Have Faith in Me

I walked onto the set, tying my brown hair into a bun.

“Is everything ready to go?” I asked one of the assistants that was helping set up.

“Yeah. We’re just waiting for your okay and then for the guys to show up,” he confirmed.

“Avenged Sevenfold, right?” He nodded. “All right. I’ll just go check everything.” I suppressed the urge to squeal as I turned. I had been a photographer for Revolver for about five years now and nothing would ever top the shoot I’m setting up for. I got the opportunity to shoot Avenged Sevenfold, my favorite band in the whole wide world. I had jumped on the offer when our editor-in-chief was looking for a photographer to shoot for the spread and the cover.

I walked around the set, checking everything was in good condition and ready to go.

“Rachel, they’re here!” someone called. I turned around and sure enough, the boys of Avenged Sevenfold were entering the studio space. M. Shadows, Synsyter Gates, Zacky Vengeance, and Johnny Christ walked in, looking around. I walked forward, suddenly shy to be presenting myself to these people that I had been a fan of for so long.

“Hey. I’m Rachel. I’ll be your photographer today,” I greeted, holding out my hand.

“Hey. I’m Matt and this is Zacky, Brian, and Johnny,” M. Shadows greeted, shaking my hand and flashing me his famous dimpled smile. I smiled shyly in return before shaking the rest of their hands.

“I’m basically leaving everything up to you guys. Unless there’s something I want to try, you guys can pose however you want. Screw around, be serious, laugh, whatever you want,” I told them as I led them to where a simple white background was set up.

“So if I wanted to pretend to be choking Brian or we wanted to pretend to beat up Johnny we could?” Zacky clarified.

I let out a small laugh as I said, “Yeah. The only thing I need you guys to do is at least throw in a couple of serious shots. Were you guys told anything about the pictures?”

“Nope. We were just asked if we’d do an interview for Revolver,” Brian answered.

“Well the idea we were going for was to show you guys as the bad asses that people perceive you as and as who you guys really are.”

“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s do this shit!” Johnny said. They went to arrange themselves on the set while I grabbed my camera. As soon as I took the first shot, I fell into the familiar rhythm.

“All right. Let’s do some singles,” I told them after awhile. Johnny stayed on the set as the rest walked off. “Turn your body a bit this way,” I instructed Zacky when I was shooting him a half an hour later.

“You make us feel like fucking models,” Brian chuckled.

“And you haven’t before?”

“Well most of the photographers are usually like, ‘Here’s your props. Now go do whatever you want.’”

“Well I do try to give some direction.” I took one more picture of Zacky. “All right. Brian, you’re up. Fedora off your head.” I continued to click away, occasionally pausing to tell him something.

“I’m starving,” Zacky whined.

“You’ll be done when Matt’s photos are done,” I assured as Matt took Brian’s spot. “Keep the aviators off,” I added when I saw Matt was putting them back on.

“Hurry up, Shadows,” Johnny ushered.

“And we are done,” I announced. I set down my camera. I felt the shyness return now that I didn’t have the camera to hide behind. “Thanks so much for doing t his,” I thanked breathlessly.

“Thanks for being a relaxed photographer. We’ve had a few that have sticks up their asses,” Matt joked as he shook my hand. I smiled meekly as I shook the rest of their hands. They tossed one last good-bye over their shoulders as they left.

“All right. Let’s clean up,” I told my crew.

***

“Hello?” I answered, picking up the phone. I was at the Revolver offices in my own little office going over the photos from the day before.

“Hey, Rachel. It’s Sheryl,” greeted the voice of one of our secretaries.

“Oh, hey, Sheryl. What’s up?”

“You busy at the moment?”

“No, why?”

“You got a visitor.

“Send whoever it is up.”

“Don’t you want to know who it is?”

“Nah. You know when not to send someone up. Besides, if I didn’t like them, I’d kill you.”

“You wouldn’t want to kill me when you see this sexy man…”

“Sheryl!” She laughed.

“I’ll send him up. Later.” I hung up and resumed looking at the photos. A few minutes later there was a knock on the door.

“Come in!” I called. The door opened.

“Hey,” a somewhat familiar voice greeted. It sounded like I’d heard it somewhere. I glanced back and there stood Matt, taking off his typical aviators. I immediately stood up.

“Oh, hi. What are you doing here?” I asked. He casually leaned against the wall.

“Well, I came in with a business offer,” he started. I raised an eyebrow, not trusting myself to talk. Who knows what would come out of my mouth when I’m star struck and shy. “The guys and I talked about it and we were wondering if you’d be interested on coming on tour with us and being our photographer.” I stared at him for a moment, taken aback by this offer.

“A-Are you sure? I mean, you haven’t seen my portfolio or anything to decide if you do want me to be your tour photographer.” Matt chuckled.

“Are you trying to talk me out of it?”

“No, no!” I quickly amended, causing him to chuckle again. “I mean. um, yeah. I’d be glad to come along as your tour photographer.” He grinned, smiling that dimpled smile that I had seen so many times in photos.

“Great. We’ll send over some information soon so you know what to expect.” I sank back into my chair as he left my office. M. Shadows was just in my office to offer me a job as Avenged Sevenfold’s photographer. I grinned widely when it finally hit me how big this was. This was going to be one hell of a job.