"Nothing." I tried to blatantly lie through the tears.
"Cam, come on." She sat down next to me, grabbing my hand in hers. "What happened? We went for food and you were asleep, I've come back and you and Peter are both in so much mental pain, it's almost overwhelming to me." She shook her head.
That's how she knew. I thought she'd already been to talk to Peter, that she'd come over to try and get both sides. To see why I'd stormed away from him.
"I, don't, I can't explain." I mumbled, wiping my tears away and taking a deep shaky breath, trying to compose myself.
"Can you try, this is a little worrying sweetie." She did look worried when I finally met her eyes.
"I asked Peter about the nightmare and the thing he's keeping from me. He turned it around on me, made it very clear he's not okay with my past. That's it." I shrugged, my voice cracking as I tried to hold back the rest of my tears.
"He did what?" She seemed shocked, as shocked as I'd been. She shook her head at me, clearly trying to make sense of it.
So was I, I was still unclear how we'd gone joking about different dimensions and teleporting molecules to a near screaming match over my past.
We'd never fought before, Peter was always so unselfishly patient and gentle with me, I'd been pretty spoilt and it had made me complacent.
"I'm so confused, what exactly did he say to you?" She glared with a confused look at the cabin door, like she was trying to use x-ray vision to see through the doors to Peter.
"I can't talk about this Wanda, I really can't. Peter will probably tell you everything." I gestured to the door, wanting her to leave so I could get myself together properly.
I wasn't bringing it to the group, I wouldn't get everyone else involved, nobody else had to suffer through our shit just for being in our proximity.
I just needed a few more minutes alone, to get my shit sorted, I'd stuff everything back down, back to where I normally kept everything I didn't want to think about.
I'd not cause a scene, I'd make it back to the compound. I'd go from there.
I'd told Wanda I wouldn't leave unless I had to, I would stay until they told me I couldn't.
But I knew myself, I liked to pretend to be tough, I liked to act as if I knew what I was doing and I had everything together and nothing bothered me, but I wouldn't be able to handle this.
I wouldn't be able to act normal for long, like I wasn't so hurt and incredibly pissed off and worried about everything.
"Don't you dare Camila. Don't you even think about it." Wanda said, suddenly her own anger flared, she stood up from the couch with stiff limbs.
"What?" I looked up at her, confused.
"You're not leaving. I don't care what you did, I don't care what he's done. You're not leaving. He's not the only person that lives in that compound Camila, neither are you! You can't put them through that, put me through that." She shook her head, her hands glowing red.
"Wanda." I didn't know what to say to her, I couldn't deny I'd been thinking about it, of course she'd picked it out of me head. I didn't want to tell her I wouldn't because I knew I was going to and I didn't want to lie to her.
She knew, she glared at me and back up to the door, "Stay. There." She growled, more angry than I'd seen her in a while.
She quickly darted out of the cabin, slamming the door behind her, I heard her shout something at someone outside and then Bucky pushed his way into his cabin with a confused frown.
"What exactly is going on?" He looked at me, taking his jacket off and throwing it onto his bed.
"Well, you're here to make sure I don't steal the jet and run away." I shrugged at him.
"Why does she think you're running away this time?" He asked me, not looking over at me anymore, as he he emptied his pockets of his phone and wallet, putting them on the bedside table before he sat down on the bed.
"Doesn't matter." I mumbled, really not having the energy to think about it anymore, let alone tell anyone else.
I didn't want to, I didn't want anyone else to know, it was bad enough that Peter might tell Wanda, I wasn't dragging anyone else into it.
While I watched Bucky turn on the TV and lean back against the headboard, I was starting to think it had been blown out of proportion, mainly by me.
I'd had a terrible life before arriving at the compound, I already knew that, I couldn't expect Peter to be okay with it, so he brought it up arguing sometimes, did that really matter all that much?
I sighed, yes, yes it did.
I couldn't be with him if he wasn't okay with my life before I'd met him. I could stay though, I could avoid him easily enough, I was really good at avoiding people.
"Hey kid, are you okay?" Bucky asked, I looked over at him and he seemed to have paid me attention for the first time since he walked into the cabin.
"Yeah, I'm fine." I threw him a smile. Well I tried to anyway.
"You don't have to tell me what's going on, but don't lie to me." He scolded.
I just nodded at him, trying to look apologetic. "How was the food?" I asked him, more to distract myself than desire to hear about the food.
