"Who took these?" he said, peering closer at the framed black and white photographs. They were all over her walls. There was one of her, in a spaghetti strapped sundress, standing at the bottom of the Eiffel Tower, laughing. There was one of another girl, jumping off of a swing, stopped in mid-air. Rows of pictures in small black frames.

She came out of the bathroom, her head tilted so she could put in an earring.

"I did. Well, most of them."

"Seriously?"

She came and stood next to him, looking up. "Yeah. In boarding school, we needed Fine Arts credits, and I chose photography, and I loved it. Granted, I have to develop my pictures in the bathroom, it's a lot of fun."

"These are amazing," he said, pointing to the row of shots looking up the sides of buildings from the ant eye view.

She blushed, looking down. "It's nothing. Besides, I don't do it anymore."

He turned to look at her, "No?"

"No."

She went to her closet to pull out a pair of shoes so they could leave. It was seven; they had slept for over five hours. He had nearly dragged her out of bed, and even then, she had put up a fight.

"Remind me to never let you drink again," he had told her. "You are the worst hung over person I have ever known."

"Why don't you do it?" His voice snapped her back to reality.

"Oh, you know, this and that." She pulled a hand through her wavy hair.

He crossed his arms over his chest, turning to look at her. "No, I don't know. If you love something like this, why stop?"

She motioned her hands in front her frantically, silently willing herself to keep her cool. His face was a mirror of the disappointment she had seen so many times in her parents.

"I don't need this from you. Can we just not talk about it? Can't we just leave?" She pulled a jacket over her tee shirt and grabbed her purse. "Please?" she pleaded.

He opened her bedroom door and motioned for her to exit the room.

The car ride to wherever they were going – he hadn't told her – was unbearable. He was silent, angry at her for whatever she had, or hadn't, done. She was tired, exhausted of people's disappointment. Did it ever stop? It was so consistent, so there. It pressured her, suffocating, a ceiling closing on her.

"Logan…"

"What?" he snapped and she recoiled.

"Never mind," she said softly, resting her cheek on the window, the cold penetrating through her skin. She kneaded her hands in her lap, desperately thinking of something to say. It had never been this silent, this awkward, this empty before. Usually there's an air of lightness, a casual sarcastic banter going back and forth. A feeling of lust and desire between the two, though never acted upon. Except once, she thought bitterly.

"I," she started, and he turned to her expectantly. "I don't do it anymore because…when I told my parent's I wanted to be a photographer, not a writer or a lawyer, do you know what they said?"

He was scared to know the answer. The mere idea of someone depleting her dreams, of minimizing them to ashes was enough to piss him off.

She continued without a beat. "They told me to get over it. Hayden's don't become photographers. My mother laughed. They said they wouldn't support me when I ended up on the street with no money. They said it was 'poor man's job'. That it would never satisfy me. I'm going to prove them wrong, but while I'm here, I just don't take pictures around people."

She picked up her purse from the floor of the car, and he watched her out of the corner of his eyes. She turned it upside down and he began to protest, when he saw what she was actually dumping out. Canisters and canisters of film.

"When my parent's go out of town, I spend the weekend developing pictures," she said, with a smile on her face. "Happy?"

He chuckled. "At least you're going to keep doing it."

She nodded, dropping the little black cans back into her purse. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Can I stop you?"

She felt obligated to shoot him a look. "Well, two questions. One, where the hell are we going?"

"Well, Ror, when somebody wants to go somewhere, they usually drive to get there. We happen to be going to get food."

"Where?"

"I don't know, first place I see that we haven't been to. Second question?"

Her voice fell, "Why'd you kiss me in the tree house?"

The wheel jerked and he turned to look at her. "Why'd you stay with me? Why did you care so much when I stopped taking pictures? Why are you hanging out with me?"

"…That's more than one question."

"Logan, I'm serious!" She didn't notice that they had pulled into a parking lot of an old café, old being from the 1950s.

He cut off her protests and yelling with a searing kiss, making her glad she was sitting because her knees would surely have buckled beneath her. She felt like she was simply going to melt into the upholstery, whether from shock or bliss, she didn't know.

His fingertips traced her jaw and she moved toward him on impulse, trying to maneuver over the counsel of his tiny car.

"Logan," she managed to murmur against his lips.

"No talking," he said, as she moved to his lap.

"You need a bigger car. A two-seater Mercedes won't work for more escapades like this."

He smirked, "More?"

She gave him a devilish smile, flipping her brown locks over her shoulder before opening his door and climbing out, "If you get a bigger car."

