep in thought. As far as I could tell, you may not have even noticed that the picture was taken. In that moment, you were oblivious to the world.3

As I flipped through these pictures, I couldn’t help but wonder who it was taking them. A close friend? A… girlfriend? That one stung, for some reason. And it shouldn’t have, I reminded myself, because I didn’t even know you. But I felt like I did. It was obvious that you tried to capture humans at their most vulnerable as I do, that you were thoughtful, fun, definitely talented, maybe even kind. 4

I went to work 7 days after you dropped your pictures off, wondering what you could tell about me if you’d had my camera, my photographs. Would you feel a bond between us, as I did?5

I pushed the photo shop door open, and was aroused from my thoughts by the ding. Saved by the bell, I thought, as I made my way to the counter, clocked in. 6

It was a Saturday again, so I was the only one there. Penance, I suppose, for skipping out the day before to go to a photography convention. Ironic, right? I don’t go to my photo developing job so that I can go develop photo’s somewhere else where I don’t get paid. Woohoo! It sucked. I learned nothing that I didn’t already know, except that people are even dumber than I thought. Man-kind has reached its all time low when someone has to ask why all their pictures are turning out black. Um, how about because you’ve never taken the freaking lens cap off? Why is someone that mechanically challenged at a photography convention, anyhow? Besides to provide comic relief to the rest of us?7

I sorted through the bin of pictures ready to be picked up until I came to the S’s, kept going, Saf. Nothing. No packet labeled Safford, Dakota. My first impulse was that I’d mistakenly put them out of order. A quick check proved that theory wrong. I began to panic, had someone pitched them? You still had another week. Why did I even care?8

I approached the crummy old computer and the monitor flicked on. Clicked through the files till I found the pick-up log. You’d been in yesterday. At 4 o’clock. While I was at the idiot fest.9

I let my head fall and connect with the monitor with a crack. It’s pretty sad when that hurts the computer more than it hurts me.10

I must have been too distracted with myself to hear the door, because I didn’t realize anyone had even entered until the service bell dinged, startling me and knocking me backwards into the shelves of developed pictures. I silently thanked whoever thought to have those built into the wall rather than free standing, because, otherwise, there would probably be a large hole in the wall right now.11

I used the shelves to pull myself up off the ground, and there you were, still laughing.12

“Very funny.” I said, peeved. Maybe I’d been wrong about the kind part.13

“I can’t resist those little ding-y things.” You gestured with your head towards the service bell.14

“I can tell. And you know what? I used to like them too, until I took this job.”15

“Heh, Well, I didn’t just come in to make you angry. I do actually have a reason.”16

“Oh?”17

“Yeah, whoever developed these smudged the ink all over.” You set the familiar packet on the counter and pushed them towards me.18

I had developed those pictures myself. I made sure they were perfect. No smudges, no discolorations. Not even a single fingerprint. I’d taken way more time than necessary to develop those pictures.19

“What?”20

“They’re smudged…” you repeated it slowly.21

I picked up the pictures, and took them out, flipped through them. There was black ink smeared all over the edges. How was that possible? I stared at them in disbelief. Maybe it was a sign. We were meant to meet again. No, it was Laura. I almost laughed at myself as logic returned. She’d worked yesterday in my place, and I knew for a fact that she looked through the pictures when she was bored. This had happened before. 22

“So, are you going to fix them, or what?” your voice broke through my thoughts. I love you Laura.23

“Oh. Yeah.” I thought of the doubles I’d made, sitting in the third drawer down at the counter. “I’ll have to make some new prints. It’ll be a while.”24