Tris & Christina Oneshots {DIVERGENT}

Life Through a Lens

Modern-day, again. A lot easier to digest than my last one, but don't count on a lot of cute ones, because this hurt my cold heart to write. Not yet edited.
Enjoy!
~
CHRISTINA
Our family photo album keeps growing. Tris and I keep it sitting on a shelf in our living room. It's white with little flowers painted on. Simple, but pretty.

The first photo, tucked in the very first slot, is of Tris and I on our first date, ten years ago. We were eighteen, sitting at the top of a hill with a picnic basket and a blanket. We were acting silly, feeding each other cherries, and blushing. It's a classic first-date picture: awkward yet endearing. Something we will never forget.

The second and third pictures are us on our third or fourth date, when we were playing in the snow before Christmas. Tris was making a snow angel and I was throwing snowballs at her. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold, and we kissed. It was at that moment that I fell in love with Tris Prior.

The fourth photo is Tris eating--no, devouring--a plate of my homemade spaghetti. There was sauce all over her face and chin, and she was embarrassed when I pulled out my camera and took a snapshot. It was the very first homemade meal I cooked for her, and she fell in love with my cooking then and there.

The fifth, sixth, and seventh are us at the beach. She was playing in the sand as the waves crashed on the shore and brushed her legs. I was building a sandcastle like a child. The last photo from that night was the sun setting over the water as it went down, down, down.

There weren't many pictures for awhile after that, as work and life rapidly picked up. The next was on our second anniversary. Two years of dating, two years of love. We took a trip to the mountains and stayed in a log cabin. There are so many pictures from that week, of me curled in front of the fireplace, Tris bundled up in a thick coat and hat. It was the day we made love for the first time.

At this point in the album, I can't count how many there are. I've lost count at twenty. Some are random with no significance, but some are so vibrant that I can still feel the emotions running through me when they were taken.

The next picture is a candid of me dancing in the rain. Cliche, I know, but Tris thought it was cute. It wasn't so cute when I caught a nasty cold after.

The following few are Tris and I visiting her parents. She had hid me from them for so long--nearly three years--in fear of how they'd react, and I finally got to meet them. They hugged us both so tightly, and her brother, Caleb, took the pictures.

There was a wide time gap between those and the next. But the next was one I'll never forget. In black and white, my hand lays in Tris's, and on my ring finger is a shiny engagement ring. She proposed that night, and my heart exploded.

The pictures came quickly after that, mostly little moments for a few months, her kissing me, us playing around, dates, lazy days. Things that would make everyone else think why they're important, but they're important because every moment is just a stepping stone to a mountain.

And then there's the most important photo of them all. Our wedding photo. It's so big that it has to lay landscape in its own sleeve all by itself. We have several copies about the house, all framed or hung on the walls.

Tris and I were standing at the altar, both of us in white dresses, and right after we said "I do," we kissed. That moment was when this was taken. It was such a sweet, intimate moment that I'll forever be grateful for capturing and being able to treasure it for the rest of our lives.

The next photo is us standing in front of our house that we'd just bought. We still live in it today, a small one-story but very spacious inside with three bedrooms and beautiful backyard. It's our safe place, a place of so many memories and more to come.

There's another string of miscellaneous photos after that. Nothing matters more than all the little but hilarious moments we froze in time with a lens. Pictures of me sleeping in awkward positions are no strangers to the album. Tris still thinks it's funny to see me drooling.

It's all so surreal. And time passed us so quickly.

Today, our daughter, Amelia, is a week old. We adopted her the day she was born after being wait-listed for two years. She's everything we've ever wanted, from her dark curls to her tiny pink toes.

Tris and I sit on our couch, Amelia tucked between us, and my mother lifts my camera and tells us to smile. We do, and the camera clicks, a familiar sound that we've associated with joy. She checks the photo and then shows Tris and I.

We melt. It's our first family photo with our first child. And we've captured it.

Everything precious in our lives is frozen in time in a book. We were able to capture every last moment, every scene of happiness and joy, every milestone that we achieved. Of course there was heartache, and those were captured, too.

We live our life through a lens. We have another moment to put in our album. And we fully intend to keep it going until we're too weak to hold a camera anymore, until it hurts to push the shutter button.

This is what we live for. Our life through a lens.