I could almost see the shot she had—the tall lavender petals with the brownish center reaching for the heavens, probably a nice strong bokeh keeping the blacktop blurred. A great, great shot, if she was worth shit as a photographer.
And, judging purely by the way she shot and shifted and shot and shifted with precise and measured movements, she was. You can tell an amateur just by the way they move, the way they hold the camera. She was shooting manual too, because a camera that old wasonlymanual. In the age of DSLR cameras worth several thousand dollars that could all but press the shutter button for you, working with an antique manual film camera meant you were either very, very serious about true classical photography, or you were a dipshit hipster who thought using a manual made you cool as you referred to yourself as a “photog.”
This lovely thing was, if not an actual pro, certainly not an amateur, and was not using the vintage for imaginary cool points. An amateur would take, maybe, half a dozen shots of that flower and figure they had some good ones and move on. A pro would take a whole roll, at least.
And, indeed, as I leaned against the wobbly metal post holding up a dented, .22-pocked Deer Crossing sign, I watched her shoot and move and shoot and move, tirelessly, switch rolls with easy familiarity and speed, and shoot a whole second roll.
I had no problems watching her shoot, even though she spent a good twenty, maybe even closer to thirty minutes on that one flower, from all possible angles. Partly because I could see in my mind’s eye each shot as she took it, cataloging them as good or nah. The other factor that made it rather easy to just stand and watch her was because she was bent over most of the time, leaning forward, wearing a tank top, and not wearing a bra. And behold, it was evident that she had been blessed by God and nature with the most massive and natural and beautiful breasts to ever grace womankind.
I exaggerate very little, if at all.
They were fucking glorious.
Granted, I’d spent the past six months and some weeks on the lam, far from civilization, and women in particular, so perhaps I was feeling the effects of six months of near-total celibacy—near-total because there had been a brief and aborted rendezvous with a willing farm girl outside Bergen, but her father had discovered us and chased me off before we got anywhere fun, and thereafter I’d been focused on the job. The tour guide in Kentucky had been willing enough, but number one I hadn’t been sure she was even eighteen, and I know America has laws about that and I have my own moral standards, and plus, there was just something else telling me to keep going. I have no real explanation for the feeling, because you’d think me being a horny twenty-four-year-old heterosexual male on a six-month dry spell, I would jump at the first opportunity to get laid. Maybe it was fate nudging me, because fate knew I was about to meet this girl.
I mean, I’d not even seen her face yet, not fully, but I’d seen enough of her curves to know I wanted to know more just from a visual standpoint, but there was something else. Something less…tangible. Call it a woo-woo feeling, I don’t know. I was just drawn to her. Drawn to the fact that she was alone on the side of a remote rural two-lane road in the wops of Missouri, spending half an hour on her knees and elbows taking several rolls of film worth of shots of a single wildflower. Something about that just…spoke to me, on an artistic, emotional, personal level.
So, you know, it wasn’t just the wondrous glory of her tits and ass. Just so we’re clear.
But holy shit, the tits and ass on the girl.
Finally, she pushed up to sit on her knees, capped her lens—which, I noticed, was a 50mm prime lens, ratcheting my respect up a notch—checked the count on her roll, and then stood up, letting the Minolta swing around to bump softly against the swell of her hip.
She eyed me, assessing and scrutinizing. “Anyone ever tell you it’s rude to stare?”
I shrugged. “I wasn’t staring, I was watching. Call it professional curiosity.” I lifted my own camera in gesture.
She rolled her eyes. “Professional curiosity had you standing where you could see down my shirt, too, I suppose.”
I grinned. “Nah, that was just a bonus.”
“So you were looking down my shirt.”
“I mean, if the look is there to be had, I ain’t gonna pretend to not enjoy it. No point in taking the piss about it.”
She blinked. “I have no idea what that means.”
“It means don’t be fuckin’ unreasonable.”
“Maybe things are different in Australia, but around here, if you get busted looking down a woman’s shirt, you apologize.”
“First, I’m from New Zealand. Second, I don’t see why I should apologize. I wasn’t staring. You were bent over and you knew I was there, and you know how you’re dressed, and I’m guessing you’re right capable of figuring out what I’d be seeing just by being stood where I am. You’re looking right skux, as we say back home, and I admit I checked you out. But I don’t agree I was being rude or creepy. Also, you need a ride somewhere?”
She laughed. “Skux. Should I be offended by that?”
“Nah. It just means you’re looking hot. It’s a good thing, and not offensive. If my mate is dressed nice and looking cool, I’d tell him he was looking skux. A girl I like is dressed hot, I’d tell her she looks skux. Not dirty at all.”
“Oh.” She looked past me, at my van. “Nice ride. Where are you headed?”
“Thanks. I just bought it a few days past. I’m not really heading anywhere in particular. Generally west, I guess, but I’m really just exploring the country, and doing it mainly through this,” I said, tugging the strap of my Nikon.
“Is that a D6?” she asked.
I nodded. “Yeah. I quite fancy your Minolta. What year is it from?”
She laughed. “Actually, I’m not certain. It was a gift from my advisor when I left Columbia. She bought it used herself back in the early nineties, so I’d guess it’s probably from the eighties, maybe even the seventies.”
“When you say Columbia, do you mean the country or the university?”
