The landscape at Malin Head was as beautiful as it was stark. There was something incredibly grounding about looking out across an expanse of endless ocean. The rocky shoreline jutted into the squalling mass of grey and foam, as if fighting it off and pulling it back time and time again.
‘It’s breathtaking,’ Ewan said, as he stood and took in the vista. ‘Bleak, but breathtaking.’
‘If it’s good enough for Luke Skywalker,’ Jo replied, as she stepped from foot to foot and wished she had brought her comfy cardigan after all. Her Converse were damp from walking through the wet grass. She should’ve known to wear better shoes. Or at least, waterproof shoes. She’d probably end up with trench foot or something. Or have mushrooms grow between her toes. But what she absolutely wasn’t going to do, she decided, was complain to Ewan about it. He seemed so entranced by the sight around him, she didn’t want to do anything to take away from that moment. He was taking in everything, as if he could actually see the Millennium Falcon on the clifftops instead of just looking in the vague direction of where the filmmakers had built, and subsequently dismantled, a replica for the movie shoot.
‘I’m going to take a few pictures,’ he said and put his rucksack down on the ground.
Jo watched as he fished through his belongings and brought out a proper, old-school camera. The day before, he had just snapped pictures on his phone, but she observed him now as he stood and turned dials and changed lenses before snapping what lay before him from different angles.
‘Amateur photographer too?’ Jo asked.
‘Very amateur,’ he said with a smile. ‘But it’s a good hobby. My father loved to take photographs of everything. I think I was the most photographed baby in Scotland once upon a time. It was different then, of course. Photos weren’t taken just for the hell of it. There was no delete button.’
Jo had never owned a proper camera. She tried to remember when the last time was that she actually got any of the many snaps she took on her phone developed. It was years ago. For a generation that photographed everything, including their breakfast, lunch and dinner, there would be little physical evidence of it in the future. That suddenly felt very sad to her. She thought of all the photos hanging on the walls of her parents’ home. Jo with her brothers, with Noah, with all the various children who had come in and out of their lives over the years.
And those photos were only the smallest percentage of what existed. There was a big box in the attic filled with photo albums and envelopes filled with pictures. Images from every notable event, and plenty of ordinary days, in the history of the Campbell family.
It struck Jo that while she had countless pictures of Clara on her phone – pictures she had shared on Facebook and Instagram, she had only one physical image of her, framed on her bedside table. She vowed that when she went home she would rectify that. Even if it only meant printing out all the photos on her phone.
‘It’s the weight of the camera in your hand that I love,’ Ewan expounded. ‘That, and using film, not just your memory card. It makes you think about things differently. It gives some importance to what you’re doing. You have to really think about what way you want it to look. You don’t have an infinite number of chances.’
She nodded at him and laughed. ‘I think I’ll stick with my phone and multiple retakes. Not to mention filters. Instagram is a kind mistress at times.’ But her laugh was a nervous one. Once again Ewan was managing to unsettle her. Everything he said seemed to speak to her, it pulled her closer to her dream and reminded her that as with camera film, life did not have limitless chances for a redo.
‘I’m not against Instagram, but there’s no comparison, Jo. There’s no better filter than nature itself. Here, come and look.’
She felt her nerve ends tingle as she moved closer to him. It felt as if she was slipping further out of her comfort zone – a feeling that only grew as she got nearer to him.
‘The book I’m writing,’ Ewan said, as he passed her the camera and she felt the warmth of his hands envelop hers. ‘The protagonist is a photographer.’
She didn’t want to feel the weight of his camera, scared that she might drop it, or push the wrong button and over-expose his film, ruining all his shots, but she could hardly push it away.
‘McCreadie?’ Jo asked, her nerves a little rattled. She didn’t remember photography as being one of the TV inspector’s hobbies.
‘This isn’t a McCreadie book,’ Ewan said. ‘I need a wee break from him. This is something different. And my protagonist is obsessed with capturing images. He sees them in a way people don’t tend to these days. He looks for the detail. The things people blindly clicking and pouting don’t see. He becomes obsessed with those details. Obsessed with the minutiae of people’s lives. A bit too obsessed, you know.’
‘So he’s the bad guy?’ Jo asked, intrigued. So far Ewan had been very tight-lipped about his new book and Jo hadn’t felt in a position to push. She knew herself that the writing process was so fluid and changeable that the story evolved, so it was no surprise if Ewan wanted to hold back on the details while he was still working the story through in his own mind. That, and a part of her wasn’t totally convinced he saw her as an actual writer despite his friendly demeanour.
’That would be telling,’ Ewan said. ‘But he definitely has the potential to go either way.’ He paused and looked at her so intently that she felt her breathing slow and her heartbeat quicken. Just as quickly he looked away. ‘Anyway, there’s a significant strand of backstory set here and that’s why I want it to be authentic. He has to be as far removed from McCreadie as I can get him so I’m not accused of being a one-trick pony.’ He moved behind her. ‘Right, hold that camera up to your face and look through the viewfinder. Tell me if that looks different from looking at a phone screen.’
He stood so close to her that she could feel the warmth of his breath on the back of her neck, the presence of his body close to hers. But she forced herself to concentrate, to do as she was told, even if she did have to squint a little to get her eyes to focus. She could see the scene in front of her framed, the shafts of light from the breaks in the clouds.
‘Don’t just press the button on a whim. Think about the exact second you want to recall. You’ll feel it when it’s right.’
She thought about what he was saying. It could be applied to so much more than just snapping photos. He urged caution. It was the same premise she had lived with all her life. On the other hand, he’d told her when she felt things were right, she had to seize the moment. Click the button. Take the photo. The next moment might not be the same.
With her finger trembling over the shutter release button, she watched and waited until a bird, wings spread wide, swooped down into view. That was her moment. It wasn’t even as long as a second. She pushed the button, heard the satisfying click as the image was captured and the whirr as the film automatically wound on to the next frame.
She lowered the camera and looked at the scene which had already changed in front of her eyes. She only wished she could bring her picture up on a screen straight away and see if she had captured it just right.
‘You have to have patience,’ Ewan told her. ‘But I can guarantee that no matter what the physical print turns out like, you have that image burned into your mind for now. And that’s not a bad thing.’