I’m a photographer, self-taught to be exact. At the moment, I’m working in my dark room to develop some pictures for my portfolio. The pictures are resting in trays filled with chemicals – one a mixture, another acetic acid, and the last with ammonium thiosulfate. That’s one thing that I learned about photography. You have to wait. You have to be patient. I have a confession to make. I don’t like showing people my work. I know that sounds ridiculous. What kind of photographer doesn’t want to show the world his work? Isn’t that the point of photography – to catch a moment in time and share it? Well, I’m just embarrassed. You see, I don’t like rejection. Not after…

For the past few days, I’ve been hearing this intermittent buzzing sound. At first, I thought I’d become used to it and stop hearing it entirely, but to me, it just became more obnoxious over time. It transformed into something akin to a constant, vibrating noise in the back of my head. It was difficult to focus on anything. It became so bad that I had trouble sleeping, and it’s beyond me how my parents never noticed it. You know what they say though. You lose hearing with age, so I wasn’t surprised when they gave me confused looks. Tyler, my neighbor, heard it though, and I was relieved at that. It meant I wasn’t going crazy. He’s actually the…