Picture Imperfect Read online

  I’m about to stand up when the door swings open, knocking into my arm and sending my camera flying.

  “No!” I lunge after the camera—basically my entire world—and everything goes into slow motion. I’m not going to catch it in time, but then an arm reaches out of nowhere and grabs it before it can shatter all over the ground.

  “I’m so sorry,” a masculine voice says.

  “Oh!” My gaze is completely focused on my camera, still intact, in the stranger’s hand. My mind is still flashing images of exploding camera parts as it hits the ground. I can’t believe it’s okay.

  I reach for it. He hands it over. It isn’t until the device is safely in my grasp that I look up and meet his eyes.

  Then everything stops.

  It isn’t like the movies. Not really. There’s no music or choir of singing angels. But something happens in that moment.

  He’s interesting.

  The first thing I notice are the scars. There’s a deep gash that starts above his right eye and follows the curve of his eyebrow down, making a sharp turn toward his cheek. There are more lines, smaller marks that shoot down his right cheek. His hair is dark and trimmed, and his face is clean-shaven. His blue eyes are offset by dark eyebrows—one of which is creased by the scar—and there’s a slight divot between his eyes as he watches me. His lips are on the thin side and slightly crooked, his nose is overlarge, and as a complete package he’s entirely average, but there’s a depth in his eyes. And kindness. It’s a compelling mixture that’s completely—holy crap, do I need to get laid?

  But no, it’s not like that. It’s not that I’m attracted to him per se. And yet . . .

  “Can I photograph you?” The words blurt out of my mouth like a gush of water from a fire hydrant in July, entirely out of my control.

  He blinks and steps back, the crease between his brow deepening as he regards me in surprise. “I’m not a model.”

  “Oh, I know that,” I say and then immediately regret the words and what they imply. “I mean, not that I don’t think you’re,” one hand flails in his direction. “I just mean you look . . .”

  I’m killing this conversation slowly.

  Heat creeps up my neck as I flounder for words.

  He laughs, the sound awkward and full of self-deprecatory amusement. “I hold no false illusions about my appearance.”

  My mouth opens again, likely to say something even worse, but thankfully he rescues me with a wave of his hand.

  “Don’t worry, no offense taken. I’m here giving moral support to my brother, Brent Crawford.”

  I nod in recognition. Brent Crawford. Newest rookie for the New York Sharks, second-round draft pick, and widely regarded as the newest Johnny Football this season. They’ve been calling him Superman. Also a young, attractive bachelor that’s been making every female in a two-hundred-mile radius lose their minds and toss their panties in his general direction while screaming and fainting as if they’re auditioning for an on-Broadway performance of Hard Day’s Night.

  “I’m Gwen McDougall.” I hold out my non-camera-holding hand and he shakes it.

  “Marc Crawford. Here, let me help you with your bag.” He easily pulls the heavy equipment bag off my shoulder.

  “Thank you,” I say, surprised at the chivalry. He hasn’t even glanced down at my tits once. This has got to be some kind of record.

  In contrast, while he’s adjusting my bag on his own shoulder, I shamelessly check him out more. The irony that I’m objectifying him is not lost on me.

  It’s not in a sexual way. It’s art.

  Or so I tell myself.

  He’s wearing a suit, but he looks good under the professional cut of his jacket and button-up shirt. Not as fit as his footballer brother, but not bad. He’s shorter, too. We’re about the same height and I’m wearing two-inch heels, which puts him at about five foot ten.

  “You don’t look like your brother.”

  “That’s the understatement of the year.” A bit of red is creeping up his neck and there’s a mirroring heat in my own face.

  Why can’t I talk to this guy without insulting him? “I didn’t mean it like that,” I try to explain. “I was serious about wanting to take your picture.”

  He watches my face, scanning my eyes while his own are full of bafflement. “Why? Because of this?” He points a finger to the scarred side of his face.

  My eyes track over where he’s pointing and I shrug. “Chicks dig scars.”

  He barks out a laugh and opens the door from the stairwell. “I can’t say I’ve ever had anyone use that phrase in reference to me.” We walk down the hall toward the sound of bustling people. “I don’t have an interesting face.”

  There’s something in his voice that stops me. It’s like when an abused child puts themselves down because it’s what they’ve always heard, but they’re really dying for approval.

  I put a hand on his arm. “But you really do. Your face might not be the societal ideal for beauty, but you have obvious character that most people lack. Especially beautiful people.”

  He glances down at my hand and then back up at my face, already shaking his head, confusion flickering in his eyes. He opens his mouth to speak.

  The door behind us slams open against the wall, making us both turn at the sound. “There you are! Did you know the elevator was broken? What is wrong with people that they can’t get their buildings fixed?”

  The screechy voice is familiar. I grip my camera tighter, as if it could protect me. Marissa Reeves, reporter for the gossip rag Stylz. I could never prove it but I’m nearly certain that she was the one behind the article they ran about me a year ago.

  She’s a psycho hose beast.

  She walks right up, pushing herself between us and knocking my hand off his arm—I didn’t even realize it was still there—and then she kisses my new friend on his perfectly imperfect mouth.

