I crossed my arms, "What happened in college between you and Lucy?"
......
"What?" she asked, blinking her eyes.
"Were you involved with her?"
"No"
"Did anything happen with her?" I asked once more, and this time I felt like the lawyer, turning over the question again and again until the witnessed answered.
"What do you mean?"
"Do I need to spell it out?"
"Yeah. You do" she said firmly.
I pretended to mime sign language as I spoke, "were you involved with her? Because I'm getting a serious vibe from her that she's tripping down memory lane from the days of old" I said, now holding my hands out wide, "College this. College that. Lauren in college. It's like she's holding on to something in the college with you"
"We kissed once. We weren't involved"
She said it so matter-of-factly, but it slammed into me, and I nearly stumbled backward. She reached for me, but I held her off. I was fine. I didn't need her.
"Ohh" I said, long and exaggerated, "Right. Of course. A kiss. That's not involved what-so-fucking-ever"
"What the hell, Camila? I was never involved with her. She'd a friend. Not an ex-girlfriend"
"You kissed her" I said, jutting my chin out at her, "That makes her kind of an ex, wouldn't you say?"
"I don't think that constitutes an ex" The low-key way she answered pissed me off, because she truly seemed to believe her own line of bullshit.
"Okay, let's get technical and legal about it then, if you're going to be like that. So I'll walk you through what constitutes being involved. When you've kissed someone, and I ask 'Were you involved with her?' that's the moment when you say 'Yes, I kissed her once, Camila, and it meant nothing to me, and we've been great friends ever since then, and I have drinks with her every Tuesday night and talk about you, but don't worry that I had my tongue down her throat because we're just friends'. It's not at the fucking poker game I'm losing that you tell me" I said, practically spitting out the words through my anger.
"Are you pissed that you're losing, or are you pissed that I kissed her?" she asked me through narrowed eyes.
Anger flared deep inside me. Anger over that woman. Over Austin. Over the three thousand miles between me and Lauren. Nager, annoyance and frustration all fused into a cocktail of heat and rage as I grabbed her shirt collar, "Thanks for pointing that out, because it's kind of both. I have a shitstorm of trouble waiting for me back home if I don't win" I said.
"That's not true. I told you I'd help you" she said, and her hand moved briefly toward her pocket, but then she stopped.
"Why do you keep reaching for your phone? That's not your style"
"Zayn is out with the Bainbridge's. Just wanted to make sure it's all going well" she said, then shifted quickly back to the matter at hand, "but I wish you'd stop worrying about the game. You're going to be fine"
"I don't want you to help me, though. I want to win on my own" I said, and I was damn near close to digging my heels into the sidewalk. Didn't she get it? Didn't she understand how important this was to me? But everything had collided right now. the game, Lucy, the possibility of truth and lies.
"And you will"
I pushed my hands through my hair, "I just wish you'd told me when I asked you in Miami if you'd been involved with her. I asked you if Lucy was your ex and you said she was just a friend, and always had been. But now it turns out you kissed her" I said, but I knew deep down it wasn't the kiss that bothered me. That wasn't why I was upset about Lucy.
"It just wasn't important, but it's not as if you've been totally honest with me"
"I didn't lie, though. I told you there were things I couldn't tell you"
"I feel like we're passing words here. I don't understand why it matters that I kissed her. Hope this doesn't come as a shock to you, but I've kissed other women before"
"I know" I hissed.
"So why does it matter so much that I kissed Lucy once? I don't even think about her like that?"
"Because. Because she is here, all the time. Because she sees you. Because I don't get to"
"We can change that" she said, her voice suddenly soft, all the harshness banished from her tone.
"How? I live far away and she lives a block away" I said, dropping my face in my hands, hating the sound of my own voice, "Ugh. Look what you've done to me. I've become this whiny woman, pining away, and she'd lovely and smart and funny, and it pisses me off that she can see you any time she wants"
She gently peeled my hands away from my face, tucking her finger under my chin and lifting my gaze to hers, "I don't feel a thing for her. I didn't tell you when you asked if she was an ex because I don't even think about her like that. I don't think of her as an ex. It was one kiss, one time, one drunken night. Nothing more. I don't think about her because you're all I think about. To the point I'm sure now woman has ever felt this way for another woman. You shouldn't be jealous of her. She should be jealous of you"
I stared at her, narrowing my eyes, "Seriously, Lauren? Cocky much?"
