He adjusts his lens without a single ounce of urgency. "Light doesn't care about your schedule."
I don't appreciate being corrected within my own project footprint. My fingers curl tightly around the printed timeline. "The next three meetings I rescheduled do."
He takes the shot. "Then you should have scheduled this for when the light was right," he says, delivering the line as a simple fact with absolutely no edge to his voice.
Instead of responding aloud, I pull out my phone and type a new note to myself: Remind Tom that deadlines exist.
I watch him pack the camera, my jaw tight as I brace for an argument that never comes. He shot my version. He shot his version. He proved his point without a single gloating smirk. I rub the center of my chest, completely unsettled.
He isn't the careless, clumsy stranger from the Donut. He's careful, just not in the ways I expect.
As the light shifts, Tom pauses his work and gestures toward the northwest corner.
"One more," he says.
It wasn’t on my list, but he doesn’t argue for it. He just sets up the shot and tilts the camera toward me.
I step closer to look through the viewfinder.
Tom doesn’t step back. He stays exactly where he is, his shoulder brushing mine. The sudden heat of his body in the cool morning air makes my breath catch.
Close enough to catch the faint smell of roasted coffee beans from his strap. Close enough to notice the sharp line of his jaw and the way he squints against the glare with the same intense focus I bring to my elevations.
I wish I hadn’t noticed any of it.
I force my attention back to the frame, desperately trying to ignore the physical gravity of the man standing inches away from me.
The image pulls the site together in a way my drawings never did.
I stand frozen in the middle of the footprint, recalculating my entire strategy as Tom lowers the camera and looks at me.
"You see it?"
His voice is calm, too calm for someone who just dismantled my entire plan.
Something in his posture shifts, his shoulders dropping half an inch before he starts packing up. "Tomorrow, 5:30 AM," he says, confirming the next session. "Dawn light on the easternboundary. Friday at four for golden hour. Monday for blue hour and rooftop."
My perfect calendar is suddenly punctured with four sessions I didn't plan.
Four more sessions standing next to him.
Pulling out my phone, I stare blankly at the conflict notifications. "5:30 AM is when I run."
I know I sound defensive, but I am desperately clinging to control.
Tom zips the camera bag closed. "So run at six." He says it like it's the most obvious solution in the world.
"I've run at 5:30 for four years." My routine is my stability.
He hoists his heavy gear onto his shoulder. "And you've had this site for six months and didn't see the angle i just showed you."
He walks toward the gate before I can formulate a response, tossing a final thought over his shoulder. "Maybe routines aren't as reliable as you think."
My hands shake, not from anger, but from the horrifying possibility that he's right. He doesn't gloat. Instead, he casually asks if I want him to send the session times to my assistant so they're blocked on my schedule.
I agree to it. I do it not because I'm convinced, but because walking away now means admitting I missed the very value he's capturing.
I can tell myself that attending these sessions is strictly necessary oversight. But the truth is, it's four more days of Tom standing next to me while he quietly proves me wrong.
