Chapter 2
Professor Sorenson looks up from the handful of prints I’ve given him and studies me like he’s seeing me for the first time: the quiet woman in his Introduction to Photography class.
The one who’s lingered timidly until everyone else finished their first “portfolio check” and left.
Now we stand across from each other in the empty, semidarkened lecture hall, and I’m pleased at his surprise; my pictures aren’t what he expected: smiling children, flowers in bloom, or middle-aged women raising wineglasses in a birthday toast.
“Judith, right?” he says. When I nod, he drops his eyes again to the photographs.
He’s moving through the pack slowly, drawing closer to Parade Girl.
It may be the best picture I’ve ever taken, but I nearly left it out.
I feared he’d look into her face, into those tearing eyes, and see the younger me—like I did.
Ridiculous, I tell myself. Impossible. But I hold my breath, waiting for his reaction.
When he reaches her, I watch his eyes move slowly over every inch of her face and the people around her with flags waving, mouths shouting. He shakes his head but doesn’t look up.
“This is terrific,” he says, quiet enough to be talking to himself.
“Just terrific.” I let out my breath, relieved, though my cheeks warm with his words of praise.
I can suddenly hear the loud ticking of the classroom clock.
“Every single one of these is stunning, Judith. You have an uncanny eye.” I’m too flustered to respond at first, so I reach for my pictures.
But when he hands them to me—reluctantly, it seems—I simply want to hand them back.
To keep living in the moment of watching him love my photographs.
“Thank you, Professor,” I say at last.
“Call me Paul. Everyone else does.” He smiles. “And you’ve got nothing to thank me for—the pleasure is all mine. Have you thought about submitting these to magazines? There’s—”
“No,” I say. He’s taken aback. But the thought of making my pictures public makes my skin crawl.
As if he’s asked me to stand naked on the town green—though that wasn’t his intention, I know.
“Thank you,” I add, putting more emphasis on the words this time.
Professor—Paul—nods and holds up his hands.
“I get it,” he says, though I know he doesn’t; he can’t.
“It’s a private passion. But you should think about it.
” I lie and say I will, then thank him again and turn to go.
But before I can get to the top of the steps, he calls my name: Judith.
I like hearing him say it, knowing that now he knows exactly who I am.
“Bring me your work anytime. I’d love to see more.”
I haven’t thought beyond tonight, past satisfying a class requirement. I never dreamed Paul would react this way—or that I’d want to show him more. But the force behind his words and his pleading smile act on me like a stiff old-fashioned—my grandmother’s drink—coursing through my veins.
What could it hurt, to show him more?