The Photographer - h.s

Getting bigger

Victoria

I took a long drag and passed the joint across the table to Sophia. It was a beautiful morning, it wasn't too hot yet, and the air smelt fresh after the rain we had gotten from the previous couple of days.

"So...how's Ben?" Sophia asked Mackenzie, who stood leaning against the banister of the balcony. She then took a drag and shrugged.

"It's going really well. We're coming on 2 months this week." She said, taking a second drag and passing it to me. "How's Courtney? How's the new place?" She asked is return.

"Things are really good. We just got fully unpacked, it only took a whole month to do." She said sarcastically and shrugged, "I think she wants to get a cat." She said, causing me to laugh.

"You don't even like cats, I had to practically get down on my knees and beg you to watch over Arlo while I was away on tour." I said and she nodded and pointed to me.

"You're not wrong, but you should've seen how excited she got when she saw someone at her office had a cat thats about to have a litter. She told her she could get first pick if we wanted one." It was nice to see the way Sophia was bending for Court, she had never been the type to fully commit like this before and just seeing the way she loves her and the way she's bettering herself since... it makes me feel so proud of her.

"And you," Mack said, turning the focus to me, "how're things with Harry?" She asked, wiggling her eyebrows and smirking. I rolled my eyes and waved her off.

"Things are good. We're still in this little bubble, no one knows besides you guys, and Mitch and Sarah. It feels like our little secret, there's no outside pressure, there's not some big spotlight on it. We can just be us without the feeling of being watched by everyone." When you're with someone who's in such a huge spotlight, it's hard to have those small things stay just between you two. Running errands together, taking a walk, going out for dates... it's all being watched and it's all being picked apart movement by movement. We're keeping this just ours for as long as we're able. "It still feels kind of... fragile, in a way. It's like, just because we're in such a good place now, it doesn't magically make everything that happened disappear. It's always kinda just, in the back of my head I guess."

"That's totally valid. He really fucked up, and you were going through an extremely difficult time, that definitely just doesn't go away." Mackenzie said and came and took a seat at the table with Soph and I.

"I don't want to play devils advocate or anything, but he does really love you, and when you left... he burned just about every bridge he had, he was a wreck. He was good at hiding it just enough, and he never wanted to admit it, but he went off the deep end. But when I tell you, he worked so hard to crawl back out of that hole. No one made it easy for him either, but he started seeing a therapist over video calls while we were on tour, he stopped drinking and started focusing solely on work and just keeping his mind busy. I'm not saying that he was the victim in this at all, he made all of his choices, and I can't say he won't make big mistakes in the future but, he does love you, and he is genuinely trying his best to make sure you can trust that." Mackenzie added and I sat back in my chair and took a deep breath.

"I still think he's an idiot." Sophia added, and mackenzie and I laughed.

"Oh no, he's such an idiot." Mack agreed.

"I guess, I do feel slightly bad for some of the things I said to him. I'm not saying I regret saying them, I just feel a little, tiny bit sorry for how mean I was about some of it." Sophia added and I raised my eyes brows and nodded at her with a small smile.

"Wow Soph- are you feeling okay? Do you have a fever? Come here, let me feel your forehead." I said and reached over the table as she swatted my hand away as the three of us laughed. I took a glance at my phone and noticed the time, Sarah wanted to meet me at the studio at noon, she said she wanted my opinion on some things.