CHAPTER SEVEN

PHOTOJOURNALISM

pho·to·jour·nal·ism

noun \foh-toh-jur-nǎ-liz-ĕm\

—journalism in which written copy is subordinate to photographic presentation of news stories

I rushed home after school, hoping Aunt Willa had already arrived. I threw open the front door. “Aunt Willa? Are you here?”

“She was, but she went back to her condo to get more stuff!” Mom yelled. “Come to your room. I need help moving your dresser.”

“Moving my dresser?” I tossed my backpack toward the dining room table and sprinted down the hall to my room.

I skidded to a halt and gripped my doorframe in horror as I stared into my room. It looked as though it had been trashed by a posse of two-year-olds. Three beat-up suitcases were piled haphazardly on my bed. The rumpled blankets reminded me of my wadded up sheets of math homework. On my desk sat a heavy-duty black camera bag. My cup of sharpened pencils had been knocked over and pencils lay scattered across the desktop and on the floor. Aunt Willa’s signature safari hat hung on the back of the chair. My bathroom door, which was next to the bed, was barricaded with a camera tripod and a crooked stack of plastic tubs. My desk, which normally was against the wall, was shoved into the corner and the dresser stood in the middle of the room. Mom rested against it, panting slightly. “I’ve made room in your closet for your dresser. We need to put it there so we can bring down the extra mattress to put on the floor.”

“What extra mattress?”

Mom pointed up. “There’s an old twin mattress in the attic. Dad will bring it down when he gets home.”

I grimaced.

“Don’t worry. It’s been wrapped in plastic—no spiders. Give me a hand with your dresser. It’s too heavy to lift by myself, and it isn’t sliding very well on the carpet.” A strand of hair had come loose from her ponytail, and she brushed it away from her face.

I went to the other side of my dresser, and we weeble-wobbled it into the closet.

“Whew!” Mom plopped on my bed and caught the top suitcase as it slid onto her lap. “What a workout.”

I sat next to her and looked around. “Hmm … wow. She sure brought a lot of stuff. You said she went back to get more?”

Mom laughed at my concerned expression. “She didn’t want to leave all her expensive camera equipment at her condo—not with all the dust and dirt that would be made during the renovation.”

I looked at my dresser stuffed in the closet. “Where did you put my turtle collection that was on the dresser?”

“I’ve boxed it up for now and put it on the shelf in your closet. I’m afraid it’s in the far back and barricaded by some of Aunt Willa’s things. She brought you a new turtle, but it’s in the box with the others.”

“Oh.” I felt the vein in my forehead start to throb again. I had been looking forward to seeing what the new turtle looked like, and now I’d have to wait at least a month until my room was back to normal.

My things were being moved.

Already.

Without my permission.

Even though the only furniture left was my bed and desk, my room looked trashed with all of Aunt Willa’s stuff. I knew with another mattress it would feel cramped and maybe even uncomfortable. I guess I hadn’t really thought about how having a roommate would work.

Of course, I had my bed and, naturally, Aunt Willa would need a place to sleep. The spare mattress in the attic seemed like a good option. No doubt Aunt Willa had slept in worse conditions when she traveled. A mattress on the floor would probably feel like sleeping on clouds to her.

The front door slammed.

“Yoo-hoo!”

I jumped up from the bed. “Aunt Willa!” I yelled.

“Ella Bella!” she yelled back.

We collided in the hallway. She wrapped her arms around me and squeezed tight. I gave her a mongo bear hug. She wore what she called her “uniform”—khaki cargo pants and short-sleeve shirt. Her hair was pulled back in a braid in an attempt to control it, but frizzled bits poked out all over, making her look like she stuck her finger in an electric socket. I kept my arm around her as we walked back to my room.

“So,” Aunt Willa said, “I hear we’re going to be roomies.”

“Yeppers,” I said. “You don’t snore, do you?”

“Nope. Chewy’s the only one who snores,” she teased. At least, I hoped she was teasing.

“Where is Chewy anyway?”

“He’s out back, chasing squirrels. I’ll bring him in at night, but he’ll spend his days outside.”

