We all stopped smiling

and slouched in our seats

pretending we had never been up straight

in the first place,

and we pretended to think

about rational things

as one by one, we muttered excuses

and shuffled away,

and I thought that

by staring at the carpet

I had willed them all to disappear.

Ominous, flashing lights in the rear view mirror resembled the flickering glow of the cherry at the end of her cigarette, crackling with illumination as she caged the nicotine vice in her lungs behind the bars of her cartilaginous ribs. She slowed her car to a crawl and pulled over as she took another drag off her smoke and killed the engine. With the head gripped between her fingers, she reached for her cell phone on the passenger seat as she rolled the window down with her free hand. Three minutes felt like three days as she waited and wondered the cause of her coming under the grip of the law.

Hanging in the stale, summer air were the loose rings of smoke, dissipating slowly from her presence, but quickly replaced as she inhaled another puff in hopes of taking her noncompliant anxiety prisoner. Smoking was how she’d always calmed her nerves and as the image of the black-leather-shoed officer approaching her door drew nearer, she drew a deep breath, pursing her lips as she inhaled; coaxing her nerves into a nicotine fog. Each of his footsteps echoed as an armament of purpose and authority against the blank brick wall of the unknown. New to town, but not naive, she swiped the home-screen on her phone where her thumb quickly found the camera app, followed by a swipe to the right to move the photo function to the red ring marked “record”. Cold ashes fell before the feet of the lawman as he began with his directives.

*******************

Breaking News.

Bold, red and white headlines flashed across television screens displaying the image of the young woman who had been arrested for failing to use her turn signal and refusing orders to extinguish her cigarette. A single snapshot of one’s daughter who had been found three days after being incarcerated, lifeless, hanging in her jail cell. One final record of a moment in time, she, dressed in orange (whose once youthful, bronzed-mocha skin was a shade of raw-umber mixed with blanched-gray) posed for her mugshot.

I (along with countless others) couldn’t look at Sandra Bland, who appeared to be inhaling and holding her breath, and see the blank stare of her dark-ringed eyes looking through me without asking the question, ”Was that photo taken after she had died?”.

A snap

a flutter

of camera shutters

A smile

turned frowns

eyes look down

Which filter to choose

With likes to lose

And hundreds of views

Silly worries youth ooze

the camera flash.

so bright.

her lashes fluttered,

trying to blink

away the colorful

blobs dancing on

her irises.

her cheeks.

so sore.

she had had

to smile for

longer than she

had ever before

in her life.

she wished

the photographer

had gotten it together

sooner and had

stopped taking

blurry shots.

she hated that

when photos

were taken,

she couldn't

be her true

self.

because photos

are forever,

and who wants

to be broken

forever?

A mere three days ago, my world had changed forever. My mom announced her decision to file for divorce. My dad claimed he wouldn't let it happen. He was convinced he would somehow change her mind. But it was done. This wasn't a sudden decision. Even if he couldn't see it, I could.

My father had, of course, reached out to his own mother for support. Today, my grandmother had shown up unannounced with old photo albums, depicting various points in time in my childhood. I pressed myself against my closed bedroom door, listening intently. I was desperate to know what was happening but afraid to be pulled into the fray. I could hear them talking as Grandma flipped through the albums.

"Look, here. You always looked so happy."

"But a picture never tells the whole story. Anyone can fake it for a picture. Like this one here, I specifically remember that day. I had the kids all gathered and waiting. He was refusing to show up, saying it was stupid to take the picture. He had wanted us to stay home that day. When he finally showed up and you asked where he had been, he blamed me in front of his whole family saying that I just sprung the picture on him and that he was always waiting for me. That was how it was every time. That's how it has been for 17 years."

She was right. The pictures only showed a brief moment in time. It didn't show the struggles leading up to it, or the fights on the way home. It didn't show that after the picture was taken, he drifted away again, leaving Mom to wrestle four kids into coats and herd them towards the car. It didn't show the uncomfortable ride home where he complained the whole time that going there was stupid. It didn't show that he complained that she had spent too much money on Christmas again that year. It didn't show that the while he complained about her Christmas purchases, he spent his time watching porn online instead of looking for a new job.

Each picture showed a lie. After the picture was done and the audience was gone, the story changed. There was always a fight in progress, an argument, a battle. In the picture of him smiling holding a new little baby, no one would know that he later told that baby's mother that he wouldn't give her money for diapers. She should have planned better for her maternity leave. The diapers were her expense. In the picture of us on vacation, no one would know that she had to save up all of her own money, while still paying for school supplies, lunches, and bills, while his money went into a separate account. No one would know that he left after the picture, basically spending our whole family vacation on his own.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, but how can that be when pictures are silent? Pictures can be faked, just like a happy marriage. Each picture showed something different, but they never told the whole story, the true story.

Can you truly judge a life based on a picture?

@AJAY9979

Two photographs, taken a decade apart, almost identical in appearance, although one is in a living room, the other in a pool. The subject: a man and a woman. In both photos, they are gazing upon the other’s lips, lids half-closed, smiles broad, heads slightly tilted, as if leaning towards the other. The man’s right hand is under the woman’s face, index finger under her chin as if gently pulling her closer.

