be sharing—before I get fussy over my attempt to get ready, I allow myself to take the album out and look at it in the daylight. It’s heavier than I remember, divided into four distinct series, each containing their own arc, and each individual photo memory is as vivid and bright as the day it was taken.
I wear a smirk as I study the first series. I’d been part of the final conference event of the evening, a panel discussing the current trends of photography in the corporate field. I’d been nervous about the whole thing and needed a drink when it was all over, but in the end I’d been pleased with my contributions, pleased enough to accept the invitation to go to a local restaurant with the other panelists and a group of conference attendees.
I’m not sure how Hendrix got in the mix. He’d known one of the speakers or had nothing better to do with his night and had popped into the panel out of curiosity. However it happened, I found myself seated next to him at one of the several tables our group occupied, and with the buzz of the event being over and a job well done, along with a dirty martini already in my system, somehow idle conversation among many turned into a heated discussion between just the two of us.
“Of course branding should be considered art!” My exclamation came in response to his suggestion that graphic design didn’t have a place in the community. “There is just as much sweat, blood, and tears invested in the pieces that come across my desk as there are on any of the prints hanging in the Foam. More so even, considering what’s on the line for the designs if they don’t do the right job.”
“But that’s just the thing,” he protested. “They have different goals. Branding is meant to get people to spend. Art is for people to enlighten and enjoy.”
“As if you aren’t looking for a payday when you’re trekking through the wilderness. There’s a reason they call it a money shot.”
“Of course I’m hoping to get paid, but the shot is the end product for the consumer. It’s not a bridge to something else.”
“Isn’t it?” I fired back, enjoying the debate. “When National Geographic uses one of your photos, they’re expecting it to draw people into the accompanying article. Exactly what branding is meant to do, except that branding is honest about it. And more practical. It should be rewarded.”
“It is rewarded. With a paycheck.”
“It should be rewarded in the galleries too, as far as I’m concerned. It’s an outdated notion that a creation is either profitable or it’s art. I promise you, it can be both.”
He paused then, studying me before a grin appeared, the first full grin I’d seen from him, and it was electrifying. Literally. I still remember the shock that jolted through me at the sight of it. “It can be both,” he repeated, as though testing out the idea.
“It most definitely can.” I smiled back, and yes, I was flirting. The conversation had moved from a discussion about something I found interesting with a stranger to a discussion about something with a stranger I found interesting. That didn’t happen very often for me. I found a man I was attracted to easily enough, but I was never interested beyond the endgame. The conversation was the branded design leading to the eventual fuck.
With Hendrix, though, I was interested in being in the moment. I was interested in more than what he had hidden under his clothes. I was also interested in what he had hidden in his brain. He was engaging and arresting, and I was undeniably charmed.
He was too, it seemed. It was in his eyes, in the tilt of his head. In the words that came next from his mouth. “Want to discuss it over a drink in the lounge where it’s quieter?”
Maybe I hemmed and hawed about it a bit before saying yes, but it was already decided in my mind. I knew that I would spend every last second of the night with him, whatever it took, even if it meant only the drinks and the banter. Even if it meant accompanying him to his room. I remember knowing that. I don’t remember the details of actually moving from this sequence to the next, but I do remember knowing I was all in for the night.
Mostly, I remember the warm glow of happiness. He made me