Sue Mell is the author of the debut story collection A New Day (She Writes Press, 2024) and the novel Provenance, selected as a Great Group Read by the Women’s National Book Association and as an Indie Fiction Pick by the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses. She earned her MFA from Warren Wilson College and lives in Queens.

Photograph by John Bessler.

Single Lens Reflex

A Story

by Sue Mell

The photo shoot is just one more thing Nina doesn’t want to do, but she’s only been here a couple of weeks, and no one says no to the daunting Reynaldo. She is trying to maintain a good attitude. The display department at Bloomingdale’s! This is her dream job. Only it doesn’t look as if she’ll ever see the inside of a store window. The only time she leaves his prop-packed closet of an office is to pick up his dry cleaning. Or to deliver point-of-purchase postcards to the fragrance and cosmetic floor, where the salesgirls smile at her with derision: she’s Reynaldo’s lackey. Wouldn’t she like to try a little blush?

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