Love Me (Normani)

Chapter 21

Camila woke up first, for once in her life she was an early riser. Lauren was asleep in her arms peacefully. They had both cried a lot that night, but Lauren definitely cried the most. Though if you thought about how long Lauren was keeping all this to herself and trying to deal with a problem much bigger than her and Normani, it was highly likely and understandable that she would cry. It was very stressful and very upsetting. She didn't know Normani was awake until she sat up, nearly making Camila jump out of her skin. "Are you okay?" Camila asked Normani in her normal talking voice, Lauren would only wake up now if you shouted and shook her. "I just need to pee." Normani yawned, getting out of bed, ruffling her messy bed hair absentmindedly as she padded out her bedroom and to the bathroom. If you couldn't see the weight change, you would think you were talking to the old Normani. Normani came back in as soon as she was done and cuddled up to her best friends contently. "I love you losers." She joked lightly. Normani was trying to get back to normal. But it wasn't normal. Camila appreciated her effort on the one hand, but on the other, she knew Normani needed to accept she really was sick. She didn't know when or even if that would happen. But if it did, hopefully very soon. Before she ended up in hospital, or worse, dead. "I love you too Mani. Oh and Lauren obviously does, but she's sleeping." Normani hummed and closed her eyes throwing a slim arm around Camila's waist. "Thank you Camila, for letting me stay and helping me out." "No worries bud." She teased. "Your jokes are still bad Mila." The girl mumbled sleepily. "Shut up, I wouldn't even class that name as a joke." Camila huffed. "It still sucked. No one says bud anymore." "I make it sound cool though right?" "Stop digging yourself in a hole Mira." She smirked. Mira. It's been a while since she had called her that. "Mani?" "Hm?" Normani was barely staying awake so Camila had better be fast with whatever she wanted from her. "I'm sorry for being a shitty friend to you and not realising that something was wrong." "Shut up and go back to sleep, it's too early for serious shit." Normani mumbled before her words were replaced with soft, even close to angelic snores. Camila looked at the time and saw it was 6am, it was too early to do anything. So she might as well join her two best friends and go back to sleep herself. Much later that morning, Lauren stretched out and accidentally slapped Camila in the face doing so, which woke Camila up. "Ah! What the fuck?" Camila brought her hand up to her cheek, a confused frown etched on her face. "Sorry!" Lauren cupped her hand over her mouth, mostly to stop herself from laughing. "Sorry Camila." "I'm sorry too!" Normani added in. "What are you sorry for?" Camila asked Normani. "For the fact you two assholes woke me up!" She said grumpily before diving back under the covers to resume her slumber. "We should do something today. Something normal, like we used to." Lauren said suddenly. "We used to sleep all day, lets do that." Normani said from under the covers, her voice muffled. Camila giggled and pulled the covers off of her friend. "Come on Mani, you can pick what we do." "Fine. I pick sleeping." She said easily. "Mani." Lauren huffed. Oh, they're actually serious about this. "Uhm, alright." "What do you wanna do?" Camila asked. "Why don't we go shopping for a bit?" Normani suggested thoughtfully. Shopping was something she loved to do, plus some of her old clothes were starting to become too big for her now. "Sure." Lauren smiled at her warmly. "Yeah I'm down for that." Camila agreed. "Just please don't drag us to every book store you see like you always do." Normani said to Camila in all seriousness. "But I love books. I'll restrain myself. A maximum of two." "But you do take forever Camz." Lauren said hesitantly. "Oh come on. I know you both secretly love it."  Camila said pointedly. "I don't mind much, I like reading and learning stuff, it's just the amount of time you take." "Yeah Mila, you could sit in a book store for hours." Normani crossed her arms. "Alright, I hereby give you permission to drag me out after ten minutes, either of you." "Hereby, what are you? The queen?" Normani smirked. "Queen of Cuba." Camila played along. "Always knew I was royalty." She quipped. "What does that make us?" "My trusty princesses." She pulled them both into her arms and squeezed them dramatically. "Oh okay ow, that's enough." Normani said with a strained voice. "You're literally crushing us Camila let us go." Lauren said as she was being choked with her left arm. "Sorry." Camila pouted. "Aw, it's okay." Lauren pouted too. "It's nice to feel loved." Normani said thoughtfully. Camila looked at the two girls with puppy dog eyes. "I want some love too." Lauren and Normani rolled their eyes and kissed her cheeks either side simultaneously. "There." Lauren smiled. "Better now?" Normani raised an eyebrow. "Much better. Now, let's get ready." They shopped for the rest of the morning and into the early afternoon. While Lauren and Camila couldn't wait to sit down, Normani just wanted to keep wandering around the shops. Only to burn calories of course. She had already gotten all the clothes she needed, she just wanted to stay active. "Mani please." Camila whined. "We're dying here." Lauren absentmindedly huffed. "Fine then, I'll walk.." "Home?" Lauren raised an eyebrow challengingly. "..I'll, I'll just walk." Normani shrugged. "No wait, I think I have an idea that you might like." Camila pointed out rather breathlessly. "What?" "Yeah I'd like to know too." Lauren turned her head to the side curiously. "There's a swimming centre not far from here. We'll grab a bite and then we can check it out. It's hot out, and it could be just what we need to cool down and calm down." "Sounds good." Normani nodded, she ignored the part about grabbing a bite to eat. Like that'd happen. "Water does ease tension, I read that somewhere." Lauren nodded. "Let's do it Camz." "Right, awesome, now, I want a burrito." Camila said, standing up and going to order for everyone. Lauren giggled and turned back to look at Normani, who looked anxious as the line got shorter and shorter. "You don't have to eat much Mani. Just have what you can manage." Lauren offered a small smile. "No one'll push you babe." Screw much, you're not eating a damn thing. Normani swallowed thickly when her food was put in front of her and lowered her head, pushing the food away. Camila sighed and looked at Lauren sadly. "Can you just try a little?" Camila asked the dark skinned girl hopefully. "It's really good." She added for good measure. Lauren just put a hand on Normani's shoulder warmly and rubbed it reassuringly. "It's fine Mani, don't feel like you have to." But God knows she needed to. Normani felt guilty for doing this, and she knew she could even swim the calories off. But they were better off not in her body at all. She couldn't wait to get in the pool and get rid of the disgusting fat on her body. Normani leant into Lauren's body when she put an arm around her and kissed her temple. Normani's filled with tears so she squeezed them shut. Camila reached over the table for her hand to hold it. "Do you want to go home?" "No, I want to go the pool." Normani insisted. "Mm. Maybe that's uh, maybe that's not such a good idea on reflection." Lauren said hesitantly. Camila met her eyes for a few seconds before it had clicked in her brain too. "Yeah, maybe not." "We'll just go back to my house, we can all watch a couple of movies before my parents get back." Lauren suggested. "Yeah, sure." Camila smiled, but Normani was crying at the prospect. She really needed to exercise. "Come on, you'll feel better once you see Nemo onscreen." Camila nudged Normani as she got up and threw their trash away. Lauren rubbed Normani's shoulder and tried to meet her puffy eyes. "It'll distract you, c'mon." She helped the distressed girl up. "Let's go."