Fingertips

(Originally published by Sonder Magazine, issue 2, 2020)

Stephanie never understood the appeal of large digital clocks. She much preferred the clocks with faces and hands, with their irritating, yet comforting, tick tick tick to fill the silence of an empty room. Digital clocks didn’t offer any comfort. They unsettled her, letting time slip past quickly and silently. The clock in the conference room glowed red. She hated red.

              She placed her bag in the corner of the room, took out her camera, attached the lens, and put her coat over the bag. Satisfied that her equipment could not be seen, and was therefore immune to theft, she slung the camera strap around her neck and paced through the room. She kicked up dust from the emerald carpet with every step she took.

              Every conference she has photographed has had three things in common; business people never know how to react to candid shots, the lighting was always insufficient, and they all started late. This was no different.

              Stephanie played idly with the camera as she waited for the mass of suits to fill the room. She was taking photos of a fly on the windowsill when a flustered man approached her.

              “Ms Jones?”

              “Stephanie.”

              “You must be the photographer for us today, is that right?” His forehead was clammy, and his cheeks threatened to spill the blush across his face.

              Stephanie half-smiled and raised her camera.

              “Aha! Course, very good, great, brilliant. Perfect. Right. Okay, so, you’re all set too…” he floundered.

              “Take photos? Yep, all set to go.”

              “Right, brilliant, good. Thank you so much for coming in so last minute. I wasn’t told they wanted photographs. You know yourself, the phones do a grand job themselves, so I offered to take pictures myself, but you know how the higher ups can get, they want it done professionally.”

              “Aye. Well, keeps me fed, so I won’t complain.”

              His laugh was weak. “Sorry, I’m Phil Newman.”

              He stuck out his hand for her to shake. Instinctively, Stephanie glanced down and saw the tips of his fingers coloured a deep pink.

              Stephanie has had the ability to interpret people’s emotional states, all her life. She saw colours appear on their fingertips, like a permanent mood ring. The shades she could see were fairly standard; red for anger, blue for sadness, pink for embarrassment, purple for unease, yellow for happiness and green for envy. Multiple fingers can have different colours. The brighter the shade, the more intense the feeling. Of course, feeling so intensely all the time is exhausting, so most people have faded colours, and Stephanie could ignore them if she wanted too. She couldn’t ignore poor Phil, however, his cheeks now matching the hand she shook.

              “Nice to meet you in person, Phil.”

              He excused himself, as the first stream of people crowded the room. Stephanie took to the corner, beside the entrance, allowing time for the slurry of grey to fill the space. Flicking through her camera and deleting her photoshoot with the fly, she waited for the business men and women to acquaint themselves with each other before sticking a lens in their faces.

              A man who looked considerably younger than his colleagues flashed a smirk as he approached a circle of people deep in conversation. He patted the back of the gentleman nearest to him with a violet hand. A blonde woman across the room watched him, tapping her nails against her crossed arms, barely hiding the green under her perfect French manicure. An older gentleman greeted a friend with a bear hug, sunshine yellow beaming from his hands.  A woman hovered around the front entrance, waving to familiar faces with a lightly tinted lemon on her hands, with lavender creeping up on her pinkie and ring fingers. She took out her phone, scrolled aimlessly and the violet turned to royal blue. She helped herself to the complimentary tea and biscuits.

              Phil beckoned the masses to take their seats. Most conference-goers swung past the tea and coffee station, swiping pastries to “take with them” before sitting at the U-shaped row of tables. Rather than trying to snap shots of those attempting to fit into the chairs with awkwardly-placed armrests, Stephanie focused her attention to the man waiting patiently for Phil to step down from the podium. His grey eyes were lightly scanning the room, stopping to notice every face. He offered a polite smile to Phil, as he introduced him to the group as Mr Kevin Halferty. Stephanie focused her camera lens, ready to click as he raised his hand to run through his coal-coloured hair, when the waiter tending to the coffee station cleared his throat.       

              “That’s a nice camera. I have one like it at home.”

              “You’re a photographer too?”

              “Oh, well, not exactly. It’s only a cheap one, but you know, it’s fun.”

              Stephanie smiled generously, turning her attention to Kevin’s speech, trying to ignore the clattering of dishes behind her. Kevin led a discussion on analytics she was eager to follow, only for her interest to be lost when it developed into a group discussion where personal anecdotes derailed the conversation. When the timer rang to indicate a tea break, Stephanie flicked through the shots she had taken, surprised by how many she took of Kevin.

