Divine Intervention

Chapter 17

Breakfast was delicious. While he got ready, I threw together a lunch of sandwiches, chips, cookies, Gatorade, and water. I was stowing it all in an empty backpack I found in the closet when he came downstairs. 

“I packed lunch so we don’t have to be too careful about time.”

“Good idea. There are some really pretty places I want to show you, so we will be gone a little while. We’ll take it slow though, no hurry today.” 

We finished putting shoes and jackets on and headed out. I had the backpack with the food and blanket in it, as well was the charging packs for my phone. He stopped at his vehicle and pulled a backpack out of the back as well as a camera case and a tripod. I smacked my forehead.  He looked at me and asked why I did that. 

“When there’s no credit on a photo of you, it’s you," I said out loud. 

“More often than not, yes. I do like to give credit," he chuckled. “My camera has a remote, a timer and I rock with a tripod," he said slinging his camera bag over his shoulder and strapping the tripod to his backpack. “Let’s go see what beauty we can find.”

We headed out in a different direction from what I had come to think of as ‘our spot’.  We hiked for about an hour before we stopped by a stream. He set down his pack and his camera case and stretched. “Here is the first place I wanted to show you.” He began to pull out his camera. I got out a bottle of water, took a drink and passed it to him. He handed it back and began playing with the settings on the camera. He took a few shots of the scenery and then turned it on me. 

“Bring your chin up a bit and tilt your head to the left just a little," he asked motioning with his hand. I did what I thought he wanted. “Perfect," he said snapping a few pictures. He came up next to me and showed me what he took. “We can look more in depth on my laptop later, but look how the light shines in your hair and the shadows play on your face. It’s stunning." He was in a zone talking about his photography. He had me take out my phone and he showed me how to play with the settings for different effects.  He really knew a lot about this and the way he lit up teaching me was the best. 

We continued on, stopping here and there, so that he could show me things. We stopped for lunch and he actually set up his tripod. He took some pictures of me and then he took some pictures of himself. He came and put his arms around me and pulled me close. Then he put his hand under my chin and tilted my face up to meet his as he placed a light kiss on my lips. I heard a soft click as I realized he was taking pictures of all of this too. I pulled away with a start. 

“These are just for me," he said meeting my eyes. “I might need evidence that this is real too.” I couldn’t not pull him in for a kiss at that moment. Every passing minute made it harder to separate fantasy from reality. It also made it more clear that serious discussions were on the horizon.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in similar situations. He showed me his favorite spots and we took some pictures. We reached the clearing right around sunset. He set up his stuff and took pictures from every angle with his camera and with his phone. He took my phone and took pictures of the sunset and then some selfies of the two of us with the sunset as the background. 

“Can I send one of these to Michelle?”, I asked once he handed my phone back to me. 

“Sure. Send whichever you like best.” I handed the phone back to him and told him to pick one. He scanned through them and chose one where he was kissing me on the cheek and my eyes were closed and the sky looked like it was on fire behind us. I put it quickly in our dm with a message that said ‘what is reality?’ and sent it. We packed up and headed home before it got too dark.

We reached the cabin before Michelle finally responded.  The message simply read, ‘Reality is beautiful. Love you sister.’ I left the screen open and handed the phone to Avi. He read it and smiled. 

“She’s not wrong. Funny story though, I thought she really was your sister at first. I asked her and she set me straight.” 

I giggled. “A lot of people assume we are.” We got inside and I dumped the backpack on the floor and kicked off my shoes. I stretched my whole body and everything popped. I commented on how sore I was from our hike.  He asked me if I was hungry. I told him that I could wait. 

He grabbed my hand and led me upstairs, “Come with me.”