Poppy and Oudemia

It was the first bachelorette party Poppy had ever been to, but she decided she would have to try and attend more when she got back home if they were even half as interesting as this one. Not because of the events themselves, she didn’t particularly care about anything on the itinerary, but the guests. She’d never seen such a varied group of fascinating subjects, not even at the most flamboyant weddings she’d photographed for her job.

There were multiple nude women around to begin with, which challenged her morals slightly, but she decided it was probably still okay to take pictures of them given they were just hanging out and chatting rather than doing anything overtly lewd. It would probably be less okay to copy those pictures to her own private folder of special photos, but she could always ask permission later, right?

A seven-foot tall woman in a biker jacket gave the opportunity for some unusual perspective shots. Poppy scooted into her shadow unnoticed, less than half her height, and aimed her camera upwards; exaggerating how much she towered over the crowds until the biker seemed like a literal giant among the other women. She bit her lip as she checked the exposure on those pictures. They might also have to go into her special folder, even though everyone in them was fully clothed.

Various animal girls gave her the opportunity to catch fur in motion, contrasting against smooth skin. A woman made of slime refracted the sunlight like stained glass. One guest had skin of obsidian and a magma-like glow that looked otherworldly when caught in shadow. Plus there were all the usual candid opportunities: laughter, gestures, affectionate touches. They were just as fun to spot and snap as always, even if she was distracted by the new experiences.

The tiny photographer dashed to and fro, darting between legs, ducking under tables, scrambling onto chairs, capturing the morning in slices of time and enjoying herself immensely in the process. Then, suddenly, a pair of eyes brought her scurrying to a halt. A woman sat against the wall, knees brought up in front of her chest, staring. Just staring. Not even blinking. Poppy stared back.

The woman’s eyes were deep, dark pools, like twin voids into the black recesses of the earth. Beautiful, in a mysterious kind of way. Poppy stepped a little closer, not breaking eye contact. The woman tracked her movement effortlessly, as if her gaze was anchored to Poppy’s eyeballs. A group passed between them, laughing and chattering on their way to introduce someone to someone else, but when the space cleared again those same endless pits were exactly where they always had been.

Poppy stopped directly in line with the woman, and tipped her head very slightly to the left. The woman didn’t move, which made sense to Poppy. There was no particular reason for her to do so, after all. She righted her head again, and tried a very slow blink. Time passed, maybe a minute or maybe ten, and then the woman blinked back at her just as slowly. Poppy nodded in acknowledgement, a tiny motion of her chin. The woman tipped her head to the right analytically, before falling still again in the new position. Poppy had never felt more seen and understood in her entire life.

The communication intensified. Poppy didn’t blink, but in a very specific way. The woman’s gaze adjusted by fractions of a degree so she was looking into Poppy’s left eye instead of her right. Poppy’s nostrils twitched. The woman returned her head to an upright position. Poppy’s shoulders drooped in relief. She couldn’t believe the interaction was going so well. She was normally pretty bad at making new friends, but this wasn’t so hard after all.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t spend the whole party socialising. She had a job to do, after all. She lifted her camera by a miniscule distance. The woman’s gaze flicked down towards the movement, then back up again, but she didn’t otherwise react. Poppy took the obvious invitation and raised the viewfinder to her eye, adjusted the focus, and snapped a picture.

When Poppy lowered the camera, the woman hadn’t moved so much as a hair, so Poppy blinked at her in thanks before finally turning away. She had enough pictures for now, and she decided she should probably leave her new friend to go and find Sarah again. Poppy wasn’t usually very good at reading people, but even she could tell that Sarah wasn’t comfortable at parties. The poor woman could probably use some support from Poppy’s newfound social skills.

Oudemia watched the tiny woman wander away, then went back to staring straight ahead at nothing in particular. If anyone had been looking at her closely, which they weren’t, they might have noticed the corners of her mouth turn upwards by an infinitesimal amount.