A Walk In The Park

Week 16: April 19, 2016

A chapter from a larger idea in progress…

“Where did the two of you meet?”

There were three coffees on the table and a notepad. Angela was taking diligent notes as inconspicuously as possible.

Kristin laughed. “Oh, it’s embarrassing.”

But Roger was more matter-of-fact. “I was actually dating her sister. We only went out a couple times-”

“You were together for two months!”

“Ok, ok, two months. But after I met Kris on like the third date, she was all I could think about.”

Kristin blushed. “You can only imagine the conversation I had with my sister.”

Angela smiled, steering the conversation. “Where was your first date?”

“Jersey,” Roger said.

“We wanted to get out of the city, you know? And Roger knew this park with a beautiful lookout. You could see the skyline on the horizon, and the planes taking off out of Newark. It was like watching everything from the clouds, it really was.”

The couple smiled and hugged, reliving the moment.

“You guys must love the outdoors.”

Roger nodded. “Absolutely. Any chance to escape the — pardon my french — the bullshit, we take it.”

Kristin agreed. “Totally. In the spring, we’re out hiking or camping almost every weekend.”

Angela took a sip of coffee and shut her notepad. She only needed the broad strokes, and these stories were rarely unique. The whole conversation was more about getting the couple comfortable with her anyway. They were all friends now, though. It was time to get started.

“Well,” she said, grabbing her camera bag off the floor. “Shall we?”

Kristin and Roger looked excited.

They drove in separate cars to Prospect Park, where Angela had planned a scenic, leisurely stroll through the woods. For city couples who loved nature, it was her go-to location. The moment she mentioned it, Roger and Kristin eagerly agreed: it was the perfect spot for their engagement photos.

Angela got there first and used the extra time to clean her lenses. She always brought three: her “nifty fifty” 50mm, a telephoto lens, and a 10mm wide angle. Sometimes, she used all three, but usually only one or two sufficed. In the woods, she was loathe to use the wide angle, but not for aesthetic reasons.

She was just afraid of seeing him.

It was really a beautiful day for photographs: a bright blue sky with puffy clouds, warm temperatures with a soft, cool breeze. And it was the middle of the day in the middle of the week, so there were hardly any other people in the park.

Angela instructed Roger and Kristin to just walk casually, like any other hike they’d taken before. She lagged behind deliberately, camera hanging around her neck, ready for action at a moment’s notice.

She could hear the two of them chatting idly, making little jokes, laughing. She pulled up her camera and snapped some candid shots of them both enjoying a casual laugh. It was sweet.

Eventually, they came to a small clearing. It wasn’t anything special, but the sunlight at that moment was unexpectedly serene, making the setting beautifully bucolic. Angela called for the loving couple to stop and enjoy the scenery for a few minutes.

She took a deep breath and replaced her telephoto lens with the wide angle. There was no other way to capture the entire scene within the frame.

“Say cheese!” she said. “Just kidding.”

The shutter snapped — click! click! click! — in a burst of photos. Angela glanced at the LCD screen midway through and, pleased with the results, kept shooting.

She wasn’t surprised when she saw his antlers suddenly reflected in the viewfinder. It looked like lens flare at first, blurry red and yellow wiggles poking out into the middle of the frame. But then they moved, and his eye came into view.

A little black dot. Watching her.

Kristin and Roger didn’t notice a thing. And Angela was used to it, so she just kept working, kept shooting, kept smiling, all the while hoping he’d go away. It wasn’t going to happen, though. The more she wanted him to leave, the longer the demon stayed.

“These are looking great, you guys,” she said, running over to show them a few shots. They looked pleased, which made her happy, and helped her keep her mind on positive things, on the things she could control.

They parted way just before dusk. Angela gave them both hugs and promised to email them the best photos by the end of the week. What a great day, she assured them, and everyone left with a smile.

But when she got home, Angela just sat down on her couch and cried, knowing that even though the apartment was empty, she was not alone. She was never alone.