Mom pushed herself off my bed and shuffled toward the door. “I’m going to check on dinner. We’ll eat in about an hour.”

Aunt Willa took a step back. “Let me take a look at you.” She reached out and gently touched my hair. “Your hair is darker now—and it’s past your shoulders.” She slid next to me and measured her shoulder against mine. “Ah-ha! Just as I thought—you grew. You’re much taller than I remember.”

“And you’re tanner than I remember,” I said.

She lightly smacked the top of my head. “I was on assignment in Africa.”

“Whoa, cool! Where in Africa?”

“All over,” she said, walking to the desk.

“What were you taking pictures of?” I asked.

“Just wildlife this time.” She opened her camera bag. “Elephants, rhinos, that sort of thing.”

I sat down on my bed and shifted her luggage off to the side. “That reminds me, I promised my friend Lucille I’d ask you what the difference is between a photographer and a photojournalist.”

“That’s easy.” Aunt Willa stopped rummaging through the camera bag and reached for a leather-bound folder. “This is my portfolio. It’s where I keep the photographs I’ve taken so I can show them to others. In a nutshell, as a photojournalist, I try to educate or tell a story with my pictures.” She pulled one out and handed it to me. Mounds of garbage, many of them bigger than my house, filled the black-and-white photograph. Birds circled overhead and in the distance a bulldozer pushed more trash. What caught my eye the most was a boy who looked to be about my age with three or four dark specks on his face—I’m pretty sure they were flies. He stood next to the trash heap closest to the edge of the photo. All he was wearing was a pair of torn shorts. He didn’t even have shoes. His grimy hands clutched a torn rag full of half-rotted food. He looked into the camera with an empty stare. I could practically smell the stench from the landfill and feel the emptiness in the boy’s stomach.

Aunt Willa shook her head. “Poverty is never a nice story, but it’s still one that needs to be told,” she said. She took the photograph from my hands and then pulled out a pizza flyer. Pepperoni was front and center. “This is an example of what a commercial photographer does. They use their photographs for advertising and publicity. And there’s also personal photography like for weddings and such. One isn’t better than the other; they’re just different. And I am proud of the stories I tell with my camera.”

“I think I can remember that,” I said quietly. The image of the hungry boy lingered in my memory.

Mom popped her head through the door. “Dad just pulled into the driveway. I’ve asked him to bring down your mattress.”

Aunt Willa spun around and smiled at me. “Your bed is almost here!”

“Wait. My bed?”

Mom nodded. “Yes, dear. We thought we’d let Willa take the real bed since she’s been roughing it in Africa for the last couple months.”

Aunt Willa shot me a sideways look. “You don’t mind, do you?”

“No … No, of course not,” I stuttered … and lied. This time I could feel the vein in my forehead pop out.

“You’re a sweet girl,” Aunt Willa said. She kissed me on the cheek. “I’ll come and help with dinner.” She and Mom headed down the hall to the kitchen.

“I’m going to change out of my school clothes,” I called after them, shutting the door and resting against it. I closed my eyes and counted to ten. It was a trick Mom taught me to do when I felt upset. It gave me time to think before reacting—or at least that’s what it was supposed to do. I opened my eyes, looked around the room, and decided I should probably count again, maybe even to twenty.

I turned toward my dresser, remembered it was in the closet, and opened my top drawer for a clean shirt.

My top drawer was empty.

My second drawer was empty, too! I slammed it shut.

I pulled on the third drawer. It didn’t budge. I jerked harder and smacked my funny bone on the closet door. The drawer opened an inch. I gave one hard tug and the drawer spewed out socks, underwear, and T-shirts—things that were supposed to be folded and in the top two drawers. I investigated the last drawer. It was also overstuffed with clothes. Apparently, Mom forgot to tell me she’d made room for Aunt Willa’s things in my dresser. I hadn’t planned on that. Of course, I hadn’t really planned on giving up my bed, either. It wasn’t that I minded giving up my bed for Aunt Willa; I just wish Mom had asked me first. I closed my eyes and counted to one hundred.