"It has nothing to do with me, and everything to do with how I feel for you" she said, moving her hands down to my arms, holding me tight, "Every woman should be jealous of you because of how I feel for you. Because no person has ever wanted a woman like I want you. No person has ever craved a woman as deeply as I crave you. And no person has ever fallen this hard and this fast for a woman"
My heart stopped, then thundered furiously against my chest, wanting to leap into her hands, "I'm sorry" I murmured, all my anger draining away, "I'm a jealous witch. It's just hard for me to see her and know you're so friendly, and that she'd so in love with you"
She froze like a statue. Then seconds later, though it felt like a minute, she looked at me as if I'd just spoken Russian, "What are you talking about?"
"You don't know that?" I asked, shocked.
"No"
"It's patently obvious to anyone who spends ten minutes with her. She'd madly in love with you, Lauren"
She swallowed, and shook her head, as if she were shaking the strange notion away, "How can you tell?" she asked, the words coming out all choppy.
"Because of how she looks at you" I said as if it were obvious, because to me it was.
"And that's enough for you to conclude she'd in love with me?" For the first time ever I'd truly surprised her. I hadn't intended to drop a bomb, but she so clearly didn't see it at all.
"Yes"
"Why? How? How can you tell she looks at me like she's in love with me?"
I rolled my eyes, "Because I recognise the look"
The look on her face was no longer of shock. It was of hope, and the dawn of something much more, "You do?"
Then I realised I'd practically said it, "Yes"
"How?"
"Because it's how I look at you" I said, the words falling from my lips in a tumble. Time slowed, and the moment became heavy, rich with possibility. The air between us was charged, electric, like a storm. We were magnets, needing our opposite.
She reached for me, cupping my cheeks, brushing her thumb over my jaw then my bottom lip, watching me shiver. I looked up at her, and her eyes were fixed on me. Waiting for me. Her lips parted, and I was wound tight with anticipation of what she'd say, "I love the way you look at me"
Tingles ran down my spine, spreading to my arms, my fingers, all the way to my toes, "You do?"
"I do. I love the way you touch me" she said, taking my hand and spreading my palm open on her chest, "I love the way you talk to me. I love everything about you. And I recognise the look in your eyes too. Do you know why?"
I shook my head, and my entire body was trembling with want, with hope, "Why?"
"Because it's the same as in mine. Because I love you, Camila. I am completely in love with you, and I love you, and I want you to love me" she said, never breaking her gaze from mine, her beautiful green eyes flooded with love.
"I do love you, Lauren. I do. I do." I said quickly, the tension in my chest disappearing, and relief washing over me in waves, "Lauren, I love you so much"
She ran her hands through my hair, burying her fingers deep. I felt her trembling. She returned a hand to my face, brushed the backs o her fingers against my cheek, and I leaned into her, savouring the gentleness of her touch. Feeling the reverence that she treated me with, like I was precious to her. She ran her hand down my neck to my throat, "Camila" she said, her voice low but so intense as she spoke, "I have never fallen in love like this"
Her words bathed me in some kind of bliss, as if my veins flowed with liquid gold, "How have you fallen?" I asked, overwhelmed with all I felt for her, with the way my body seemed to reach for her, to need her.
"With everything I have. There is no part of me that isn't in love with you. There is no part of me that holds back" she said, her voice steady, certain.
Allness. That's what it was for me too. An utter allness. A love so deep and consuming it filled my organs, it rode roughshod over my skin. It was a mark of the timeline of my life. Before. After. I raised my hand, and touched her face, stroking her jawline, watching with wonder as I made her gasp after a simple touch. She grasped my hand, linked her fingers through mine, and brought my palm to her mouth, kissing me there, "I love you" She bent her head to my neck, brushing her lips ever so softly against my skin, then up to my ear, "I am so in love with you" she said, as if she couldn't stop telling me, "I love you so much"
"I am so in love with you" I stretched my neck so she could kiss me freely as she wanted to as I ran my hand through her hair, "So in love"
She stopped kissing me, pulling back to look me in the eyes once more. Her gaze melted me from inside out, "I can't wait to take you home with me tonight. To spread you out on the bed. To make love to you all night long"
"I want that. I want that again and again. And over and over"
"Now go back in there" she said, gesturing to the restaurant, "even though you look like you've just had sex"
My cheeks felt rosy. I was sure there was a glow in my eyes, "I feel like I've just had sex. Sex with the woman I love" I said, playing with her hair, not wanting to let go of her, but needing to.
"You will have that. I will give you everything, Camila"
~~~~~~~~~~
this kind of love hurts when it doesnt work out. I felt this chapter deeply.
but GUYSSS......
CINDERELLA TOMORROW!!!!
im so excited, i cant wait