There are (a) people who love group photos, (b) people who merely tolerate them to be nice and (c) people who say “do we really have to?” twice before begrudgingly posing for one.

A group photo is one of the few situations where we, as fully-functional, bill-paying adults, collectively forget how our faces work.

It begins innocently enough. Someone says, “Shall we take a photo?” in the same tone you’d suggest splitting a dessert. This is always presented as a good idea. It is, in theory. Everyone agrees in the moment. Later, no one takes responsibility.

Phones come out. Not one, several. A brief negotiation follows about whose camera is better. There’s always at least one person who distrusts other people’s cameras, as if megapixels are a moral issue.

Then comes who should hold it. Someone produces a selfie stick. Not apologetically. Intentionally, as if they’ve been carrying it specifically for this moment. There’s mild resistance but it’s ignored.

Positions are negotiated with the intensity of a peace treaty. Taller people migrate backwards. Shorter people are gently ushered forward with a firmness that suggests hierarchy has been established. Can everyone move in a bit? Everyone moves. A bit more. This continues until the group is technically one organism with nine faces.

“Is everyone’s face actually in it?”

No one answers honestly.

The first photo is a warm-up. That feels fair, because it gives us a chance to practise being human.

Second attempt. Someone blinks. Someone else looks like they’ve just been told unexpected news about an overdue bill. Another feels like they looked “strange”, which is one of those phrases that cannot be disproved because no one knows what they were aiming for in the first place. Delete.

“Just look normal,” someone shouts.

Sure. But “looking normal” is not a skill you can consciously enact. It’s a bit like breathing or walking into a room casually. The moment you think about it, you’re doing too much. Should I smile with teeth? Is this too much teeth? Why are my hands here? Have they always been here?

Eventually, you get there. The photo is taken. Probably the fifth attempt. Or sixth. Consensus is reached with surprising speed, like we’re all a bit tired of ourselves.

You look at it later. Properly.

One person looks excellent. Effortless. Slightly amused, even. As if they were caught mid-thought in a film about their own life. Natural in the way that only happens when someone isn’t trying to be natural. You suspect they didn’t even know the photo was being taken.

Everyone else is doing their best. Smiles arranged. Eyes slightly too wide or slightly too narrowed, hunting for some midpoint between awake and not alarmed, landing somewhere near neither. Arms hanging with the specific stiffness of people who have only just remembered they have arms.

And then there is you.

You are doing something with your mouth. Something…ambitious. Something you were not previously aware of. Something your face has apparently been doing for years, possibly your entire adult life, at every gathering and occasion and photograph you’ve ever been in. Oh no, it’s not a smile. Not technically anyway.

You look away. You look back. You don’t remember authorising your face to do this. You show someone. They say, no, it’s fine. You know what it’s fine means. You will think about it for the rest of the day. Possibly longer.

And the worst part is, this is now the official version of you. The one that gets sent around. Possibly uploaded. Definitely zoomed into by at least one person. At some point, someone will suggest, “We can fix it with a filter.”

And you’ll nod, like this was always the plan.

It wasn’t. But it’s too late now.

The person who looked incredible has already forgotten the photo exists. Somewhere right now they are simply going about their life, looking good, not once considering what their mouth is doing.

The photo goes in the WhatsApp group. Someone says lovely! Three hearts. You open it one more time.

The mouth is still doing it.