  I DON’T MEET BRENT Crawford until nearly two hours later. I love photography, but most of this celeb racket is for the birds. And not pretty birds like peacocks, but dumpster birds who screech and claw and offer no real benefit to the planet.

  “I can’t work under these conditions,” complains an A-list star, one who stars in a ton of action movies and does his own stunts and by all reports is “a great guy.” The problem? We don’t have the brand of water he prefers.

  I glance around for Victoria. There’s been too much activity, trying to get all the shots done in one day. They have the space divvied up into ministudios with various backdrops and fill lights. I only saw Victoria once right after I arrived. She had time to air kiss me on both cheeks and point me in the direction of one of the setups and I haven’t seen her since.

  It’s nice that she trusts me, I guess, but the truth is we have similar if unorthodox shooting methods. We want to get a person’s true character instead of the one they wish to present to the world. Which is why, while my celebrity is bitching and distracted, I catch some shots of his true colors. Not sure if the magazine will run the shot of his snarling mouth and cold eyes, but I know Victoria will appreciate it. I have a theory that she gets so many great shoots because of the amount of blackmail material she has.

  The celeb’s handlers manage to calm him down, and I get a few more decent shots that he won’t sue me over. Hopefully.

  I thought I would get away from this drama when I left modeling, but apparently not.

  Two hours later, and we’re nearly finished. Brent is the last shoot of the day, and I brace myself for some possible meltdown behavior.

  A majority of the people have left, so the melee has died down a bit. All that’s left are a few straggling reporters, a makeup artist, and a stylist who stays on hand in case of emergency.

  Brent introduces himself and shakes my hand much like his brother did, which makes me hopeful. Most of these people didn’t even bother. I have him sit on the bench in the middle of the set. He’s surrounded by stark-white material and I adjust the lights as I walk around him, lookin
g at him from different angles.

  I really can’t see much of Marc in his features. Brent is taller and wider. His jaw has a harsher angle and his nose is straight and fits his face perfectly. They do have the same dark hair and blue eyes, but while Marc has the world in his eyes, Brent’s are somehow lighter. Less serious.

  He’s wearing a long-sleeved dark grey sweater that fits his form and shows off his physique. The contrast between the dark clothing and white background should make some good shots if I can play up a bit of shadow in the background to emphasize his features. But there’s a rigidity to his shoulders and jaw that becomes apparent as I play with the lighting. He’s not comfortable in front of the camera, although he puts up a good front.

  “I met your brother,” I tell Brent as I’m adjusting a tripod. And completely offended him, numerous times in quick succession, like my mouth is an automatic weapon full of insults.

  “Oh yeah? He’s the best. He’s still around here somewhere, I think, with his girlfriend.”

  Something twinges in my chest at the words and I inwardly shake myself.

  Why should I care if he’s dating a psycho beyotch? I just met him. I don’t even know him, even though I obviously stuck my foot in my mouth and was completely rude to him. Maybe the awkwardness is because I have a care for another human in general. I wouldn’t wish Marissa Reeves on my worst enemy.

  “Is Marc your only brother or do you have other siblings?” Asking personal, if somewhat inane questions is a trick I use to get people to relax. Everyone loves talking about themselves. And if I can get them talking and comfortable, I can get a sense of who they really are instead of the façade they present to the world.

  “Just me and Marc,” he says. “What about you?”

  I stop adjusting the light lamp in front of me and find him watching me. He’s actually interested in my response.

  Not interested like that, and even if he were, I don’t date pretty boys or celebrities. Not anymore. But he’s looking at me like he actually cares about my answer. Which isn’t normal in this business.

  “I have two sisters.”

  “Are they older or younger?” he asks before I can ask him another question to keep him talking.

  “They’re both older. I’m the baby.” I move back behind the camera on the tripod aimed in his direction.

  “So we have that in common.” The flash of his teeth is dazzling.

  I press the shutter a few times and then straighten. “Everyone knows the youngest in the family is always the best one. The first kids are just experiments until they get it right.”

  That makes him laugh and I snap a few more shots. “Did you want me to pose or look a certain way or something?”

  “No. I know that’s typical, but candid shots always turn out much better. Relax. Sit however you’re most comfortable. We can talk about whatever you want and this’ll all be over in a minute.”

  After a few more shots, it’s clear Brent is too wound up to lie around, so I have him stand and move as he pleases for a bit, snapping shots at different angles while we chat.

  “How long have you been a photographer?” he asks.

  “Not long, a few years.”

  “Weren’t you a model, before?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I think I saw you somewhere.” His eyes widen. “No, wait, it was recently. Aren’t you the Wonder Woman of Broad Street?”

  I laugh and tinker with my camera to hide the heat filling my face. “Hardly. It’s not anything special.”

  “I don’t know about that. The article I read was pretty rad.”

  “Well, you know how those click-bait stories are.”

  “Oh believe me, I understand unwanted attention.” He grimaces and rubs the back of his head and I click the shutter.

  “I bet. Aren’t you Superman?”

