Sunkissed Serendipity

Chapter 22

Isla

Once the sun starts to set on the beach, the group gathers around to go home for the night. I take the opportunity to bring my camera out of my bag and move close to the water. The sky is a hue of orange and purple, so deep in color that it paints the entire world with its beautiful shade. It's perfect, and I'd be an idiot to miss out on taking a picture of it.

As I bring the camera up to my eyes, I straighten the lens and get the perfect shot. I snap a picture, and once I'm sure it is a good one, I do a spin and take a picture of the group of people I've hung out with for the past few hours. We had fun playing volleyball, throwing a frisbee at the elderly, and chasing each other around the beach. It was a fun time, and I knew I wanted a picture to remember it by.

So I walk closer to the group and pull my camera down to my waist, knowing I'd have to get permission first. "Mind if I take a picture of you guys?" I shout out when I get to them, and the boys look up at me. Cameron has a smirk on his face as he asks, "A solo shot?"

That makes his brother snort out loud, rolling his eyes eyes and he says, "Yeah, right."

Cameron gives me a look, and I laugh, shaking my head. "No, I want to get a group shot," I say, still finding his comment humorous. At least I've been laughing a lot around them, so that was something. The others shrug at my comment, and Mark says, "Sure! Go ahead."

I smile at the permission, pick up the camera, and put it in my eyes. Once I look into the frame, I find that Julian isn't in the shot and slide the camera over in order to find him. He is standing next to me instead, and I say, "What are you doing? Get in the shot."

Julian gives me a look before he saunders over to his friends and places a hand over Zach. Once I get the shot, I give them a big thumbs up and say, "Perfect."

The guys go back to packing up all of the things they brought with them, and Julian walks over to me. He looks over at the water, where the sun is still hanging right above it, and says, "Want some pictures of you?"

"Hm?" I ask, feeling subconscious because I'm always behind the camera. I'm not the one getting a picture taken of it, and it's new. Julian nods, taking a step closer to me and holding out his hand. "Come on. Give me the camera, and I'll take a picture of you."

Reluctantly, I hand him my camera for the second time and go back a few steps. Once I'm ready (after fixing my hair, of course), I look straight into the camera with a large smile. Julian presses the button, and to my horror, the camera flashes brightly, and my eyes almost blink from the unexpectedness. After a second, the flash goes away, and I shriek, "Why'd you take it with a flash?"

Julian looks genuinely confused as he hands me the camera I'm eagerly reaching for. "I don't even know how that happened."

"You changed a setting," I say to him, wondering how that even happened within a second, and head over to the pictures we had just taken. Once I look over at the photos of the friend group and move toward one of mine, shock is evident. The flash had gone off, but it had softened to paint my face a golden light, and the sunset was dim but bright in the background as well. The thing was, the picture was so zoomed in that only my chest up was in the photo, and the part that was focused was my face. My eyes held a smile, and my lips were pulled out in an equally large smile.

It was a picture I don't usually take of me, even with my phone, and yet—well, it was kind of nice.

Julian looks over my shoulder and peers at the picture as well. I look up to see his reaction, and he says, "It's nice, right? You look very pretty in it."