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A lightness.
A woman I’ve only had glimpses of before then.
She talks about aperture and shutter speed and something called ISO. She mentions the importance of white exposure and shows me how she frames a shot, what catches her eye.
“You see?” she says, holding up the camera so I can look at the back of it. “That’s not quite right, but if I angle it like this and pull back here—”
I hear the rapid clicking of the shutter opening and closing before she holds it up again.
“This is better, right?”
I blink, actually seeing that itisbetter. “Yeah, butterfly. That’s really good.”
She smiles up at me and swear to fuck, my heart skips a beat before I manage to rein that in. Luckily, she’s focused on the camera, on powering it down and putting on the lens cap. “I think that’s enough for now. Should we go back?”
“Nah,” I say. “Let’s go a little further.” I lift my chin. “There’s a lake on the corner of my property you’ll like.”
She blinks, cheeks pink from the cold, nose kissable as she looks up at me. “Planning on drowning me?”
“Nah,” I say, glad she’s relaxed enough out here that she’s able to snark at me again. “I would have done that in the river. The lake is frozen over.”
“Considering all your options,” she says with a quick grin. “I do like a man who plans ahead.”
“Nah, baby,” I say, “I think you like to fly by the seat of your pants.”
She misses a step and I reach out, snag her arm, steadying her. My bag hits her arm and she winces. “Planning to brain me with your backpack instead?” she teases.
“Sorry, butterfly.”
Another missed step, but this time I manage to steady her without attempted murder.
“Why do you keep calling me that?”
Yeah.
Why?
Because I’m an idiot and I can’t seem to stop.
“The butterfly pushpins,” I lie. Because it started that way.
It just…feels like more now.
Watching her come out of her cocoon, seeing the beauty beneath as her wings unfurl, ready to take flight.
Something that both brings relief and…
The urge to get a net ready.
“Oh,” she says, throat working, eyes not meeting mine. Then she’s looking away again. “How far is the lake?” A beat, the half of her mouth I can see curving. “Lake.”
“Funny,” I say dryly, holding a branch back so it doesn’t smack her in the face.
She steps through, follows me along the winding path that I’ve traversed so often by now, I have it memorized.
“What do you have in the backpack?” she asks after a moment.
“You’ll see.”
