MATCHED (CAMREN)

CHAPTER 1

The air train glides through the starry night so smoothly and my heart pounding so quickly that it feels just like a sledgehammer.

"What are you smiling about?" Harry asks as I smooth the folds of my green silk dress neatly.

"Everything" I answer him, and it's true. I've waited so long for this day: for my Match Banquet. Where I'll see, for the first time, the face of the person who will be my match. The first time I hear my future's name.

I can't wait. Although the air train moves quickly, it still isn't fast enough, for me that is. It still wasn't faster than the lightning-quick beats of my heart. Perhaps Harry can hear my heart pounding, because not long after, he asks, "Are you nervous?"

"No" I say. But Harry has been my best friend since God knows when. He knows me too well.
"You lie" he teases. "You are nervous."
"Aren't you?"
"No not me. I'm ready" He says without hesitation, and I don't even doubt him. Harry has always been the type of person who is sure of what he wants.

"How could you tell I was nervous?"
"Because you keep opening and closing that." Harry points to the golden object in my hands. "I didn't know you had an artifact." There were only few treasures from the past that floats among us. Although citizens of the Society are allowed one artifact each, they are hard to come by unless you had ancestors who possessed one.

"I didn't, until a few hours ago" I tell him. "Gramps gave it to me for my birthday. It belonged to his mother" It was funny how the Match Banquet landed on my birthday this year.

"What's it called?" Harry asks.
"A compact" I say. I like the name very much. Compact means small. I am small.

"What do the initials and numbers mean?"
"I'm not sure." I run my fingers across the letters ACM and the numbers 1940 carved across the golden surface. "But look" I tell him, opening the compact to show him the inside: a little mirror, made of real glass, and a small hollow. I used it to hold the three emergency tablets that everyone carries--one green, one blue, one red. No one really knows what the red tablet does. But the green one calms while the blue basically gives you nutrients.
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As the city hall comes into view, my mother and father each drew a breath obviously mesmerized by the lit up hall. I wanted to make sure I look my best but I don't want to seem in vain, so I sneak a glance at my face in my compact's surface instead.

The rounded lid distorts my features a little, but it's still me. My brown orbs. My brunette hair. My chin with a trace of dimple like my grandfather's. All characteristics that make me Karla Camila Cabello, eighteen years old exactly.

"You look beautiful" Harry tells me, and I flush a little even though I've known him all my life. I do feel beautiful in this dress. Ice green, floating, full-skirted and silk.

"Camila" my mother says, smiling at me. I blink and look up, startled. I then walked alongside her and my father. They both link and arm through mine. I am surrounded as always, by their love. It is only the three of us tonight. My sister, Sofi, can't come to the Match Banquet because she is under eighteen, too young to attend.

"Please be seated" an Official tells us from the podium, "Dinner is about to be served" We might be here for our matches, but we also can't wait to taste the food.

"They say dinner is always wasted on the Matchees" an old man sitting across from us say, smiling. "So excited they can't eat a bite." And it's true. One of the girls sitting farther down the table, wearing a pink dress,stares at her plate touching nothing. I don't seem to have this problem however. I can eat some of everything. And that's exactly what I did.

I have just popped the last bite in my mouth when the announcer says, "We are ready to announce the Matches." I swallow in surprise, and for a second, I feel an unexpected surge of anger: I didn't get to savor my last bite of cake.

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HA! Camila being Camila irl in this fic 😂😂 How are y'all? As promised, chapter 1 bishes. I'm excited for the next chapter! So stay tuned. Have a lovely day/night.

-H