Double Exposure
Chapter 1
Lucas Hart, heartthrob and model, with eyes like a bright sunny day, his face a breath away, and then suddenly his lips were on mine. And I blacked out.
Twenty-four hours prior, at my friend Jenny’s house, I adjusted the lens of my camera and snapped another half dozen shots. Jenny’s hamster, Cherry, blinked at me with a semi-dazed expression, wide eyes, and slack jaw, while still gripping the giant strawberry she was eating. Her soft, white-gray, fluff contrasted with the vibrant red of the fruit. The stark white of clean pet bedding making an excellent backdrop. She really was too cute for words. I shoved my glasses up my nose and raised the camera for another shot.
“Only you think Cherry is art, Tory,” Jenny teased from her place on the bed. She flipped pages in some glam and fashion magazine, and shoved her ginger hair out of her face. “Do you really have to work tomorrow?”
“Sorry,” I said instantly. For most kids our age, Saturdays meant shopping, movies, friends, and running around the neighborhood. I would be working with my aunt Patty at her photo studio. She rarely let me touch her camera—a top of the line beast worth more than most people’s cars; mine was a high-end knockoff I could make sing. But I got to spend hours learning her technique, understanding lighting, building my own photographic eye on the world. “It’s a big shoot. You know how well she pays.”
“Enough to buy a new lens. I know, I know. How many lenses does one sixteen-year-old boy need? I would just love to hang with you on a weekend for once.”
I’d been saving for a full camera upgrade, but even that was a long way off. I opened the case and tucked the camera away, then dragged my messy, long blond hair back into a ponytail and fastened it with the rubber binder I always kept around my wrist. I did feel bad. But being somewhere for the sake of being there bored me to tears. My mind always wandered to a snap of dark and light play of color and filters. I could get reasonable shots with my phone, but not the art I was longing to capture with my camera.
“We’re hanging right now,” I pointed out. “It’s Friday. That’s a weekend…almost.”
She glared at me. I flinched.
“You’re taking pictures of my hamster.”
“She’s being super cute. But I’m done now.” I held up my hands for a moment before throwing myself on the bed beside her. Girls were sort of needy and intense. I didn’t always understand them. Jenny was my best friend, and she helped put things in simple terms for me. Was I being stranger than usual? I knew technically, we were different. I had autism, and sometimes viewed the world through a skewed lens, which my aunt thought made me a better photographer. Most everyone else thought it just made me weird. Not Jenny. At least not most of the time.
“Something bugging you?”
She let out a long-suffering sigh. “You know Lucas, right?”
Everyone knew Lucas. Well, maybe not everyone. In our school he was a bit famous. He modeled clothing for major retailers, and starred in a few commercials. I didn’t get it. No one was going to open an ad for Target and scream, “O.M.G., it’s Lucas!” Or at least, I didn’t think so. He did some high-end stuff too, but I knew little about clothing, preferring to spend my time focusing on photography instead.
Being on TV or in magazines didn’t really make anyone different. I examined the camera lighting and angles for a long time trying to figure out what the big deal was.
Lucas wasn’t a jock. Jocks got a lot of attention in school. He wasn’t a brain. He was just pretty. I thought he did have a bit of that ‘capture me’ essence I always searched for through my camera lens. But Jenny told me it was considered creepy to take pictures of people without their permission. I’d never gotten up the courage to ask him. Would he charge me? Would it eat into my camera fund? I wondered if it would be worth it.
“What about him?” I asked.
“He was talking to Alice.”
“Okay, and?” Alice was the school gossip, a cheerleader, and dating the football quarterback. Cliché from her bleach-blonde roots, to her everyday cheer outfit. Very ra-ra, ‘let’s go!’ personality. She’d been nice enough to me when I took pictures of her for the yearbook and the school online newsletter. She was photogenic as any pretty girl might be, but she wasn’t Lucas.
“Alice broke up with Teddy last week.”
The quarterback. “Okay?”
“She was hitting on Lucas. Who wouldn’t? I mean, he’s Lucas.” Jenny leapt up from her spot to pace the room. I put my hands under my head and got comfortable, as this was going to be a long and mostly one-sided discussion. Woes of a teenage girl longing for a guy she couldn’t have.
I didn’t understand much about romance. Why one person picked someone over another, and all that. It couldn’t all be aesthetics, right? That was something Jenny had never been able to answer for me. Lots of people were nice to look at or even photograph; it didn’t mean I wanted to snog with them.
I must have dozed because Jenny smacked me in the stomach. “Ow,” I growled at her.
“I’m pouring my heart out to you, and you’re sleeping.”
“Um…” How was I supposed to respond? “Maybe you should ask him out?” It sounded like the easy solution.
Her glare was unfriendly.
“Sorry,” I grumbled.
“You’re such a guy.”
