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AJ had always had an eye for detail. Right back to university, when he appeared at the improv society one Freshers week and then never left – he brought with him far more director’s instincts than any of them had ever had. He thought about the cuts between scenes and the soundscape behind them. He brought a new layer to their acting; a font of knowledge when it came to film; quietly knowledgeable about things he seemed almost embarrassed to have read about.
He liked simple things too. The films he made were always produced with the smallest amount of equipment – cameras stripped back to their basic parts, forcing him to use them properly. No auto settings, no clever lighting. He worked hard – and they all saw it far more than anyone who only saw the finished product.
But it went beyond work. He had a camera, a small one that lived in the bottom of his backpack. Second-hand from a car boot sale, he hadn’t even expected it to work when he got it home. Old film, battered lens case, worn leather strap fraying at each end.
He bought it a week before he told Luke, Sam and Tom how he had been feeling. He was experimenting with it as his mind played over the words he needed to say, the confession that could have ended everything. And when it didn’t, the camera became a frame through which their entire relationship sat.
The day Luke left for the first time, they went back to Tom’s flat in a jumble of moods. The glowing buzz of the newfound closeness fought to outweigh the sudden loss of Luke. AJ sat in an armchair opposite the sofa, flicking through settings on his new favourite toy, watching the focus snap in and out on random objects on the coffee table in front of him.
On the sofa, Tom had claimed one end, scrolling through his phone distractedly. His legs were curled beneath him, feet encroaching on the middle cushion and pressing lightly into Sam’s. Sam had been sat with his chin resting over the back of the sofa, head tilted as he daydreamed out of the window. Over time, he got distracted by something else though, his eyes flickering over to Tom.
The lighting was right, weak rays of sunshine coming in through the streaked window behind them. It hit Tom’s hair at the perfect angle, a single highlighted line cast across his bowed head. And then there was Sam, a small smile playing across his lips, something so perfect about a quiet moment between the two of them.
AJ saw it through the viewfinder and took the shot. The small click didn’t disturb Tom but he caught Sam glancing over, turning that soft smile on him instead, their eyes no longer separated by a lens. AJ grinned teasingly in return and tried not to get carried away, imagining a thousand other snapshots from the future.
A crisp autumn day.
They went walking in a local park early one morning, all of them but Tom complaining about the time. It was deserted when they got there, only a few of the keenest dog walkers calling out to their pets in the distance. The grass was beaded with dew and the air caught their breaths in dancing white clouds.
Tom and Luke walked ahead of them on the path, the latter taking familiar, skipping steps to keep up with Tom’s stride. Every time AJ stopped to take a photograph of the leaves that had started to turn, Luke would complain he was cold and bounce on the balls of his feet until Tom coaxed him to start walking again.
Sam had been hanging back, hands in his pockets as he watched AJ at work. When he was sure they were alone, he’d wrap a hand around AJ’s arm as they walked along, his shoulder offering some warmth against the cool morning air. AJ felt relaxed despite Sam’s forwardness in public. There was something about the calm he exuded, a confidence that AJ didn’t have but could take on as his own if Sam was there to do it first.
Luke and Tom were more hesitant. They walked with a respectable, friendship-level of distance between them. Once or twice, Tom’s gloved hands flexed at his sides but he never reached out for Luke’s.
“Have you not taken enough pictures of leaves yet?” Sam asked amusedly the next time they stopped. AJ turned the camera on him without changing any of the settings, far too close to his face to take anything good. Sam pulled a stupid face anyway and AJ laughed, looking forward to deciphering the blurry mess he would surely be left with when he looked later.
“So photogenic,” he teased, glancing over when Sam bumped their arms together, looking as happy as AJ could remember.
“What about those two?” Sam nodded ahead of them. “Not photogenic enough for you?”
“I like taking pictures when people are comfortable,” AJ replied, not meaning to be profound about it but finding himself looking at Luke and Tom again, the boundaries between them tangible. “They come out best when the people are acting natural – at ease.”
