Shutter Me

Chapter One

“Blakely! Your next assignment is to take a picture of Coach Mahone taking a bath after a hardcore basketball practice.” Kendall ordered flatly while shifting through the shots I freshly printed on photo paper

“What?” I exclaimed as I lifted my eyes out of my camera hole to stare at her. The new errand was unbelievable and totally disgusting. However, it sounded very real.

Kendall removed her black Skullcandy headphones from her ears and hung them on her shoulders. “Just kidding, Kit.  You got something way better than that.” She grinned at me like she knew a good joke and she was dying to tell it.

I was dying to kill her for the phony order, but I smiled in relief.

“And… what’s— that?” I said while pausing after every word as I took steps towards Kendall.

She was slumping in her office chair and her feet were hoisted on top of her glass table. Her eyes made her look like she didn’t sleep for the past 64 hours. The lack of rest made her skin pasty white, her blonde hair unruly and her dark blue eyes tired even if she placed double amounts of eyeliners beneath them.

The effects of being the paper’s layout editor, people.

Kendall heaved herself up and searched for something along the brown folders she had stacked up on her table. She found a Polaroid picture. After a few brushing away of dusts, she handed it to me. Golden brown hair, impish blue eyes and a dangerous smile. It didn’t take me a minute to recognize it.

“Marco de Grassi?”

Kendall nodded happily and then she looked at me expectantly, hoping that the message got through me. But honestly, no amounts of her brain cells got through me. Nonetheless, she was waiting for a reaction. I spoke up.

“You want me to take a picture of him while taking a bath?” I asked with an amused tone. I fiddled with my camera’s settings to pretend that I really had plans of capturing Marco’s bath moments.

She eyed me mischievously. “That would be nice…but nope. The EIC wants him” She pointed at the Polaroid picture, right at Marco’s face. “…on our Student Spotlight feature and you are in charge of the full-length interview and photo shoot.”

I looked up from my camera screen in shock.

“Why me? I’m the photographer! I understand the part about the photo shoot but—the interview? It’s not part of my job description.” I protested vigorously.  

“Well, if you don’t do this, maybe you can say goodbye to your job.” Kendall answered, gesturing imaginary quotation marks with her hands on the job part of her reply for emphasis. “Hunter Chronicles is just not hitting with the student body anymore and the School Activity Coordinator called in the EIC and told her that if we won’t have enough buyers for the next issue, he’s going to shut down the school publication.” 

My eyes shot open wide. “What?” I exclaimed again, letting my camera loose. “So now, the whole staff is counting on me to save the publication?”

Kendall nodded with an encouraging smile.

“Isn’t this too big for me?” I questioned as I frantically waved the photo at Kendall.

“Why? Do you have something against de Grassi?” She replied as she pounded on her laptop’s keyboard. She didn’t answer any of my questions. In exasperation, I plopped myself down a snuggly red bean-shaped couch. I batted my eyelashes at her.

“Rumor has it that he’s an egotistical bigheaded dirtball,” I confided while playing around with my camera’s strap to relieve my stress. “I assume that it's not just a rumor though. I've had Health class with him last year, and he just lets his group work for him like he's some CEO. He doesn’t talk to just anyone.  I bet he doesn't even remember having a class with me."

I felt a smile crack behind Kendall’s laptop. “Maybe you’re partly right, but he’s a damn good-looking egotistical bigheaded dirtball.” She pointed out like I didn’t know that already. “And that’s the point of choosing you. Since, he practically doesn’t know you exist and you look all innocent and naïve …maybe he’ll let you interview him.”

“Wow and now he has a heart for the innocent needy?” I mocked. Kendall rolled her eyes at me. Since I wasn’t the type to give up quickly with an argument, I bombed her with another query. “Anyway…does that mean you can’t help me?”

“No. It means I can’t join you while you’re doing the actual interview in his house,” Kendall replied coolly.

“Wait. Who said anything about going to his house? “I buzzed, flabbergasted that they’re putting me out there to interview the dirtball in his own home. “I am not stepping into his house no matter how elegant or pretty it is. I demand that we get a different interviewee.”

“The boss said you’re going inside his house and if you haven’t noticed already, the EIC makes the demands here and not us. If you want the Hunter Chronicles to shut, yeah, get a different interviewee.” Kendall sighed aloud. “Don’t you see? We need Marco de Grassi to pump up our readers’ number from zero to sky high! I mean like—who wouldn’t be interested to know what it’s like to be a million dollar kind of guy?”

“Me, apparently,” I said in a deflated tone.

Kendall clicked her tongue. “Look, this is our last year, Blakely. Let’s make these moments count, okay? Don’t be a buzzkill. I’ll help you through this.” She looked at me with puppy dogs eyes. “Now will you please just accept the beat?”

I got down against her with the staring competition but looking at Kendall’s tired eyes just made me feel guilty that I was still giving her a hard time. I sighed and looked away.

“Psh, alright alright. I’ll do it!”

Kendall clapped like a retarded seal. “Yipee! Finally! Now I can stop shooting caffeine into my veins by gulping coffee every minute.”

It sounded like a hyperbole, but it seemed true since I could see a large cup of Starbucks coffee towering over her school paper files.

I shot her an evil glare. Noticing my vexation, she pouted at me.

“This will be over soon. I promise. Nowadays, falling in love with a person is like Polaroid.” She dramatically paused.

“It’s instant.” She said while making magic jazz hands with her fingers.“Who knows? You might like that attractive, sexy, rich, totally irresistible…”

My eyebrows rose up again, and I made sure Kendall saw them.

“Dirtball, douchebag” She added to finish the sentence. Kendall grinned ever so slyly.

“I hate you, Kendall Dixon.”

“I love you right back, Kit Blakely.” Kendall sappily replied and her grin turned to a smirk.

She placed her Skullcandy on her ears again, dumping her almost finished Starbucks when I decided to walk out of her office. As I walked outside to the halls, I pocketed Marco’s Polaroid picture and adjusted my camera lens.

 I’ve got so much work to do.

A/N: 

I decided to make this a short story which explains why it's short (Way to go, Captain Obvious!). My thoughts tend to change though so...I don't know T___T asdfghjkl scumbag brain. Anyway, have a nice day!! :)