He frowned and shrugged, "It was fine, we all just had burger, they weren't anything special."
Bucky seemed to start analysing me, my question about the food sparked him to take notice.
"Stop it." I shook my head at him.
"Fine, lie to your best friend, see if he cares." He smirked at me and turned back to the TV, the only channel it seemed to get that was in a langue I could understand, he could probably speak Norwegian, he'd never told me exactly how many languages he could speak and what they all were.
"So you do know we're best friends, I always knew you did." I said, but my heart really wasn't in it.
When the door opened again it made me jump, I'd been staring aimlessly at a spot on the floor that I was trying to make look like something, anything, in my head.
"Cam, come talk to me outside." Wanda nodded her head behind her, my eyes roamed around the scene behind her, making sure Peter wasn't there before I sighed and removed myself from the couch.
"You're being weirder than usual tonight, I just thought you should know that." Bucky said as I followed Wanda out. I shot him the finger before I closed the door behind me.
I could instantly see our breath fogging in front of us, Wanda carried on down the porch steps and turned off the right right, towards the front office.
She lead me around the side of the building and sat down on a well used bench. It was probably where the limited amount of staff took their breaks.
Instantly I pulled my legs to my chest and wrapped my arms around them, partly because it helped me feel protected, partly because it was well below freezing outside.
"He's scared." Wanda started, I could tell she was looking at me but I couldn't look at her.
"Aren't we all Wanda." I mumbled, not really caring about his motives.
"Cam listen to me for gods sake. That thing you think he's hiding, I'm not telling you it's really, really not my place, is really not a bad thing, it's a scary thing, for him, so when you sprang it on him that you knew something about it, he freaked out, he's terrified to tell you, he shouldn't be but he is. He panicked, he went into defence mode, I think you know something about that." She eyed me and I couldn't not look at her anymore.
"I don't care Wanda," Of course I cared, I cared more about this, about Peter, than I'd cared about anything in my life, "I can't be with someone who keeps throwing things in my face, things I can't change or control. I do get defensive you're right, but I don't throw shit like he did in anyones face for it. You're freaked out, cool, leave the room, leave the building, don't make someone regret something they can't change." I tried not to shout, I tried to keep my voice calm but it shook with tears again.
"We all deal with things in different ways Cam, you like to run, other people don't." She shrugged, she saw I was about to protest and held her hand up, "He's jealous." I frowned at her, confused.
She didn't need me to ask for her to continue, "Of Jeremy, he's jealous. It's stupid, I know that, you know that, actually anyone that has ever seen the two of you in a room together for more than five seconds knows that, but he can't help it, he's jealous."
"What the hell does he have to be jealous of? Wanda, he was a job! My dad sent me to find him, I had to get information from him, I hated it, I hated being in his apartment, I hated pretending to like him, I hated trying not to cringe every time he touched me, what is there to be jealous about?" I was so frustrated, it kept getting worse and worse.
"You can't really explain jealousy Cam." She gave me a sad smile.
"What does that even mean?" She was as frustrating as Peter right then.
"Do you know I'm jealous of Vision, all the time? Almost everyday." She asked me, eliciting a frown that seemed like it would be permanently etched onto my face for the rest of eternity. She again, carried on without a prompt from me other than the confused frown. "It's irrational, some people might even think it's crazy but I am, I'm jealous of him. He gets to spend every day with Billy and Tommy, I'm jealous of them, they get to spend every day with Vision. I get snippets, I get to see them every so often, jump into their lives every few days, for a few hours, sometimes a few minutes. They get each other all the time, I don't. It makes me jealous. That makes me angry sometimes, upset, worried, all the emotions you can think of. Is it rational for me to be jealous of people who are in a completely different dimension through no fault of their own? Absolutely not but it's not an emotion you can control Camila." She wiped away a tear from her cheek, making my chest tight as I struggled to control my own tears.
"I'm so sorry Wanda." I breathed, not knowing what else to say to her. It hurt, thinking about the pain she must be in all the time. I wondered if it must feel like they're dead to her, would them being dead be easier, more final?
"Just, give Peter a chance to explain how he's feeling, you'll be happy to know I shouted at him for what he said to you, what happened, but I do get it. Let him explain, let him tell you what he has to tell you before giving up completely?" I wished Wanda hadn't been the one to try and explain it to me, it had really confused e even more but I nodded at her when she grabbed my hand. "You're going to be okay." She wasn't asking, it was a statement.
