limit is up. “Now it’s your turn,” I say, hoping I’ve given them enough scraps of information to make something meaningful. I divide them in three groups of three, one group of four, and send them to the hallway to take turns taking portraits of their team members.
“Why the hallway instead of in here?” one asks. Arthur who goes by the too-appropriate nickname of Arty.
My immediate reaction is to assume I’ve made a mistake, and I briefly question my decision along with him. The classroom is set up with backdrops and flash kits, and surely the students expect to be given time to use the equipment.
But I want to teach them photography skills that transcend the studio, and the hall outside the classroom is both quiet and magnificently lit with natural light coming through the floor-to-ceiling windows. I hadn’t realized how perfect the setting was last Saturday because it had been slightly overcast when I’d come in. This morning, though, the sun was streaming in rays of gold, and I’d had to stop to catch my breath imagining the photos that could be caught there.
I’m thinking of a fancy way to explain myself, trying to figure out how to address anyone who might believe the class should be more focused on studio work when Hendrix answers simply for me. “Because of the light,” he says simply. “You’ll see.”
Of course he’s the one who understands. While everyone who registered had to have a background in art, Hendrix is the only one who had real camera experience. It’s a photographer’s habit to notice the light. Always measuring the luminance with the mind, at least, if not an actual photometer. It’s impossible not to. Light is the basic element of photography, as necessary to the art as air and water are to the human body, and just as a person would notice when a room lacks oxygen, a photographer notices when a room lacks light.
I find I’m seeking it constantly, anchoring myself in it when it’s found like a cat curling up in a bright patch of sun. Hoping one day that the light will penetrate past the layers of clothing and my mutilated skin and warm up the person inside me.
And so maybe it’s the light that draws me out to the hallway with them when I’d planned to send them to work on their own while I read at my desk until it was time to meet with them one-on-one. I’d almost believe it myself if my attention was spent equally across the groups as they pose and adjust and click, click, click.
But it’s hard to watch anything other than Hendrix, his expression intent as he measures angles with his eyes. I cringe imagining sitting for him, which isn’t quite fair because I’d cringe sitting for anyone. But for him, especially.
I don’t think about the fact that I’ll have to coach him soon.
That’s a lie.
I try not to think about it, but it’s very present, like a fly trapped in the car, buzzing and buzzing as it searches the vehicle for escape, slow to take the one presented when a window is inevitably rolled down.
I’m annoyed with the buzz of Hendrix. More so than with a fly because it’s my own mind that’s trapped him. My own mind that refuses to shoo him out of any one of the hundred windows I’ve opened up to let him out.
Although I wouldn’t be obsessed with him if he hadn’t enrolled in my class. There. It’s not my fault alone, it’s his fault too. It’s his fault first.
But it’s my fault when he catches me watching him. And it’s my fault again when I don’t look away. He’s too captivating, the way he studies me. His face illuminates and if I had my own camera, if I snapped right now, anyone who looked at it later would see the story. Brutally handsome man pleased by what he sees.
I shiver when I remember that what he sees is me.
Oh, look at that. It’s time to mentor.
“All right, who’s ready to discuss their work so far?” Immediately, I regret giving them the choice to step up—what if Hendrix is the first to volunteer? I can’t start with him. Can’t, can’t, can’t.
Fortunately, Salima is bouncing eagerly like Freddie when he’s waited too long for the loo, and I happily attend to her first, pulling her aside in the hallway so the others in her group can continue practicing while I talk with her.
And now it’s easy again.