Several minutes later, when Fritz became aware of my presence, I turned and walked from the dramatically high-ceilinged great room, which extended the width of the house in back, through the media room and entered the library at the front of the house, where Amelia was seated in front of a roaring fire, holding court amid a group of four girls. She shone down on them like the sun. In my experience, eleven-year-old children are rarely drawn to the adults in the room. They are usually drawn to each other. But Amelia had such a powerful presence that the standard rules didn’t apply to her. It was practically impossible not to pay attention to her performance, partly because she seemed to expect that everyone would.
“Ingrid, we’re so proud of you.” Amelia spoke in a lilting voice. “Natalie told us about your tennis championship.”
Ingrid’s face colored and she giggled.
Amelia placed her fingers lightly on the child’s face and brushed the hair away from her eyes. “The semifinals? What an accomplishment.”
Objectively speaking, I was more attractive than Amelia was. I had larger breasts, a smaller waist, and fewer lines in my face. I was certainly younger, by ten years at least. Amelia had chiseled cheekbones and deep-set eyes. Overall, her features were a little sharp, but striking nonetheless, and she had remarkable magnetism—the kind of person to whom men and women alike gravitate.
A wall of bookshelves at one end of the library stood in contrast to the pristine furniture, glistening glass everywhere—a room that didn’t suggest the presence of a child. Natalie appeared to have self-control and restraint beyond her years, so I gathered that she didn’t pose a threat to the breakable objects in the room, nor did they pose a threat to her, at least not now. Perhaps she had learned the hard way.
I wouldn’t have been able to blend into the crowd so well if it weren’t for my affluent high school boyfriend, son of an Orlando lawyer, whom I’d dated for three years. I had the luxury of time in which to study his parents, his sister, and him, individually and collectively. Even at fifteen, it was obvious to me that you need to immerse yourself in the lifestyle if you want to fit in, if you want people to believe that you belong to their world. It’s a matter of osmosis. It turned out my boyfriend was a prick. He pulled a knife on me once. When I explained the nuances of the situation to his parents, they got me a full ride to the University of West Florida. It was the least they could do. If they wanted gratitude, they should have gotten me into Yale.
My talent as a photographer is multidimensional. I’m a documentarian when called upon to be that. Of course, I can disappear into the woodwork and capture the interactions that naturally occur at a gathering among family and friends, but that sort of photography often leaves me unsatisfied. I like to create the moments. I see myself as a director.
I reappeared in the dining area with my camera out several minutes later, followed by Itzhak, the Straubs’ aged bloodhound, who wandered in and among the girls, eventually sidling up to Natalie. Absentmindedly, she scratched him behind his ears.
I began with discretion, as the documentarian. From twenty feet away I snapped photos of the girls. Natalie held herself in reserve much of the time. The others were presumably her friends, but she didn’t seem to trust their friendship. Amelia might have misjudged how long they would spend on jewelry-making, because most of them finished their projects relatively quickly and soon looked bored. Natalie appeared self-conscious, as if she felt responsible for entertaining the girls.
Over the years I’d learned that the children needed to be in a good mood, or the photos would fail. I’d come up with ways to save unsuccessful parties and had become particularly adept at party tricks, such as balloon animals and face painting. I always came equipped with a dual-action hand pump, balloons, face paint, brushes, stencils. Once in a while I chose to pull out some of my supplies. Only when I sensed a party going off the rails. Surprisingly, even so-called sophisticated children, as old as thirteen, found such things delightful. Balloons especially. They usually elicited gestures and facial expressions that suggested innocence and joy. In New York City, many children lost that early on. Jaded children made very poor photo subjects. Balloons gave me the best chance of capturing something that looked like happiness.
Natalie said yes to the balloon animals. Responding to her friends’ requests, I made a unicorn, a giraffe, a cougar, a castle, a yacht, and a helicopter.
The balloons worked. I got the shots of Natalie and her friends that I needed—faces illuminated, energized, in medias res. Even the most constrained and constraining parents craved images of their children diving headfirst into the world without fear or inhibitions, living, experiencing. What they, themselves, had wanted to do but couldn’t. Most of the time my raw material turned out well. And if all else failed, of course I could photoshop.
Toward the end of the party, Fritz gathered the girls around the dining table and Amelia brought out a large birthday cake, shaped and decorated like a cello and bow. Eyes on her daughter, Amelia beamed as she placed the cake in front of Natalie and knelt on the floor next to her daughter’s chair. Amelia’s posture, her tilted head, her soft smile, were intended to convey extreme devotion to her daughter. Not that I considered her disingenuous. But I gathered that loving her daughter in front of witnesses helped cement a necessary self-image.
The assembled girls sang to Natalie, crowding in to get a better look at the cake. And then Natalie blew out the candles. These are the most important