One I couldn't particularly agree with.
She left me a few minutes later, saying she needed sleep and told me to leave as well, she hadn't wanted to leave me there, I joked that I couldn't fly the jet so couldn't get very far so she could leave. She'd rolled her eyes and walked away looking worried for me.
I'd sat for almost an hour trying to take in Wanda's words before the cold drove me back inside. I couldn't bring myself to go into my own cabin, and so I snuck back into Bucky and Sam's cabin even though their light was off, I crept to their sofa and laid down. I got no sleep.
The jet ride back was harder than I'd thought.
Peter had whispered he was sorry in my ear as he walked passed me, moving further into the jet.
It had knocked the wind out of me and I'd had to spent the first twenty minutes forcing myself not to cry in front of everyone.
I stared down at the floor, trying my hardest not to look over at him, not to look at anyone.
Their voices blurred into the background, their easy laughs and their jokes become one noise ringing in my ears until we'd landed.
Things had gotten worse when I'd ran straight to my room when we'd walked in the door. I'd thrown my stuff onto my floor next to my door and dropped down onto my bed with a shaky sigh.
I planned to stay in the room for as long as I possibly could, I grabbed my phone from the bedside table to turned it off and as I did I felt like someone had poured ice down my spine.
There was a message waiting for me on the screen.
Cam, need to talk properly call me, will answer -
There was a number under the words. Jeremy.
I couldn't deny that it was anyone else anymore, and I also knew, despite the fact we needed information, we needed to know what Cole was doing, what he was doing, what had happened with my father, I also couldn't say anything. Not now. If it had happened three days ago I'd have ran down to everyone, told them, shown them the message, tried to get Karen and Friday to track down the number.
But now with Peter's words, Wanda's words, running around my head, I couldn't.
I quickly turned my phone off, throwing it into the draw in the bedside able as if it could burn me.
My breathing had picked up further and it took fifteen paranoid minutes for it to calm down, I kept thinking they'd all know somehow.
Three days was a long time. It didn't seem like a long time normally, it never had before, but not talking to anyone for three days made it seem like a very long time.
Wanda had tried, multiple times to get me to leave my room, Bucky had tried, even Sam had tried but I couldn't.
I was pissed, every time I tried to align Wanda's words with the argument, all I could hear was Peter accusing me of lying to him about Jeremy and I'd get mad all over again. It might have been irrational, it might have been an overreaction but I couldn't help it.
And the guilt of Jeremy's text didn't help. It kept proving Peter right in my head.
He wasn't. There really had been nothing on my side with Jeremy, but clearly I had had more of an effect on him than I'd first thought when he'd disappeared so easily.
I barely slept, I'd barely eaten anything, just some left over chips I'd had in my room and a candy bar I'd found on my dresser.
As day three hit Wanda's concern seemed to move from my mental wellbeing to my physical wellbeing, shouting at me that I needed to eat. When I told her about the chips she'd gotten even more mad at me.
I'd thought by avoiding everyone and not leaving my room it would prevent the discord happening, that if I just stayed away, I wouldn't fight with Peter, I wouldn't draw anyone else in to the stupid, potentially relationship ending drama that had bloomed out of nowhere, but the anger in Wanda's voice seemed to prove me very wrong.
I'd not cried since we'd gotten back, I didn't know what I was feeling, my emotions had veered wildly between anger and pain and confusion and guilt.
"Cam when are you going to start taking care of yourself?" Wanda shouted at me through my door.
"I do take care of myself Wanda." I mumbled back, just loud enough for her to hear.
"No you don't. You don't seem to give a shit about yourself and it's really starting to piss me off." She shouted again before I heard her storm away.
I cried then.
I couldn't sleep. It was partly my brain, it wouldn't let me, every time I got close to sleep it would remind me of what Peter had said, or what I'd shouted, or what Wanda had said, or the stupid text from Jeremy.
The other part though, was my body. It had gotten used to sleeping next to Peter, even if we weren't that close in the bed, I'd still know he was there and I'd been able to breath better, sleep sounder.
Apparently my body didn't care that we were fighting and couldn't have Peter in the bed next to me, it still wouldn't let me sleep.