“Huh,” Sam said under his breath, recovering a mischievous expression within a few seconds, “That might be the deepest thing you’ve ever said.”
“I – object to that,” AJ protested jokingly. His eyes snapped in front of them again when he heard Luke laughing loudly. It was impossible to tell what Tom had done to provoke the reaction – probably not much, given Luke’s track record for losing his composure with very little convincing – but it had kicked the two of them into a calmer version of themselves for an instant.
Luke rocked his head against Tom as he laughed, the other man wrapping an arm around his back, just for a second. A second was all AJ needed though. Another moment frozen in time.
They visited Luke in Spain one summer. It was a trip filled with rich tones and bright sunlight, a feast for AJ’s overactive mind. He relished the contrast of the busy Barcelona streets and the silence of Luke’s flat, leaving the older man bemused as he walked around the apartment and took photos of peeling window frames; a stack of books at awkward angles; the remains of a cobweb flickering in front of the whirring air conditioner.
There were photos of them too – he was taking more and more as they settled into their new dynamic. Tom cooking in the kitchen as Sam and Luke watched on, both sat up on the kitchen counters, their legs and arms brushing subconsciously. Sam caught laughing at something stupid one of them had just did, this time in focus. Luke leading the way down the street, excited to be showing them around his home.
The same contrasts existed there too – how they were in private and in public. The creases left in the bedsheets after four people had slept there. The three of them organised into stupid poses in front of one of the many landmarks Luke had taken them to see.
He let himself become the designated photographer, acting like a proper tourist and making sure that he captured enough memories for them all. It was back in the flat that he took the most though, catching fleeting expressions and partial images – a foot arched over the arm of the sofa; the side of a head caught mid-turn; two hands slotted together.
When he got home, the bright, busy photos were printed with enough copies for them all. Luke was watching him as he went through the rest, suddenly lifting his head from his previously relaxed position against AJ’s arm.
“You’re quite good at this,” he said eventually, smirking when AJ rolled his eyes. The expression mellowed after a while, softening completely when they reached the one of the joined hands. “You really are.”
Despite that, Luke didn’t ask for copies of the rest of them. He watched AJ tidy them away into a box that he kept in his desk, too strangely paranoid that someone would see them and ask questions if he just left them out in the open.
“Can I see them sometime?” he asked when AJ was sat back next to him. He almost seemed surprised that AJ had a photographic record of their relationship but his eyes were bright at the thought of seeing it all captured in a series of stills.
“You were there when I took them,” AJ teased, this time getting Luke to huff out a put-upon sigh instead.
“I want to see it how you did,” he replied eventually, eyes closed contentedly as he settled back into AJ’s side.
One day, he made the mistake of letting Sam and Tom loose with his favourite camera. They pestered him for almost an hour about how to use it properly, then spent at least ten minutes pretending to take it as seriously as he did, doing bad impressions and making each other laugh. AJ tried to frown at them, an expression that got caught on film in a photograph of questionable quality.
Tom was too impulsive to get a clean shot, pointing and shooting without taking a minute to focus properly. He didn’t think much about composition but AJ knew he’d get made fun of if he pointed that out so he bit his tongue.
Sam was a little better but he wasn’t good at taking it seriously. Another criticism that AJ wouldn’t be giving out loud.
They were having fun for the time being and the end results would be amusing when he saw them. He imagined the two of them would be disappointed with the disjointed, blurry images they’d end up with but there was always something to appreciate in the imperfections of art. They’d call him pretentious if he told them that as he presented them with the results of their hard work.
They’d also smile like proud schoolchildren though, pleased to have his approval.
When he did get the images developed, most of them were as indecipherable as he’d expected. Too dark or far too bright. A couple even had a thumb encroaching on the corner.
But there was one. He didn’t know which of them had taken it; as he so often did with them, they had caught him unaware. He wasn’t sure why it got his attention, just as compositionally confused as the rest of them but there was something there that made him look for a moment longer.
He was stood with his back to the camera. The background was crisp but he was just slightly out of focus.