  He laughs. “Maybe we should start the Justice League.”

  “Only if I get to be the Flash,” a voice calls out from the other side of the room. Marc walks over to the camera and stops a few feet away, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “You are way too slow to be the Flash,” Brent teases.

  “I am not slow.”

  “You are.”

  “I’m methodical. There’s a difference.”

  “Don’t listen to him, Gwen. When we were kids, on our birthdays every year, our mom would give us a set amount of money to spend at any store we wanted. I would blow through my hundred-dollar allowance in five minutes. This guy,” he jerks a thumb in Marc’s direction, “would take hours figuring out what he wanted and calculating the costs and comparing one toy with another.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with making sure you know what you want.”

  “There’s nothing right with it either.”

  They both laugh and I smile because the cadence is almost exactly the same. Brent’s shoulders aren’t as rigid as they were before. I snap a few pictures while they laugh together.

  We chat and I continue taking pictures. Brent asks about the rest of the shots and how they went. I tell them stories of some diva meltdowns—without names, although I’m sure they can figure it out—and then the conversation turns into a reflection on the strangeness of our semicelebrity lives.

  “It’s like people who are in the thick of it start to have a distorted view of reality. You know what I mean?” I ask.

  I’ve never really been able to form this into words. My family would never get it. They live normal lives with normal jobs, without the worry of being a public specter or fodder for the masses.

  “And then there’s the worry about falling from grace,” Brent says.

  “Yeah, I’ve been there,” I admit with a small laugh.

  “It’s like living in a fantasy land where you can’t distinguish between what’s fake and what’s real.”

  “Or who’s fake and who’s real.”

  We meet eyes and share a moment of commiseration. I never thought that today I would find someone who understands what things are really like. Everyone else is stuck in the fantasy.

  “I feel so bad for you beautiful people,” Marc says drily. “It must be hard having more stalkers than Katy Perry has Twitter followers.”

  “Stalkers?” I raise a brow. “I don’t have any stalkers. That I know of.”

  “Brent has a bunch. One sends him these creepy serial-killer letters. They even use this ancient-looking vellum and fancy ink. We had to send it to the cops to have them analyze it. They said it takes a significant amount of time to write up even one. He’s gotten like fifty.”

  “That is pretty creepy.”

  “Oh it gets worse,” Marc says. “They even sent him pictures of dead chickens.”

  I laugh. “Dead chickens? Why?”

  “Who knows?” Brent says. “Someone with a mental illness, more than likely. You know how it is. Sometimes people think they know you but they really only know what they read and see on TV. They create a whole version of reality in their heads.”

  “Kind of like some of the celebrities we know,” I say.

  “Two sides of the same coin,” Brent agrees.

  A door slams nearby and a voice screeches out over the open space. “Brent, you look so great!”

  Marissa is back. Why is she always slamming things? Probably for attention. I bet she’s a scream-sneezer.

  She walks over to Marc and links her arm through his, murmuring something in his ear that makes him smile.

  They talk for a minute, their heads huddled together and I can’t make out the words, just the low sound of voices.

  I focus on Brent inside the viewfinder. He’s frowning and watching his brother.

  I wonder why.

  The shrieky pitch of Marissa’s voice knifes into my ears again. “I have to go, but I’ll see you Friday night for dinner?”

  Marc nods and she kisses him on the cheek, leaving behind a streak of red.

  “Bye, Brent!” she calls as she’s leaving, completely ignoring me. Not that I care. I’
m used to it.

  And from the likes of her, I’m grateful for it.

  Chapter Four

  I suffered evils, but without allowing them to rob me of the freedom to expand.

  –Gordon Parks

  MARC

  “I’M SORRY BUT I’M GOING to be late for dinner. We’ll have to cancel our reservations.” It’s seven thirty on Friday night. I should have been out of here by five, but I’ve spent the last two hours fixing a report Dad completely screwed up. “I have at least another hour here. But you don’t have to wait for me. We can go out tomorrow.”

  “I haven’t seen you since the shoot on Monday,” Marissa says, her voice pouty. “I can wait at your apartment. Maybe that will entice you to hurry. Brent can let me in, right?”

  I hesitate. Is her tone calculating, or am I just tired? “Yes, Brent’s there.”

  “Great. I’ll head over there in a little while. Let me know when you’re on your way and I can order takeout or something. My treat.”

  “That sounds great.” I relax.

  We hang up and I frown at my computer. Time to get to work.

  But I can’t focus, thinking about Marissa. Brent’s been acting weird about her lately. Well, not exactly weird, just silent. And I know Brent well enough to know something is up, but I’m not sure what. If it was something serious, surely he would have said something.

  And now she will be there waiting for me. With him.

  I’m paranoid. But I have reason to be. She wouldn’t be the first woman I dated who was more interested in my brother than me.

  But Marissa is different. She never asks me questions about Brent. She hardly even mentions him.

  Except for the other night. After the photo shoot in Harlem, she called to ask if everything was okay with Brent and the photographer. Apparently there was some scandal with Gwen over a year ago, and Marissa was worried about Brent getting involved.