              “I hope there is at least one I can use for my modelling gig.” a calm voice said behind her.    

              “I’m sure I could find something,” she said without looking up. “Your speech was interesting, Mr Halferty.”

              “Thank you – ”

              “Stephanie.”

              “Steph. I like to think it was, before it was hijacked anyway.” He tensed his hands and cracked his knuckles. Stephanie glanced down. His fingertips were peachy. Skin coloured. She stared hard at them, trying to detect a shade of rose, or even a hint of red, but there was nothing. She stared into his calm, grey eyes, dumbfounded. Before she could form a response, he glanced over her shoulder in recognition of a colleague and excused himself.

              Surely there was a colour on his fingertips, there had to be. He must be quite reserved, the colours were faint, that’s why Stephanie couldn’t see them. There was no other explanation.

              She paced around the room, asking for photos with those who couldn’t help but eye up her camera as she walked past, before circling back to the freshly set tea and coffee station. Kevin was in discussion with the woman from before.

              “It’s so strange, Emily is never late to these things. I wonder did she get lost.”

              “Perhaps, though I haven’t been in contact with her,” Kevin noted.

              “She lives not too far down from you, doesn’t she Kev? Maybe she took a wrong turn.”

              “I imagine so.”

              The waiter offered Kevin his drink, when it slipped and clattered down onto the floor. The coffee spilled onto Kevin’s white shirt, scalding him. He grimaced, the waiter apologised profusely, the woman grabbed napkins all around her. Stephanie couldn’t take her eyes off of his hands. Amid panic, frustration, embarrassment, no shade of colour on his fingertips betrayed him. They remained neutral.

              She distanced herself from the scene, shaking her head. It was ridiculous, it was impossible she couldn’t see his colours, that she couldn’t interpret his emotions. All her life, she has never met anyone who she could not read with complete transparency, who could hide their most guarded feelings from her.

              Trying to distract herself by focusing on the job, Stephanie couldn’t help but observe the colours on every business person in the room. A few pale yellows, a considerable amount of soft blues, a handful of illuminous pinks, a growing number of reds at the day went on. No-one was above their feelings getting the better of them.

              The evening drew the conference to a close, the darkening sky forcing Stephanie to rely on the room’s artificial light. Phil concluded events with a final speech. The business men and women stood and hastily left the room, each of them commenting on their desire to avoid traffic.

              Kevin was one of the last to leave the room. Stephanie watched him carefully, trying to make herself look busy. He glanced at her and she turned away to break eye-contact. She gently tugged on the camera strap to twist it around her back, as she returned to the corner to collect her coat. She listened to him say his final goodbyes and ignoring the waiter’s insistent apologies.

              Breathing deeply, she adjusted the camera lens and rushed outside. Fighting against the urge to shudder in the bitter cold, she hid behind the grand pillars beside the entrance.

              Kevin stood beside his car at the driver’s side, his fingers grappling at the door’s handle. He nodded and mumbled disinterested farewells as a flow of cars drove out of the front gate. He stood there, with no intention to leave until every car was gone. The winter evening had settled, and Kevin was visible only by the porch lampposts beside him.

              He looked around him, calm. Stephanie pulled in from his view, pressing her back against the pillar. She waited to hear him walk along the pebbled path. A click, and his car boot was open. She turned around, peering her head from she pillar, and raised the camera to her eye slowly.      

              Kevin muttered to himself, tutting as he rearranged the contents of the boot. He shifted a heavy object around with some effort. Stephanie pressed her finger to the camera button, begging the lens to click silently. When he didn’t turn in her direction, she was content he didn’t suspect her presence. She took two more photos in quick succession. Something pale caught the light from the lamppost. Kevin got into the car, the engine growled to life and he drove away into the darkness.

              Stephanie rushed back inside. Ignoring the waiter’s attempt to start a conversation, she gathered her belongings as quickly as she could. She ran outside to her car, threw her equipment onto the back seat, hopped behind the wheel and locked the doors. She reached back for her camera and flicked through the most recent photos.

              It was so poorly lit, she struggled to make out Kevin’s face in the pictures. She saw the blur of white coming from inside the boot from earlier. Unable to identify it, she zoomed in on the photo. Her hand began to shake. It was a slender arm, with a dainty bracelet resting on the wrist.

              Stephanie skipped to the final photo, as Kevin was closing the boot door where she saw his hand, bright in the light of the lamppost. His fingertips were dripping red.