Thomas Takes a Photo

He sets up the camera on top of a trash can. The lighting is questionable, but he can’t worry about that right now. He knows he can fix certain things with adjustment apps, but bad lighting is more difficult to repair than one might think. These are things he would probably know more about if he was a real photographer, but he’s not. He’s just a guy with a phone and a nice suit that he wants to document. There’s nobody around, because it’s so cold, but the cold is also creating a small window of time to snap the photo. He’s willing to suffer for a nice picture, but he isn’t willing to freeze. He sets the timer. Ten seconds is the maximum. He perches the phone on top of the receptacle, runs over to the brick wall with the beautiful mural on the side of it. The mural depicts a beach with perfect sand, a blue ocean, and people playing with dogs and building sand castles. He produces a small smile, more of a smirk. The timer counts down. The photo is taken. He runs over to check in case it didn’t turn out the way he wanted it to, but truthfully, it rarely does. Then, it’s a compromise. Is it good enough? Will it do? Can he live with it?

* * * * *

“Thomas, sweetie, look over,” his mother was waving at him as though he was miles away rather than directly in front of her. The photographer was a nice lady who had taken his Christmas photo too. The sweater his mother put on him was itchy, and all he wanted to do was rip it off, but his mother told him if the photo came out nice, she’d take him straight to the toy store so he could get the lego set he wanted. His mother believed that children should have two photos taken a year until they were ten, and then it could be an annual occurrence. This was going to be his spring photo, and the background was a forest, even though Thomas didn’t think of a forest when he thought of spring. He had two more years until the spring photos would end, and it would only be holiday photos for the cards his mother sent out. The studio they were in smelled of old coffee and carpet cleaner even though there was no carpet in sight. Thomas thought about what kind of legos he would want. There was a new set that cost a lot of money, but it was the Death Star, and it would take him months to complete. He wanted something that would take a long time to finish. His perfect Lego set would be one with so many pieces, he’d never finish it. It would just keep being constructed, and he would delight in how impossible it was. How it was totally impractical.

“Thomas, smile,” his mother yelled, and he did, or he tried to. The camera went off. The photographer showed his mother the screen on the back of the camera. She scrunched up her lips, and tilted her head. Her tongue ran across her teeth, and she shook her head.

“Another one,” she said, as if she was the photographer, as if this was all under her control, “Thomas, I know you can do better than that.”

* * * * *

He doesn’t like the way the photo looks. The light is blocking him out entirely. Part of the problem is that it’s behind him. He’s giving him this backlit look that would be fun as some kind of art project, but it won’t get him likes on Instagram. You need to be seen to get any engagement. They don’t like anything artsy. He sets the phone back up, and then decides to take off his coat. His suit looks nice. The more of the suit they can see the better. Who are they? His audience. The people he’s never met. Who he only knows as hearts and emojis. Love, fire, approval. He shifts the camera so that it’s not aimed directly at the light, but now the mural is obscured. He hates when things are laid out this way. He knows that people don’t put together the world so that it can be photographed, but something about it seems careless. Paint a beautiful mural of a beach and then put a light directly above it so that anyone who tries to take a photo in front of the mural at night is going to be washed out. Yes, he could take a photo in front of it during the day, but it would be busy during the day. There were stores and restaurants nearby. Many more passerby. He was going to be original. He was going to get a photo of the mural at night. The juxtaposition of a sunny day at the beach and the darkness of winter and night and isolation. Have a vision even if you aren’t an artist. Even if you’re not creative at all. It’s important to fight for what you want. Move the camera. Ignore how cold you are. He ignores how cold he is. Good. Good. Now part of the mural is visible, but most of the light is out of the photo. He sets the timer. You’re doing very well, Thomas. He runs into place. Maybe a smile isn’t the right idea. Maybe keep it more stoic. The timer runs down. He lets out a half-smile. His teeth are chattering. Ignore them. He runs to the camera and knocks it off the can. Dammit. Is it cracked? Did you crack the screen? He picks it up. The screen is fine. He looks at the photo. How did it turn out?

* * * * *

In the car, his mother rolls the windows down. “Mom, it’s cold,” he says. She tells him that it’ll be good for them. They’re getting too out of touch. They ride around in their car with the heat on, and they have no sense of the world. These are things she says, but Thomas isn’t listening. He tunes out when she starts talking like this. She enjoys punishing herself, but she never lays a hand on him. It’s just that when you’re a mother, it’s hard to hurt yourself and nobody else. Mom, can you roll up the windows? He’s got his phone in his hand. He’s sitting next to Thomas. The Younger Thomas. His cheeks are already flushed from the frigid air coming in. He wants to take a photo and put a black and white filter on it. He wants to make it look like one of those photos he would never post. Ones that live only in his phone. That make him feel as though he’s good at expressing himself even though he’s not. His mother turns up the radio. She sings to try and warm herself up. It won’t work. In between songs, she praises him.

“You took such a good photo, Thomas,” she says, “It took you a few tries, but that’s okay. Sometimes it takes a few tries. Mommy can do it in one, but that’s because she used to be a model. You’re not a model, but you don’t have to be, because you’re a boy. Nobody needs a boy to be a model. You just have to learn how to smile when you’re told to. It always looks as though you never want to smile. You have to smile, Thomas. Even when you don’t want to. Especially when you don’t want to. It’s a good skill to have. You have to work on that.”

* * * * * *

In the car, he looks at the photo. He’s turned the heat up to five. You’re going to run out of gas leaving it up that high, Thomas. You’re wasting gas. The photo did not turn out the way he wanted. Not even close. The background is in sharper focus than he is. His shirt looks wrinkled. You should have taken it off. You should have been shirtless. That would have made a statement. People would have seen that. The algorithm responds well to prurient photos so long as they’re not inappropriate. Why didn’t you take a risk for once in your life? Why didn’t you try to step outside your comfort zone? He doesn’t know what to do. He wanted to post something tonight. To let everyone know he went out. That he put on a nice suit and went out and had a lovely time. What is he going to do now? What are you going to do now, Thomas? And oh my god, you weren’t even smiling. The photo is a bad photo, and you’re not even smiling in it.

He rolls down his window. He wants to go back to being cold. He turns off the heat. His cheeks flush. Leave the windows down, Thomas. He’s going to leave them down. You need to be a little colder. You’ve gotten too warm, too comfortable, that’s the problem. Reintroduce yourself to the cold. His teeth start chattering again. He finds that sucking in the cold air hurts. It hurts. It’s supposed to hurt. Next time you’ll smile and you’ll aim the camera just right and you’ll read up on photography and modeling and maybe you’ll even make a friend so that somebody else can take these damn photos for you. Wouldn’t that be nice, Thomas?

He keeps looking at the photo hoping he’ll like it more the next time he sees it, but it doesn’t work that way. It’s not a book or a movie. You can go back to a good photo as many times as you want, and you’ll see something different. Something you like. A bad photo always looks the same. It doesn’t matter how many times you see it.