Sam

Here it was, Friday again, the end of another week. Most people hated going to work on a sunny Friday morning, but to Sam, it felt like any other day. He would wake up, eat a light breakfast, and go to work. He was a building inspector for a reputable company and worked from 8 AM to 4 PM, five days a week. Then, after clocking out, he would head down to the park or the beach to take a few pictures with his camera before heading home to cook something for dinner.

“Hey, Sam! Wait up!” Matt called from the office across the hall.

Sam waved back at his cubicle neighbor. “Are you leaving now?”

“Yup! Just finished filling my last report.”

“Good. I hear you always end up clocking out pretty late after I leave.”

“Are you calling me slow? I probably did twice as much work as you.”

Sam turned to his friend. “Oh yeah? How many reports did you have to file today?”

“A whopping six,” Matt replied, sounding rather proud of himself.

“I finished ten, and in just under an hour."

“Well, not everyone likes tedium like you, Sam!"

Sam shrugged. "Or maybe I just like what I do for a living. You should try it--I'm sure there's an employer out there looking for a guy like you to drink beer and watch football for 40 hours a week.”

His friend punched his shoulder gently. “Hey, why don’t we go and grab some food before heading home? I’m meeting this new girl I found on a dating app, and I asked her to bring a friend along.”

“A friend?”

“Yeah. I figure you and I could treat it like a double date.”

Sam gulped. “Sorry, I’m not interested. Besides, I’m headed to the park for a bit.”

“You mean the same park you go to every other day?”

“That’s the one.”

Matt scoffed. “Oh, come on! Why not do something fun for a change?”

Sam licked his lips nervously. How was exchanging awkward small talk with a stranger at a local diner considered fun? Sam could hardly recall a time where a blind date went well, and even fewer times where he wanted to give someone a call the next day.

“Alright pal, suit yourself. I’ll just give Dave a call and see if he wants to join instead,” Matt said.

Sam nodded. “Sounds good. Thanks for inviting me though. Maybe next time.”

“I’m always sticking my neck out for the guys who don’t appreciate it…” his friend mumbled to himself.

In the parking lot, the two of them split up and headed towards their cars. Sam drove an old Chevrolet that was good on gas and easy to maintain with parts procured at the local scrap yard. It wasn’t much to look at, but it was better than his old ride, which was still sitting in the back of his grandparent’s garage, just waiting for him to commit to fixing it.

As Sam drove away, he pushed away all thoughts of Matt and blind dates and focused instead on the road ahead and the park coming up in the distance. Colorado was a state full of natural beauty and radiant sunsets just waiting to be frozen in time. He would spend a few hours looking for the perfect opportunity to capture a unique glimpse of the sky, or the people walking by. Sometimes his friends would try to convince him to pursue photography full-time, but Sam actually liked having a stable job that brought in enough money to meet the needs of a college dropout with no degree and no professional photography experience.

Besides, he enjoyed his work as a building inspector, and as it turns out, he was pretty good at it. All he had to do was follow the rules and work efficiently--the ritual of it all was actually rather calming to him. So what if his life seemed uneventful and predictable? At least it was a peaceful change from his past.

Sam arrived at the park around 4:30 PM. He found a nice, shaded parking spot and reached into the back seat to grab his camera bag. He owned a DSLR camera, which was nothing too fancy, but it got the job done.

Sam pulled out his camera and cleaned the lens before taking a walk through the flower garden. When he reached a patch of daisies, he caught sight of a couple of bees flying from one flower to the next. Their dark colors contrasted elegantly against the while petals, so Sam decided to stop and take a picture. He turned on his camera and got into a ready position. He almost had the perfect angle, but then, out of nowhere, Sam was suddenly hit by a large moving object. He was knocked off balance and sent crashing towards the cement path, camera first.

“Hey! Watch it!”

Sam immediately looked to see who had run into him, and was surprised to find a sophisticated-looking woman with intelligent brown eyes. Then next thing he noticed was the warm sunlight hitting her silky complexion, and the natural pink color coming to the surface of her face giving her the perfect flustered appearance. Sam would have snapped a photo of the one-of-a-kind scene, but unfortunately, all he could think about at that moment was the cracked lens on the other end of his camera. A lens that he had purchased just yesterday for a whopping eight hundred dollars after four months of saving up.

“Are you kidding me?” Sam groaned, examining the break in the glass.

“I’m so sorry,” the woman said as she scrambled back to her feet. “Is it broken?”

“Well, it does have a large crack across the middle,” he noted with a slight laugh.

“I mean, I figured as much, but I’m not an expert when it comes to cameras,” she admitted.

Sam got back to his feet and pointed to an old bandaid on her forehead. “So, I guess I can assume this kind of thing happens a lot?”

Her brown eyes furrowed with annoyance as she slapped one hand over the bandage, as if trying to hide it from view. “This little cut was not my fault, and just to be clear, it’s not like I ran into you on purpose.”

“I didn’t say that you did, but you still can’t walk around here blindly.”

The woman crossed her arms. “Or, here’s a novel idea: maybe you should find somewhere else to stand and take pictures that isn’t in the middle of the walkway that people are using? That way, no one can bump into you!”

Sam frowned. Why was she being so defensive?

“The path through the garden is huge. You had plenty of room to walk around, had you been paying attention,” he replied honestly.

“What is your problem?” she asked.

His problem?!

Sam was filled with genuine frustration. “Look, you want the truth? A simple apology, no matter how sincere, won’t fix my camera. I’m going to need about eight hundred dollars to replace this lens, which I won’t have for another four months. So, yeah, I think I have the right to be a little upset.”

“Eight hundred dollars?!”

Sam took a deep breath, trying to calm his nerves. “Don’t worry, I don’t expect a complete stranger to pay for the damage they incurred on the private property I chose to bring to a public park. So, I won’t press any charges or file a complaint, okay?”

The woman’s brown eyes seemed to shine red with anger, so he quickly turned to walk away before she had a chance to say anything else on the matter.