Pan Estates
Based on this AU concept.
Pan Estates made an ideal location for photo shooting for a number of reasons. One, Max hated irregular noise distractions, and while Pan Estates was frequently noisy during its construction, she could hardly call it irregular. Two, she and Rachel could always acquire a full buffer of walls between them and the outside world when they had access to completely empty housing, meaning they could be as free with their photography as they wanted. Thirdly, and this was key: the construction workers could not give less of a fuck about the two of them being there if they even noticed they were, because none of them made enough money to stop resenting the Prescotts, and this was the smallest of rebellions. They got a little antsy if Nathan came along, but even then, they would hardly feel right kicking out the boss’s boss’s son without the possibility of getting into some shit for how they handled it.
So as they made their way into a house without an address, or even a street name, they knew precisely where they were going despite a lack of familiarity with this exact house. The living rooms were the heart of these ‘estates’, and they had a lot of clear wall space, which was exactly what Max needed for the photo shoot today.
As was pretty typical, there would be a lot of set up before they really got to start shooting, but seeing as Max actually came into this session with an idea of what she wanted, there was an exceptional level of preparation (for them) this time around.
Rachel carried in all of the photography equipment while Max came prepared with the extra stuff this time. Max unloaded her binder, filled with well over a hundred polaroids, labeled ‘Rachel portfolio 2012′, as well as three wheels of scotch tape, each of which looked partially used. Rachel set up the tripods and mounted up both of their cameras while Max got started, placing a roll of tape on the back of every single polaroid, at first just lying them face-down until Rachel was ready.
Once Rachel finished with the tripods, she began to take the polaroids and add them to the bare wall, following along with Max’s already meticulously-constructed pattern for them to be organized into. On the back of every photo sat three rows of notes, all underneath the dates they were taken. The first line only stated: Y, B, U, or R. Yellow, Black, Blue, or Red. These designated their original clusters and had helped Max organize them. Then, there was a R and C designation: Row and Column. Max had spent hours in her room trying to find the perfect 100 photos, declare their dominant color, pick her four primary colors to work with, then organize all of the photos in relation to each other in a way that seemed pleasing.
And, after perhaps half an hour, they were organized correctly, and Max was almost content. All they needed to do was adjust the light sources for the shots. The two broke out a long row of plug-in lanterns, and quickly realized that they had not previously communicated a solution to this problem.
“I put the pictures as high as I could reach.”
Max nodded.
“And we’re almost exactly the same height.”
Max nodded again, glad that she wasn’t made to explain in any mime-ier of a way.
“I fucked up.”
Max shrugged, searching in her bag for the heavier tape.
“Okay, but, I’ve got the solution. Let me stand on your back.”
A pointed side-glare from Max.
“What? C’mon, I’m like 110 pounds, you won’t even notice.”
Max’s eyebrow tilted down just enough so that Rachel would know precisely how much she disapproved.
“Aww, sweetie, come on - I know I messed up, but now the shot will look even better, I promise! It’ll only take a minute or two, tops.”
Max continued to give the look, but Rachel was only returning a big pout. And what was Max ever supposed to do against big, pink, pouting lips?
Max let out a long sigh, signaling her defeat.
Rachel wrapped her arms around Max’s shoulders with a little squee in the process, squeezing her and laying her head against her shoulder. “Thankyoubabe! I’ll make it perfect, don’t you even worry.”
About five minutes and a severe back ache later, Max had her lantern light source, and got to turn off the living room light, leaving only the rectangle of lights surrounding the rectangle of photographs. Yellow in one corner, black and blue adjacent to it, red in the opposite corner. Rachel wore a white button-up shirt in contrast to everything else, hanging over her short shorts that she changed into for the sake of the photo. Blonde hair swept to one side, placed over the yellow corner. Black dragon tattoo snaking its way up her leg, hovering over the black corner. Bluejay feather earring and neck bared with her hair pushed to the other side, her little sliver of blue. Red was the only missing element, but Max stripped off her own little red hairtie, and Rachel quickly wrapped it over her wrist.
