They Call Me Dani

I'm writing this in the evening, on my laptop, at the Unnamed Studio.

Tara asked me to bring a camera to the studio for Yunie to fix.

Things have been going well between us. We've been hanging out a decent bit, as friends. Things still haven't quite escalated past that (don't rush me okay). I stopped by and Yunie wasn't there. Neither was Misha or really anyone else that usually hangs around. It was just Hunter.

"Yunie around?" I asked.

"Nah, haven't heard from kyr today. What've you got there, maybe I can help."

"Just some old camera" I held up the camera. It was a... well, it was an old camera. Some sort of FujiFilm deal. I don't know much about cameras. "The uh, camera part is broken."

"Let me take a look, I'm not bad with cameras." I shrugged and handed the camera off to them. They took a quick look at it, twisted some knobs, pressed some buttons. They seemed to figure things out pretty fast, and before long they were popping the thing open with a screwdriver.

"This is Tara's camera isn't it?"

"Er... yeah."

"I always liked this camera. It's a Fuji X-E1" He said, mostly to himself, as he poked around inside. "Not the newest camera, but still a beauty. I'm glad to see Tara trying to get back into photography"

"Yeah, she mentioned she used to be pretty into it.

"Fuji really had their stuff figured out around this period. The color profile on this thing was stellar, and that sleek black and silver design..." Hunter paused for a moment, looking up to face me. "Just so you know, whatever happened between Tara and Misha, that's there business. I have no beef with Tara. She was always cool to me."

I nodded. "I appreciate you saying that. I feel like... pretty much everyone has had some strong opinions about me hanging out with her."

"Fuck em" Hunter said, turning their focus back to the camera. "Only opinions that matter here are hers and yours. What do you want from her?"

"I don't think I can answer that one in polite company"

Hunter laughed. "Well hey, whatever it is... you can't stress other opinions, right? Like, personally I always thought you and Azura would end up together. But I don't write your story, yeah?" He jerked his screwdriver and the camera's body popped back into place. They held it out to me.

I took the camera from them with a nod. "Did you fix it?"

She nodded. "And hey, fuck Misha, fuck Yunie, hell, fuck me even. You know what you want, that's all that matters."

I smiled, sliding the camera into my pocket. "Thank you. Seriously, I think I needed to hear that."

"Anytime! And hey, if she shoots you down, stop by later, I make a great rebound."

I gave a whiff and a smile, and turned to leave. I stopped abruptly though, and turned back to them. "Seriously? Me and Azura?"

Hunter shrugged. "You're hot and dumb, she's weird and smart. Seemed like a natural fit."

"I... actually, yeah, fair enough." He laughed, I gave him a courteous wave, and sat to write this blog post before heading out to meet Tara.

In a lot of ways, Hunter was right. It was silly of me to put so much stock in other peoples' opinions. Yet here I was, still thinking back to Cadence's ominous warning. I recognize in this moment that I could probably be in Tara's apartment right now, still wearing the clothes I had on two days ago... we could be smoking a cigarette on her fire escape, the smell of sweat and pheromones almost drowning out the smell of liquor... We could have disappeared off of the face of the earth for a full week together... the only thing holding that back is me...

Hunter was right, I am hot and stupid.