Kids made it really hard to stay in a bad mood or wallow in sadness.
Which made Shayna feel even more grateful to be working on this assignment. She and Andy had been at the Littles Celebration for about two hours, and she’d met about half the people on her preliminary contact list and gotten dozens of shots. Everyone was friendly and helpful and only too happy to talk about their experiences with the organization. Plus, it was a gorgeous day, so they’d decided to host the whole thing outside on the rec center’s grounds.
Everything was going great. Shayna had even been able to set aside some of her worry about Billy when she’d mentioned to Mo by text that she thought something was wrong with him. Mo said he’d go over to their house before she got home to check on Billy and then he’d be there to help her move when she was ready.
That was all as good as it could be. Which really wasn’t saying much.
She was setting up to take some video when Barry came up and peered into her bags.
“Whatcha doing?” he asked.
She pulled out the D850. “This is my favorite camera, and it takes both photographs and pretty amazing video. I thought I’d shoot some of the latter and put together a little movie for the Big Brothers website or Facebook page.”
“Oh.” He watched her like a hawk. Shayna smiled. She easily remembered how fascinated she’d been by cameras at a pretty young age, too. “Are cameras expensive?”
“There’s a pretty big range, actually. You can get a high-quality compact with 25x zoom for about two hundred dollars. Or you can spend a couple thousand dollars or more on a DSLR, which is just a digital single-lens camera as opposed to one with film, that has all the bells and whistles.”
“Huh,” Barry said. “I hope I can have a camera someday.”
“You will. Know how I know?” she asked him as she zipped her cases closed again.
?
??How?”
“Because you already know this is something that interests you. And I believe you can do anything you put your mind to.”
He grinned, and that smile did a ton to make her feel better. Kids had a way of putting your problems into perspective, that was for sure.
After that, Shayna had an assistant for the next thirty minutes while she grabbed video of kids jumping in the moon bounce and playing games, of families gathered around tables heaped with food, of toddlers dancing without a care in the world in front of the DJ’s table, and of the event signs rustling in the breeze. She’d get it all edited into a forty-five-second spot in between other things at work this week.
When she was done, she found Andy with his notebook closed and recorder turned off just sitting and enjoying the event. “Ready?” he asked.
“I got everything I need,” she said. “And had a lot of fun besides.”
They said their good-byes and walked out to their cars together.
“I’m down the block there,” Shayna said, pointing past a line of utility repair trucks that had taken up a lot of the street when she’d looked for parking earlier.
“Here, give me one of your bags and I’ll walk you down. I wanted to touch base with you on a few scheduling things.”
“Sure, no problem,” Shayna said. “But you don’t have to carry anything. How did you feel today went?” They started down the block, then crossed after the last of the utility trucks.
“Better than I expected. Everyone was very open. It was clear that Big Brothers Big Sisters did a great job laying the groundwork and explaining why the article would be important to the program. This feature is almost going to write itself.” He smiled.
“Bet it’s nice when that happens.”
“So nice.”
They reached her car, and Shayna popped her trunk. “Did you have some interviews you wanted me to accompany you on?”
Andy nodded. “Three so far confirmed for next week, but I expect two others, too.”
“Okay. Let me just put my bags in here…” She lowered everything off her shoulders and retrieved her phone from her back pocket. “And I’ll pull up my calendar on my…” She frowned. “Do you feel that?”
Andy barely had a chance to react to her question.
The world exploded around them.