Even though he and the rest of my family will have to know eventually, I decide that Lauren will be first.
I figure the best way to do it is face-to-face. With that, I start looking at my schedule.
How soon can I book a flight to Los Angeles?
Chapter Two: Dezi
“You’re an asshole, and don’t think I won’t tell everyone I know how much you suck,” the lovely woman with the angelic face bellows at me from the opposite side of the kitchen. That’s pretty much what she’s become, a fine object to look at but way too prickly to touch. I focus on the path of least resistance to get her the hell out of my house.
“Listen, Bridget. Sometimes things just don’t work out and I should have told you sooner I wasn’t ready to live together.” I make a quick decision that now is not a good time to mention that I think she needs a therapist more than a husband.
My goal is simple. Get her out, don’t get smacked in the face, make sure all her shit is gone so she doesn’t need to come back.
It takes another fifteen minutes for her balloon of rage to lose its air. Then, as the tears begin to trickle down her chiseled cheeks, her bottom lip quivers and she thrusts herself at me hoping to meld her curves into me and bring this dispute to a close right there on the kitchen floor. I should be all over the invitation for a self-serving quickie but all I can see is a twisted, sad girl who needs to be someone else’s problem.
I gently pull back, hold her shoulders and tell her it’s time to go. Five more minutes after that, with several broken dishes scattered about and a stream of insults trailing behind her, Bridget exits my life. Jesus Christ! By the skin of my teeth, I survive another round of girls gone wild. I look down at the shattered glass and my eyes trail up to the screen door pulled from its hinges. If this is all the damage done, I got lucky again. I know it won’t always go my way; one of these days my luck will run out.
I vaguely remember hearing my cell buzzing on the coffee table as breakup chaos was unfolding in my kitchen. I walk carefully over the glass to check my messages. Melissa, my secretary, was letting me know she had booked a shoot in Los Angeles this coming Friday. Not just any shoot, this was the shoot. My hand grips the phone, my stomach doing a quick spin as I listen to her voicemail detailing the job. This is a deal I have been working for months now, an exclusive spread for Time magazine featuring the senator from California who had been caught shagging his staffer. There had been such a strong early buzz on this guy, pundits were talking presidential potential. He blew it, quite literally, and now the schmuck actually agreed to sit down with a reporter and have his mug splashed across the cover.
Of course, he’ll been doing it simply for the right to tell his side of the story, which we all know by now means blabbing about how his marriage had been cold and distant for years, but he couldn’t imagine putting his young children through a heartless divorce. Sure, it’s so much better for the tykes that you sniff around your assistant rather than be straight up with their mother.
Whatever.
I don’t care what sorry excuse this dog has for fucking up, it isn’t my problem. All I need to worry about is taking a photo of him that has the perfect mix of apologetic, shadowy angles that will entice the average grocery shopper to stop at the checkout and throw the magazine into the cart.
I feel my eyes narrow as I begin to set the shot in my head, already noting how the light needs to hit from the side, his chin down, eyes looking straight ahead. I will make this asshole look like a million bucks. It’s why I got the call; my stuff is rock solid and I know it.
It’s not like a life calling or anything like that. It’s not brain surgery or rocket science and I’m not saving puppies from the high-kill shelter. It’s more of a comfortable fit. I have an eye, I suppose.
Once I blew out my right knee during a college football game I had to find a Plan B for the rest of my life. Sure, I had dreams of the big time, worked my ass off from the time I hit puberty and realized I could grow muscle. While the other guys were out smoking pot, funneling Bud, or getting laid in the back seat of their parents’ car, I was at the gym. My body was strong and lean, but my mind thought it knew it all. I was a naive, stubborn bastard. I totally dismissed the trainers and coaches when they would tell me to pack on more body fat, add some weight to support my overworked muscles. I’d laughed at them when they told me to focus on what they all believed to be my true God-given talent, if you can call it that. I resented them for thinking I couldn’t make it, or for suggesting a sport that I had long dismissed because it wasn’t nearly sexy enough to handle everything I had to offer.
Baseball, they had all told me. Your future is with baseball. Make it work, Dezi, listen to your body.
Instead, I had listened to my ego, and it was way too loud for its own good.
Even though they were the very same people who trained kids like me for a living, I ignored them like they were the village idiots. To me, baseball was the girl next door. Sweet and loyal, always there for a good night kiss on the cheek. But football was the hot chick that wanted it rough and dirty, who bit and scratched me raw. I kept slithering back for more until she just about ripped my heart out.
One injury turned into another, then another, until finally, the ligaments snapped and my leg began to resemble something like Jell-O. I found the best surgeon I could, and gave him the green light to get in there and fix me up. The surgery was a success, but the results were not. The rebuilt knee was perfectly fine for a regular guy’s life. It did not work for the running back that needed that extra burst of speed and agility to make the play.
I tried to take it like a man, make an honorable exit from the game and move on even though it was like a knife through my gut. Just like that, everything I had worked for and dreamed of, taken off the table faster than a Thanksgiving turkey.
After graduating from college with a degree in business, I did some soul searching. I knew I had blown my one chance of living my passion, so I needed to find something that wouldn’t bore the crap out of me, while keeping me fairly well-funded. Through the years, I had started looking more closely at the action shots that filled my Sports Illustrated magazines. How the photographers were able to make the colors explode from the page. How they could capture the bead of sweat rolling down the pitcher’s face, but blur the faces in the background into nothing more than smudged dirt. It began to stir me, how a moment in time could be captured but the perspective was fluid.
I decided I wanted to learn more about it. Then I set out to become the best.
My technique varies. I change it up depending on what the subject is. Sometimes it’s a straight forward, no bells and whistles, what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of shot. Typical for portrait work, still subjects like landscapes, that kind of thing. As I developed my skills, I realized I could actually elicit an emotional response simply by adjusting my light, angling the forehead, the chin, or an ear. Catching a flash of honesty in the eyes of someone you are photographing has become my touchdown. A moment of personal glory so deep and powerful, it’s like a bolt of lightning running up my back and piercing my heart on its way out. Gives me chills just thinking about it.
For a few years, I took every job that came my way. Catalogue stuff, stills for commercials and films, even a few high school senior portraits and modeling portfolios. I needed as much practice as I could get given I had started this from scratch. I made my family and friends promise to be straight up with their critiques, and I took it all in with no ego, which was new for me. I gave myself room to learn, but none whatsoever to fail. There would be no way in hell I would let myself drop another ball and slide back to square one. This time it had to stick.
By now, it has. At this point, my work has gotten enough attention that jobs typically come to me. That’s why I had to hire Melissa a couple years back. I just couldn’t keep track