I growled to myself and checked the time, it was two thirty in the morning. I cracked my door open slightly, listening for any sounds at all, I couldn't hear anything, but that wasn't really any sign that somebody wasn't up, sound didn't travel too well around the compound.
I stepped into the hallway, weirdly feeling like I was doing something wrong, like I should have stayed in my bedroom.
I felt out, trying to see if I could at least sense if anyone was downstairs, in the lobby. I couldn't feel anything out of place.
I let out a sigh of relief and as quietly as I could, crept down the hallway, taking extra care passed Peter's room.
A pang of sadness passed through me as I did this, I missed him.
I hadn't admitted it to myself since the fight, but I did. I missed him so much. And he was still there, he was still in the building, I was still there. The only thing getting in our way was us. Or me. I didn't know, I didn't know if Peter wanted to talk to me.
I pushed myself down the stairs, through the lobby and down into the gym, taking a second to listen and sense to see if anyone was in there, they weren't.
I glanced down at myself as I entered the gym, flannel pyjama pants and a tank top weren't really the best workout gear but as I stood in he middle of the large space and looked around myself, the anger and loneliness that had propelled me down to the gym had worn off, I no longer had the desire to run on the treadmill until I felt like puking, or get annoyed at myself as I threw barely adequate punches at the hanging bags.
I sat on the end of the treadmill, staring around at the equipment, like I'd somehow find the answers I needed from the inanimate objects.
I sighed and laid back against the rubber of the belt. Frowning to myself when I thought about how dirty it must actually be.
I wished there was a way to stop the anxiety that was coursing through my body in that moment, to just give my brain and my body exactly what they needed to rest.
"Oh shit. Sorry." Peter's voice made me jump and sit up too fast.
Peter was standing by the bench, frozen in his motion of grabbing a pair of boxing gloves. He looked shocked and when I made eye contact with him he quickly dropped his gaze and the one glove he'd picked up back down to the bench.
"Oh, hi." I muttered, I barely managed to say anything.
My body had stilled, the sight of him instantly calming that anxiety that had been making my limbs feel weak, my shoulders to feel tense.
My brain had different ideas though. It went blank at the sight of him, trying to take in everything about him while at the same time trying to find a way to shut down the analysing part.
He looked tired. His hair was a mess, he had dark circles under his bloodshot eyes.
"I'll just," He didn't finished, just pointed behind him to the gym door.
"N-no it's fine I'll leave I was just laying down." I stood up, using the side bar of the treadmill to pull myself up to standing, I took a few steps forward and Peter backed up.
"It's fine you were here first, I'll go." He sighed and backed up further.
"So we're treating each other like strangers now? That's where we've landed?" I asked him as he started to turn around.
"I guess it is." He sighed again, sounding exhausted.
"Great." I mumbled to myself, turning around on my heel starting to get the feeling back that had brought me down to the gym in the first place.
"Well what do you want Cam? Because I have no idea what you want from me. Do you want me to talk to you? Do you actually want to try and make this work? Or do you just want to stay locked in your room forever?" He asked, louder I'm sure, than he intended.
I spun back around, I'd thought he'd already left the room.
He moved quickly towards me, his tired eyes wide.
"I don't know." I admitted in a small voice, losing all the fight I'd had in me as I looked up at him, I wanted to tell him I knew what I wanted I wanted him to leave. Or I wanted him to apologise. Or I wanted to apologise. I wanted to leave. I wanted everything to be okay again.
"Then how am I supposed to know?" He asked, the look on his face broke my heart. Almost literally. He looked lost, he looked like he was in pain. He looked like he hadn't slept in as long as I hadn't.
He wasn't okay.
"What do you want?" I asked him. I was a coward. I didn't want to admit that I missed him, I didn't want to tell him that I couldn't sleep without him. That I was sure I'd overreacted to his words and that I wanted to make this work. Not until I knew where he was. Coward.
He didn't hesitate, there wasn't a second of thought before he said, "I want you Cam, that's all I've wanted since I first saw you. I didn't mean what I said in the Cabin, well, not exactly like how I said it, I-" He cut off, running a frustrated hand through his hair, he pushed it off his forehead but it just flopped right back down when he moved his hand away. "I'm jealous of Jeremy, okay, I can't help it. I can't stop thinking about you with him. I hate it. I hate that feeling I have that if we ever found him you'd leave." He screwed his eyes up, frustrated with himself.
I had no idea what to say to him, my throat felt closed up, my mouth felt dry.