Picture Perfect

With his camera at eye-level, Jon was poised to take the perfect picture, he turned around hoping to find that perfect shot.

With nothing immediately standing out to him, he brought the camera down and carried on walking. To this day, he isn’t sure why, but at that moment, his heart began to race, his palms began to sweat, his stomach fluttered, in a way very reminiscent of nervousness.

…But he had nothing to be nervous about. Or did he just not know it yet?

As he rounded the corner, in the near distance, he saw a fountain, it was beautiful. The water shot up at all different angles, the sprays catching the light perfectly. He approached the wonderful thing, eyes wide in astonishment.

He brought his camera up once more, walking around to the opposite side, he couldn’t help but fall silent. The sun was setting just behind the fountain, the golden glow falling over everything, just as he was about to take the picture, a young woman sat down on the side of the fountain. She was wearing a yellow, floral summer dress that fell just above her knees. She wore no shoes and she sat with a hand at either side, the look that was in her eyes conveyed feeling of deep thought. It was the perfect shot.

Without even thinking, Jon took the picture, and with one click he had the picture saved into the memory of his camera.

Trying not to stare at it, he lifted his head to see the girl smiling over at him.

“I’m sorry, I hope you don’t mind…” he trailed off, realising how creepy this must have looked to her.

“No, it’s fine don’t worry. Do you mind if I have a look?” she asked, her voice thinly coated with a Belgian accent that Jon couldn’t help but find adorable.

“Yeah, of course,” he smiled, sitting down next to her and showing her the picture on the small LCD screen of his camera.

She moved closer to him to get a better look. “It’s beautiful,” she breathed, looking at the background of the picture.

“Yeah, it is…” he whispered, meaning something completely different to her.

“How rude of me, I’m Ine.” She offered her hand to him.

“Jon.” He smiled, trying not to stare at her beauty.

“Nice to meet you Jon,” he couldn’t help but smile at the way she said his name, like it was the first time she’s ever said the word. “So what are you doing here Jon?”

“Well, I’m on vacation,” he said, wanting to go on, but not saying anything more because he didn’t want to risk sounding stupid in front of…Ine.

“In Belgium?” she asked, very obviously surprised.

“Yeah, it’s beautiful here, I really like it.” he didn’t do anything more than smile at her.

“You’re right, this is a beautiful country.” She agreed with him, the mere sound of her voice making his stomach flutter, as girly as it sounds.

“Now, this might sound either really forward or really creepy – maybe even both.” Jon chuckled to himself, “but would you mind if I took some more pictures of you? I mean proper shots, nothing weird!” he said quickly, backtracking.

“Really? You want to take pictures of me?” she asked bewildered.

“Yeah, you’re beautiful,” he said sweetly.

“Well then of course you can Jon,” she agreed, knowing it wasn’t very wise seeing as she’d known the man for a maximum of fifteen minutes, but she didn’t care.

“Just so you know, I’m a photographer. This is what I do for a living, these are probably going to go in a show of my work when I get back home.” Jon mused.

“Great, where is ‘home’ exactly?”

“I come from Chicago in the US.”

“Oh, I know that place, I’ve always wanted to visit there.” She told him shyly, her light brown hair falling in front of her face delicately. There it was, another shot, quickly he took it. Because she was looking down at her feet, he wasn’t even sure Ine knew he’d taken it, that’s what made it ten times better.