“Bonjour,” I replied, then winced. “Still bad.”
She laughed. “It’s charming. Don’t fix it.”
I smiled, warmed by that small mercy, and kept walking.
Élodie’s office door stood open, sunlight slanting across her desk. She looked up as I approached, her expression unreadable but attentive.
“Mila,” she said. “You’re in early.”
“I wanted to talk to you,” I said, heart thudding.
She gestured to the chair opposite her desk. “Sit.”
I did, folding my hands together deliberately, grounding myself in the gesture.
“I think I’m ready,” I said. “To show my work.”
Élodie studied me for a long moment, the silence deliberate.
“Ready is a strong word,” she said finally. “You’ve been here only a short time.”
“I know,” I replied. “But something’s changed.”
“That happens,” she said coolly. “It doesn’t always mean the work is ready to be seen.”
Old Mila would have backtracked. Would have apologized for presuming. Would have softened the request until it barely resembled one.
I didn’t.
“I understand the risk,” I said. “But I also understand my work better now. I’m not asking for certainty. I’m asking for consideration.”
Élodie’s gaze sharpened—not unkindly. Assessing.
It wasn’t a yes.
But Élodie had never been a woman who handed out reassurance just to soothe nerves. That was part of why I’d come to Paris in the first place—why I’d chosen this residency, this city, her.
She believed in work over sentiment, in rigor over ego. Praise from her was rare and earned. She challenged without coddling, pushed without humiliating. And when she said maybe, it meant she was actually considering it, weighing the work rather than the fear behind the request.
I trusted her judgment. Had from the beginning. Trusted that if she thought my photographs weren’t ready, she’d say so plainly. Trusted that if she saw something worth risking her reputation for, she wouldn’t look away from it just because the timing was inconvenient.
Studying under her wasn’t about validation—it was about becoming sharper, braver, more honest. About learning how to stand behind my work without hiding inside it.
I left her office buzzing with nerves, unsure whether I’d stepped forward or misjudged the moment entirely. Either way, I had to keep moving ahead.
I set up in one of the shared workspaces, forcing myself to redirect the energy. To do something tangible.
Amaya slid into the chair beside me not long after, peering at the contact sheets spread across my table.
“These are new,” she said.
“Yes.”
“They feel closer,” she said after a moment. “Like you stopped hiding behind beauty.”
The comment startled me.
“I didn’t know I was,” I admitted.
