See You in Hell

13

Over the next few weeks Louise threw herself into film making. On top of all the other worries on her mind she was furious with herself for letting the project fall behind while she'd been distracted. Now she focused on nothing else. The more she filled her days with work, the less her brain could draw her back to the subjects she'd rather avoid. But she still agonized about Ollie.

She had changed her schedule so they wouldn't align well for dates. It was all under the guise of prioritizing filming. She'd come up with strategies to mitigate the times when she couldn't avoid him too. Her insistence that they include Andy in everything to "keep him from feeling left out" was not as altruistic as it might have appeared. Going to a movie was a good fallback; at least it filled the dead air. Although Ollie was clearly signally he wanted to take their relationship to the next level. In the dark theater she found his hand had a habit of creeping towards hers on the arm rest. She would have to figure out a new approach.

At Least the situation between her and Logan had improved. As Louise's hatred had grown, Bob had become only more enamored of his newest employee. A few days after the house party, he had announced his decision to start letting Logan take on shifts by himself, citing his growing aptitude in the kitchen. Logan had even started trying his hand at custom burgers.
"They're not quite chalkboard ready, but he's almost there!"

Although she was irritated with her Dad's admiration, his timing could not have been better. Only one shift with Logan per week remained. If she could just hang in until the end of the summer, Ollie's departure to college would give her an easy out. She hoped the blow of rejection would be softened if the reason was the distance between them.

Louise was just starting to feel that the worst was behind her when disaster struck again. It was her own fault. Ollie dropped her home after their shoot. When they pulled up Louise had exited the car as quickly as she could, hoping to avoid another attempted kiss. In her haste, she hadn't made sure the camera bag on her lap was secure.

It was such a short moment between tedium and disaster, but Louise felt the second of the camera slipping free to the crunch when it hit the curb as if in slow motion. It ricocheted back onto pavement and skidded under the car.
"Shit."

The sound had been bad. A stunned silence followed. She and Ollie held their breath as they bent down to assess the damage. The battery door had come loose in the fall and there was now a pronounced scratch running up the left side. Louise was relieved to see that there was no perceivable crack on the lens or monitor. She said a silent prayer before holding down the power button. It was possible there was more internal damage.

The camera started up fine. Louise didn't see any problems with the digital elements, but when she put her eye on the viewfinder her heart dropped. The lens stayed blurry no matter which way she twisted the focus. Ollie's luck was no better. No amount of wiping and adjusting would restore it. It was clear the fall had knocked something deep inside out of alignment.

Louise was beside herself with frustration. Ollie hovered nervously around her, trying his best to offer support, but his consultation wouldn't fix the lens. Mr.Frond was going to completely lose it. She'd barely managed to convince him to lend them the equipment for the summer, now all of his catastrophizing would be justified. But more importantly, this was going to ruin her cinematography.

Alone in the basement of the restaurant she hunched over her Dad's neglected workbench. Linda had set it up for him when he'd gone through a particularly enthusiastic miniatures phase. Her mom had wanted to reclaim their bedroom from his scattered projects, none of which ever seemed to make it to completion. There wasn't much in the way of actual tools, but at least she had managed to find a screwdriver small enough to twist open the tiny fastenings on the lens.

She'd broken the whole thing down. A YouTube video had given her some hope that this was something a DIY approach could fix. It had started off promisingly enough. Years of honing her lock picking skills had made Louise excellent at taking things apart, however putting things back together was not one of her strengths. The little pieces were all so delicate and complex. She couldn't seem to get anything back in place. The parts that she had laid out so carefully at first had begun to become scrambled in her exasperation. Nothing looked like it did in the video. Louise was becoming desperate now. She'd had managed to make things worse. Her eyes welled with tears of frustration.

She silently cursed herself for losing track of time when she heard the basement door open from upstairs. She'd meant to leave before Logan's shift started. His footsteps stopped suddenly when she came into view. She didn't turn to acknowledge him, they still weren't on speaking terms. More importantly she didn't want him to see her face - her eyes were probably still red from crying. He passed on to the walk-in without comment, but on the way back his curiosity must have gotten the better of him.

"Are you making a bomb?" Logan's sarcasm was the last thing she needed right now. She didn't respond. There was a pause. Louise could feel Logan's gaze boring into her, taking in all of her vulnerability.
"Everything ok?"
"Yup. Just doing some repairs." He lingered a few seconds longer. For a moment it seemed as if he was going to say something more, but in the end he just headed back up the steps. Relief swept through her as his footsteps retreated into the distance.

Hours passed. If nothing else Louise was persistent. She eventually managed to put everything back together. It looked right from the outside, but the insides were dubious. There were a few small screws left which had never found their home. Either way the lens was no more functional than before.

When she finally emerged from the basement, she was dazed by the sudden brightness of the restaurant lights. The sun had gone down while she'd been downstairs and Logan was just mopping up for the night. She had hoped to slip out of the Restaurant unnoticed.

"Any luck?"
"No." Her answer came out more sorrowfully than she'd wanted.
"What was it you were repairing?"
"A camera lens."
"Fuck. What happened?"
"It fell." There was no need to add all the details, he had plenty of embarrassing material on her already.
"Are you going to be able to fix it?" Why was he pretending to care about this?
"Doesn't look like it."
"Can you get a new one?"
"Maybe. They're not cheap to replace." He nodded thoughtfully.

Louise continued toward the door, hoping their exchange was over, but Logan stopped her again.
"What do you need exactly?"
"Why does it matter?" She was getting seriously irritated with him now.
"I might have something you could use." Louise was too stunned to reply right away.
"A DSLR lens?"
"I'm not quite sure what that is, but we have a bunch of old camera stuff at home."
"And you're going to let me use it?" She didn't hide her skepticism.
"Like I said, I'm not exactly sure what's there. But you can come take a look if you want."