He hopped out after her, his arm wrapping around her waist. "Is that an ultimatum?"

She smiled up at him, an innocent look on her face, "No?"

"As in you don't know."

"As in we can always take my car next time."

--------------

She buckled herself back into his car after their long, delicious dinner. She ran her hands over her stomach. "Oh, God, I ate too much."

He glanced over at her, "I think that's the first and only time I'll ever hear you say that. Should I take a picture of this moment."

"Shut up and take me home."

"Yes, ma'am."

He pulled up to her mansion, through the gate and up to the circular drive, getting out before opening her door. "Always the gentleman," she said teasingly.

"Of course."

"Thanks for dinner. And for staying with me. Goodnight, Logan." She kissed his cheek and walked to her door.

She turned around and ran back to him, giving him what was meant to be a quick kiss on the lips. His hands clutched at her waist, their noses brushing. Her hands cupped his cheeks, her hands cold to his skin.

"Goodnight."

----------

He didn't know what had come over him. When he had dropped her off and gone home, he was filled with some sort of courage, of bravery.

His father had been sitting in his study and Logan had knocked on his door, letting Mitchum Huntzberger that his son wanted to talk.

"Dad," he said, "can I talk to you?"

"Logan," his father sighed, "I'm busy."

"It'll be quick, I promise."

"You have," he checked his watch, "two minutes."

Logan walked to his father's desk, leaning on the plush arm chairs in front of the large, paper-covered mahogany desk. "I don't want to be the owner of Huntzberger Media."

His father laughed. "You aren't."

"But I will be, and I don't want to. I want to write, yes, but for me, on my own terms. Not for you and a bunch of crackpot journalists who are only concerned with the latest Hollywood gossip."

"Are you done yet? This tantrum will pass. You know that this is what you're going to do. You will be the heir to my company, you will take over, Logan. Or else you'll forfeit the rest of your inheritance and anything I would leave you, assuming I die anytime soon. Your spot will be waiting for you, Logan. You can't get away from it unless you go empty-handed."

"Who are you kidding, Dad? Selfish bastards don't leave anything for anybody. Except debt, pain, and knowing that their father's didn't love them at all. Well, too bad. I'm going to be leaving come next year, leaving this, this-this," he searched for words, "hellhole, and you. Leaving you here to scramble to find someone to take over who won't embezzle or use you for all you're worth."

His father looked at him through his glasses. "Don't be foolish, Logan. It's this girl you've been talking to. She's trying to do this to you. Make you turn on your family so her family can come and take it all from us! Don't you see?!"

"Leave her out of this, Dad!" his voice rising.

"You'll see in time, Logan. She's just a little whore who wants nothing more but to add a few more dollars to her inheritance fund. You'll come around. Writing for fun," he laughed. "That's not possible. Not for anyone in my family."

He walked slowly to her house. For the first time, he told someone what he wanted to do with his life, and what happened? They laughed at him. He hated his father, he hated his family.

He climbed up the trellis carefully for what seemed like the millionth time. She was awake, labeling her canisters of film in the lamp-lit room. She smiled when she saw him, setting the pile of film on her desk and opening the window.

"Just couldn't wait to see me?" she asked.

She looked at him, his defeated face and she brushed the back of her hand along his cheek. "Logan, you're freezing."

"It's cold," he said dumbly. She took his cold hands in hers and pulled him to her bed, sitting him down.

"What is wrong? What happened?"

"I told him I didn't want to work for him. I just…I called him a bastard and that I was going to leave him to find someone else to work for him after I graduate. He laughed and told me I could never write for myself, never be anyone without him."

He was somewhat incoherent, but she understood. He knew she would, as cheesy as that sounds. She pulled him to her, running her hands through his hair.

"He said that you were doing this to me, that you wanted me to leave them and let your family take over."

"Oh, baby," she said, smoothing her hand over his cheek. "You know that isn't true."

"He called you a whore. And I called him a bastard."

"Logan," she started.

"No!" he exclaimed loudly. "No one will talk about you like that!"

She sighed, "It's nothing I haven't heard before."

"But not because of me. And you know it's not true. God, I hate him."

She pulled him back to her, resting his head in the crook of her neck. "I know."

"Why does he hate me?"

She ran her fingers through his hair again. "He doesn't hate you, Logan."

"He does, I'm sure of it."

"Come on," she said, getting up and climbing up farther on the bed. "Let's go to sleep. We'll finish this in the morning."

He let her pull his hand with her, so he was laying next to her in her queen sized bed.

"I don't like people talking about you like that," he said, the last thing he said before he fell asleep, his arms wrapped around her.