He Refused to Take My Photos but Shot Her for 7 Years Novel – Chapter 1 When my coworkers found out my boyfriend was a photographer, they went nuts with envy. “You must get amazing shots all the time, right? Ugh, my guy still can’t even figure out how to focus!” I smiled and shook my head. “He only shoots landscapes, not people.” That was Dorian Frost’s rule. Even on our first anniversary. Even after I explained a hundred times—I just wanted one simple tourist photo. Dorian still snapped at me. “My ex broke up with me because I wouldn’t take photos of her.” To avoid a breakup, I spent the next seven years walking on eggshells. Careful with every word, terrified of crossing his line. Until today. I scrolled past my influencer best friend’s latest post. [Just flexing my photographer—seven years of insane shots and he’s never asked for a single cent.] Right below it, a top comment sat there.
[Photographing my muse is an honor.] The profile picture was pitch black. It was Dorian’s account. *** The second that comment appeared, the replies exploded with shipping hype. [Everyone in the industry knows Dorian Frost only shoots landscapes. Vivienne Shaw is the one and only exception he’s ever made.] [Have you guys seen his earlier work? It’s all emptiness and cold, hard edges. But the second he points his lens at Vivienne—the lighting, the way he catches her eyes… it’s so tender it hurts.] [I called it seven years ago—the photographer behind Vivienne is in love with her. Y’all dragged me for it and called me crazy.] The comment section buzzed with energy. Only I grew colder, inch by inch. I never could’ve imagined—the photographer who’d been shooting Vivienne for seven years, patient, gentle, turning out one stunning image after another, and the boyfriend who, after seven years with me, still wouldn’t take a single photo—were the exact same person. Dorian murmured my name in his sleep. But all I felt inside was ice. People flooded the comments with screenshots from Vivienne’s private account.
That was when I finally saw it. The overlap between Dorian and Vivienne ran so much deeper than I’d ever known. She always called him her soft-hearted saint. [Starving! My soft-hearted saint made me buttered noodles.] The noodles looked perfect, steam curling up fragrant and warm. But my mind went straight to the first time he cooked. He’d turned the noodles into black charcoal. Back then, Dorian looked embarrassed. “Wait for me. I’ll learn!” And eventually, he did. He learned—and cooked it for Vivienne. [Bad shoot day today. But he waited for me in a blizzard for five hours without a single word of blame.] I remembered it with painful clarity. Dorian hated the snow. For years, I begged him to visit Northgate City with me to see it.
He always refused. Yet now, they were telling me the guy grinning, buried in snow like a human snowman, was Dorian. … A dull ache pressed deep in my chest. The photos Dorian refused to take for me—he took for Vivienne. The snow he loathed—he stood in it for her. Even then, some desperate part of me still clung to hope. But I had to face it. To Dorian, Vivienne was the exception. His uncompromising rules—they applied only to me.