Page 72 of Tilly in Technicolor
I don’t really know what to say, because the emotions swirling through me feel important, but words don’t come easily.Instead, I lift my camera to my eye, capturing Tilly’s gaze in profile as she looks with something like delight at a door that reminds her of the color of my hair. The click makes her turn.
“I wasn’t ready,” she says, scrunching up her face but unable to hide that smile that comes so easily to her.
I take another picture.
“Ollie, oh my God, these are going to be terrible. Stop it,” she says, reaching toward me. I dodge her hands and snap a few more.
She’s laughing hard now, and I know every single one of these photos will be masterpieces.
“You’re the worst,” she says at last, choosing a new tactic and slapping her hands over her face to hide from me. I take a few snapshots of that, too.
“I’m sorry,” I say, letting my camera hang around my neck. “My finger slipped.”
“Four hundred times? Sure.” Tilly reaches out and gives me a playful shove. “Let’s get serious and take some for Ruhe.”
“Right. Because ‘serious’ is the first thing that comes to mind when I think of you.”
“I’m sure ketchup is a close second,” Tilly says, and a burst of laughter erupts from me. Tilly turns, looking at the door once again. “We could do something where it looks like I’m pushing it open,” she says, placing her hands against the wood.
“I like that idea,” I say, holding up my camera and focusing the lens. Her nails are a bit obscured in the position she has them in.
“A bit to your right,” I instruct. Tilly leaves her hands firmly planted on the door and shifts the rest of her body sharply to the right until she’s making an awkward angle.
“Not your legs. Put your hands—no, not there. Over a bit to—” I put the camera down, moving to her and gently wrapping my fingers around her wrists. A sharp dart of energy shoots up my arm and echoes down my spine. Tilly looks at me like she felt it, too.
Carefully, trying not to create any more… sparks, I move her hands and place them against the wall so they’re tilted to the side. Her mismatched rings glint in the sun, the small stones and gold creating a glow across her skin.
I stand there, staring, forgetting that I’m supposed to be doing anything but looking at the graceful lines of her fingers, the way the light slopes up her arms and kisses her cheeks. She’s… she’s…
Tilly is everything.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, her tone quiet.
“Nothing,” I say, stepping away from her. “Sorry.”
I hold up my camera and click the shutter button a few times then adjust my angles. Everything in me feels shaky, like my body turned itself inside out.
“I think we got a few good ones,” I say past my dry throat.
“Noice,” Tilly says in a goofy voice. “Wanna keep exploring?”
I nod, and it’s all the encouragement she needs to start moving.
We walk for a while in comfortable silence, the day crisp and clear, offering perfect views of our hilly desert landscape. Eventually, Tilly veers off the main road onto a dirt path that heads down into a valley.
“Where are you going?” I ask, trailing after her.
“I don’t know!” Tilly says, giggling as she picks up speed down the hill. Dust kicks up at her ankles and it looks like, at any moment, she’ll leave the ground altogether. Fly away.
“We don’t have a map. And service is spotty at best,” I continue, pulling my phone out of my pocket and glancing at the low bars in the upper corner as I try to keep pace with her.
“That’s what makes it an adventure.” Tilly glances at me over her shoulder, and her grin is so full and vibrant, I almost trip over my own feet.
At the base of the hill, she stops running, and we both work to catch our breath between laughs.
“Come on,” she says at last, gripping my wrist and tugging me after her as if I won’t follow wherever she goes. “I think I hear water.”
“Water?” I nearly shriek. “What do you plan to do if we find water?”
