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Ivan had joined the film club as some extra elective to put on his already extensive resume. Teachers loved extracurriculars, but Ivan really couldn’t bother with something like drama, or such. Film studies, however, sounded relatively easy. After all, art was subjective, and thus, harder to get a poor grade in. A merely logical process of thinking.
Regardless, Ivan was a great student, leaving him with little free time between all the studying, and extracurriculars, and such.
But surprisingly enough, he actually started to enjoy film studies. It was interesting, learning about the angles, capturing the lighting, keeping something beautiful on film. Ivan hadn’t anticipated it, but it sparked his interest, for whatever reason. Ivan had grown to love the camera that he had, his camera roll much fuller than it used to be. Ivan never really considered himself much of an artist (that would be Till), but somehow, this kind of art had caught his attention.
Primarily, however, Ivan had grown fixated on taking pictures of Till.
The first time Ivan had taken a picture of Till was a distinct memory out of the many that he had. He remembered it ridiculously clearly; as he did most memories with Till. Such was the nature of Ivan.
It had been near the end of the day, and Ivan was merely wandering about to find something to take a picture of for his assignment. The sun setting made the sky beautiful, but that felt far too plain and unoriginal to hand in for his school project. Ivan had kept the camera at his side the whole time, still wandering for something good enough to take a picture of. (The funny part was that Sua probably took some picture of the sun first thing she left, and still got praise over it.)
The leaves crunched under Ivan’s shoes, wilting just a little in the fall weather. Nothing had caught his eye still. There was a park bench to his right, golden and brown leaves falling over it. To his left, a gazebo surrounded by some flowers that persisted in life despite the weather. And in front of him…
Abruptly, Ivan had stopped in the midst of his walking about. His eyes caught on a sight that certainly wasn’t any beautiful scenery, or landscape view with some aesthetic appeal. No, here was Till, seemingly just sitting around, tuning the strings of his guitar with a slight frown. He was clearly annoyed about it, maybe because he was tuning by ear? Ivan didn’t know that much about guitars, only what Till had told him. However, when Till did tell him about them, Ivan certainly listened diligently.
The faint light of the sun—something Ivan only remembered because it had been the backdrop to Till’s radiance—made his sharp eyes seem a little lighter, shining like some invaluable pendant. His hair, ruffled as ever, blew slightly along with the wind, and Till’s complete focus was on that guitar in his lap, not even glancing at Ivan once. And, god, was he a sight to see.
Ivan couldn’t have been more disgustingly, pathetically in love with him.
Ivan was not properly broken out of his staring spell, with no words said from Till, but the boy finally raised his gaze, eyes landing on Ivan in mild surprise at his presence. Slowly, delicately, Ivan had raised the camera up, and snapped a picture of Till, eyes slightly softer than usual because he was caught off guard, and no frown now.
After the quick flash of the camera, Till immediately huffed. Ivan could care less about his disapproval, for once. It might be ridiculous, but Till was the only thing Ivan could imagine to be picturesque enough to be deserving of being immortalized on film. Till told him to delete it quickly, and Ivan held the camera high up above his head, telling him a complete no.
That was that with that interaction.
The following…ten times, maybe(?) followed similarly as such. Ivan would take a picture, and Till would question what the hell he was doing, and Ivan never gave a clear answer. Eventually, though, Till stopped questioning it.
There was something delicate, and beautiful about it to Ivan. There was something disgustingly intimate about having somebody’s face captured through a camera’s lens, twisted in whatever expression. There was some way to pine through the capturing of soft light hitting Till’s face, an unspoken confession in all the pictures Ivan took.
Perhaps, art simply spoke the words that the mouth could not speak. Words of love that Ivan could not express himself, that still ached within him every time Till looked at Mizi too long. To some extent, every time Ivan got to click the camera and get another picture of Till, that ache was soothed.
Ivan mostly took pictures of Till now. When Till’s face was twisted into a scowl, Ivan wouldn’t hesitate to bring his little digital camera out and capture it with a teasing grin, which only worsened Till’s sulking state about being photographed in the first place. When Till was smiling, Ivan always felt conflicted about taking a picture or simply living in the moment.
Till would make comments about it once in a while, things like telling him to quit it, or whatever, but he never actually got that mad. Just begrudgingly tolerated it while Ivan stewed in unspoken affection. One might call Till his muse, but that also simply might be ridiculous.
Just there, in the curve of Till’s lips in a little smile in pictures that Ivan has caught, is where Ivan’s feelings must lay. The light caught in his eyes is the scripture to Ivan’s self indulgent fantasies that keep him up at night, laying awake. No, perhaps they plague him more than that. Delusional dreams that cloud his thoughts even in the morning light, even when he’s meant to focus on something like his studies.
Ivan could pine endlessly, hopelessly, one-sided, completely, for life, most likely. He doesn’t think anything could snap him out of his daze about Till. Till turned Ivan into such a blushing, giggling schoolgirl, it was some level of comical.
To any point of the matter, today was no different.
Ivan took his seat down beside Till at lunch with an easy grin at the shorter boy, who was sketching like he did often. Till immediately turned the page away from Ivan, probably drawing Mizi, but Ivan couldn’t even let that ruin his mood around Till today.
Till looked as entrancing as ever.
Ivan brought up the camera with a hint of mischief behind that smile, like he was trying to annoy Till just a little bit while admiring him wholeheartedly.
Click.
Till frowned instinctively, always much too easily embarrassed by Ivan’s actions. Which Ivan, of course, had only ever found ridiculously endearing.
This picture came out great, like always.
Till settled down and kept sketching, albeit shooting Ivan side glances for whatever reason. Ivan started to click through the camera roll, pictures of Till repeatedly showing on the screen of the digital camera. Ivan was entirely shameless about it, instead smiling quietly as he observed all his pictures of Till.
He almost sighed dramatically, dreamily. Till was so pretty it hurt.
Ivan would keep hiding his feelings in picture taking, though.