Not Just One Night

Chapter 32

Lauren's POV

I bolted from the diner the moment I saw Camila run across the parking lot.

I had been watching her from the booth, silently fuming that she had chosen to speak with her roommate over me. We were in the middle of an important conversation that needed to be finished.

But the moment I saw her reaction to whatever it was that Ally was calling for, all anger dissipated.

I could clearly tell that something was wrong so I made a run for it; chasing after her.

The bell sounded as I slung the door open, colliding full force into sheets of rain as I ran out from underneath the covered awning toward the brunette.

The droplets immediately blurred my glasses, and without stalling my feet, I removed them, shoving them into my pocket.

The weather also made it more difficult to breathe. Almost like I was drowning.

My lungs began constricting and it was taking everything in me, to catch up to her. Which I still wasn't able to do.

By the time I made it to her car, it was already unlocked, the door open.

Over my own heavy breathing, I could hear Camila mumbling to herself.

"I'm so stupid."

She was kneeling on the concrete, her body hovering by the open door, and her hand blindly fumbling beneath the leather seat. I called out her name, confused and slightly worried at her sudden frantic behavior but she didn't respond.

Instead, she spoke to herself again, "Why didn't I remember that. Shit," she sighed, and I could hear the apparent vulnerability in her voice. It cracked on the obscenity and I knelt down beside her, the rain drenching both of us. I reached over pushing the hair out of her eyes, that were wired tightly closed.

"Camila," I whispered. "Babe what are you doing?"

Her breathing was inconsistent, and her cheeks flushed. She shook her head, opening her eyes and I saw that they were glassy, and already bloodshot. She was clearly upset, and there was a twinge of guilt that I was expecting her to explain in such a fragile state, but to know how to help her, I needed to know what was going on.

So I asked again, and her response came out breathy and shrill. "I'm looking for a phone," she shouted, never once slowing her search.

"A phone, or your phone?" I asked trying to remain as calm as possible, knowing that she most likely would need me to be.

"A phone," she responded, as I expected. I knew she couldn't be in search of her's because it was lying on the pavement, and from what I could tell the call with Ally was still connected. I pulled it to me, wiping away the puddled rain on the screen, and placed it to my ear. Just as I did, Ally called out, "Camila? Did you find it?"

If I wasn't getting answers from the brunette, I might as well pry from her roommate, I thought. So I asked Ally what was going on.

"What is she looking for?"

Her reply was the exact same as Camila's had been.

"A phone," she said. Starting to panic myself hearing everyone suddenly on edge, I begged for her to explain what was happening with her best friend; my girlfriend.

She steadied her voice enough, to attempt to catch me up on everything that I needed to know, but she started from the time that she called Camila, and still completely lost, I stopped her.

I imagined that whatever the beginning to her story was, had everything to do with Simon holding Camila back earlier, after Chris' meeting. So I suggested that she start there.