However, even beyond the setting, the differences are profound.

In the first photo, the subjects were unaware of the photographer. The photo was taken as they were joyfully lost in the other. Immediately subsequent to the photo being snapped, perhaps he pulled her forward, perhaps she leaned, without question, they shared an innocent kiss; romance was budding, love was stirring. Marriage and happily ever after were waiting in the wings.

In the second, they were posed, attempting to recapture the image of the first photograph. But everyone knows, nothing stays the same. They leaned, they smiled, but rather than the joy of new love in their eyes, if one looked carefully, one would have seen anger and not a little fear. The picture taken, smiles evaporated and the man flicked the woman’s chin with suppressed violence as they turned away from one another. The photographer promised photos by the end of the day while a child leaped from the side of the pool into the woman’s arms; an innocent witness to things he did not understand but felt instinctually. He wrapped arms and legs around the woman, and they swam to safer waters.

Even now, decades later, just looking at the photographs, the woman has a visceral response: rapture when gazing upon the first, modulated terror with the second.

After the picture was taken, Mr. Krass printed the picture out, put it in a frame, and hung it next to the others. Then, he made sure that he played the part of a perfect host. He provided humble, but sufficient accommodations for his guests tonight. Krass reminded everyone of their early start for tomorrow morning. The five guests would need a good night’s rest.

The next morning, Mr. Krass awakened before the crack of dawn, prepared a meager breakfast, and gathered all the tools that a digger would need.

This group was made up of a variety of personalities. There was a grotesque figure who was built to work long hours, a couple taking an adventure before their marriage, a barber and a bartender. All were excited and bright-eyed and ready for their hands-on field trip.

Mr. Krass always had but one intention when he purchased his plot of land in the middle of nowhere. It had been his dream to mine the cave on his property to prospect for gold. He decided to play hosts to five guests at a time and during their stay, he would provide the entertainment. Krass arranged trips for his guests to go “gem-panning.” No one would know that his true intentions were to use his guests as miners who would dig until their last breath. They would never again be seen-from the weakest to the strongest, one by one, they’d give out.

Dismayed, Mr. Krass, was not; for, after the demise of each guest, he would act as host until....his endeavor was realized.

On yet another “gem-panning” adventure, things changed. Before leaving out for the adventure, one guest, Manual replaced the picture taken with another that excluded him. During his digging, Manual recognized a sparkle in the mine. He was convinced that it was gold and determined, he would not give out. He would find his way back to the cottage with bags full of gold and no sign of Mr. Krass.

"Just pretend you're fucking happy," Jessie had snipped.

I had sat on the couch glaring at her with my arms crossed. "Just because my dad married you and you tricked him into thinking your heathens are his doesn't mean that I have to like you."

"Feeling's mutual, Georgianne. But it's a picture. You don't want to look like the only fat kid in the Holocaust."

I had flipped her the bird right as my dad walked in. He looked at Jessie, the camera, then at me. "Baby girl, please just smile for the damn picture."

"Fine!" I yelled at him.

Jessie put the camera to her face and I made the creepiest smile I could. She put the camera down again. "Jake!"

"Georgianne Elizabeth Fowler! Smile for the goddamn picture like you mean it."

I huffed, smiled for the 0.2 seconds it took for Jessie to take a picture then stormed to my room. My dad started to yell at me again, but my door was already slammed before he could. I plopped on my bed and looked at my mirror. Picture frames covered my dresser. some of my mother, who died in a car crash, smiling while she held me. Others of my brother who got taken by the state and my grandmother stirring pots with a jolly smile on her face. They were all lies. My mother enjoyed drugs more than being a mother, my little brother was a sickly kid whose parents didn't give a damn about him, and my grandmother put baking over everyone in her life.

In a fit of rage, I stood, grabbed the picture frames, and began to smash them one by one. Glass sprayed all over the floor and the wood splintered on impact. My grandmother's hand was severed from the pot she was cooking. My brother was torn apart. My mother flipped and flipped and landed somewhere just under the door. Friends I never talked to anymore, my dad with his mullet and a cigarette dangling from his mouth, me holding the little sister I couldn't let myself grow attached to, summer camps, birthday parties, their wedding that I didn't approve of from the beginning, our new house, my little brother a few days before the state found out about how our mom was treating us and took us away--

"Georgianne!"

"What!" I yelled, hurling a picture of my mom and her then-boyfriend (my brother's father) holding him.

"What the fuck are you doing!" Jessie yelled as she nearly dodged the picture, which hit a wall in the hallways and broke.

"I hate these pictures! I hate everything!" I screamed.

"What's going on in here? Why are you breaking shit!" my dad chimed in.

"Why do you care!" I screamed at him. "You let her mock me with these goddamn pictures that I don't even want and now you give a damn what's happening with me? Fuck you! Fuck both of you!"

"Georgianne--" my father said in his trying-to-stay-calm voice.

It was too late. As soon as he walked towards me, I pushed past him, slid between him and Jessie, then bolted out the door.

A lit cigarette in your mouth.

The sun setting behind you.

Your hair, longer than mine, dancing in the wind.

A quick flutter of the camera.

I knew as soon as it was taken, it would be the only photo of you I’d ever take.

The only piece of you I’d get to keep.