They took many versions of the shot: Rachel over the portfolio of herself, Max’s portfolio. Facing Max, facing away from her. Arms crossed or at her side. Lantern lights or the original lights (that being the last set they took). And Max would take every picture with both her Polaroid as well as Rachel’s own digital, so Rachel could edit her own versions of the shots later for class. Just little directions, little changes, Max making sure never to inspect her shots before taking the rest, not until she was separated from her power to make more shots. She always contradicted herself when she had the power to change things. Consistency, image, theme - these things required that she trust herself. And taking portraits of Rachel was one of few things she trusted herself to do. She didn’t believe anybody could capture her quite like she could. And maybe she was right.
When that little shoot was done, they began to take it all down with much more ease than they had set it up, just peeling off the pictures, then the tape from the pictures. It wasn’t until nearly every picture had been laid out to be returned to the binder that Max paused her process, and looked up at Rachel, who was pulling all of the photos down.
Max swallowed, as she always did in preparation for those occasional moments she spoke. “Take one of me.”
Her model turned around from the wall, head cocked to the side for a moment at the unusual request. They took pictures together all the time, but Max was never the subject alone.
Max’s instructions were never spoken, but Rachel soon understood. Max removed more photos from the binder, those never designated for this project, and mixed them up with photos from the wall. Photos of Rachel, photos of Rachel and Max, photos of them and Nathan, them and Victoria Chase, or anyone else they partied enough with to be included in the photos.
Max lay down, and began to place the photos along the sides of her body, or over her neck, or anywhere. Rachel helped, covering and surrounding her in these photos, these memories, whether they could be remembered as anything other than a photo or not. Soon, Max was awash in a sea of them.
Rachel removed her camera from the tripod, and set up a shot.
Max smiled, but it wasn’t for the camera.
“Oh, Max,” Rachel sighed.
“Ooooh, Max,” Rachel groaned, but Max had no response but to continue as Rachel’s hips bucked, as if she would somehow throw Max off with her face still held so tightly against Rachel’s body.
Rachel’s body was rather still by the time that Max finally pulled herself back up along with Rachel, and pulled her legs up behind her model’s. The blonde girl turned on her side while Max brought them close enough to spoon, and Rachel hummed softly in response. As soft and as gentle as Max always was, Rachel appreciated how firm her kisses were along her shoulder, her back, her neck whenever they finished or had an interlude during sex. It tickled like a massage and focused the sensation all over her body into little points.
A minute later, though, there was a knocking on Rachel’s dorm room door, and it was not timid, either. It came accompanied by a grating, irate voice, “Hey, Amber! We can hear you and your little girlfriend you know, and we are supposed to be living in dorms, not a brothel!”
Rachel rolled her eyes, but was never one to take shit like that: “Yeah, Chase? Well I’m not a whore, so I’m pretty fucking sure these are still dorms! We might be in for a renovation if you keep drooling over Jefferson’s dick, though.”
“Oh what-the-fuck-ever, just shut it, won’t you?” There was a little more huff, but soon the cashmere-wearing growler returned to her side of the dorm, where there was perfectly no reasonable chance that she could hear these two.
“Hmph. She just wishes she had her own photographer - or model. Either one’d help her career, or help her with Jefferson. Pretty sure you and I, though, we’ve got him in the bag.” She snuggled back against Max as well as she could, but Max wasn’t kissing anymore - her fingers just drifted lazily over Rachel’s skin, which was rapidly growing colder, so she pulled her comforter over the two of them.
There was quite a pause before Max said something in response, not that Rachel had expected her to, but then she practically whispered, “I’m not just your photographer, right?”
Rachel rolled around, careful to make sure she didn’t pull up the sheets and allow heat to escape. She gave Max a long look, and the two of them were so close that Max could not effectively divert her gaze. So she just stared at Rachel’s forehead all the while.
Finally, Rachel let a pointedly incredulous dawn over her face. “No, sweetie. I love you. I was just talking about Victoria, not us . . . don’t worry. You’re mine, and I’m yours, okay?”
Max nodded, burying herself against Rachel’s chest. “Okay.”