"Cami-" Joe says when I walk into frame wearing the outfit that he put together for me, "you are so beautiful."
"J," my face turns into an upside down smile, "you're sweet."
"Whoever picked your outfit must have amazing style," he says into the phone and I chuckle.
"He's pretty cute," I smile and look at myself in the mirror. He was right- the skirt I got for Paris totally went with this black cropped windbreaker with his number on the back. Of course he had to advertise himself on me, since I was basically doing the same to him.
He showed me his outfit earlier, black jeans, blue dunks, blue shaded cartiers, and one of my sweatshirts. And it wasn't discrete either. In big text it had "Camden Connors" with my face on the back.
He wore it proudly.
"Are you nervous?" I ask carefully. He didn't like talking about the games beforehand. When he does talk about them, he says short, simple answers.
"No, but I like talking to you, a lot. Keep talking," he nods and looks away from his phone.
"Well," I think for a second, "Ella and I's plane leaves at 7 tonight. I think Tianna and Cyd are coming with us."
"I'm really glad that you're starting to branch out," he grins, "I know it takes a lot of time to warm up to people."
I laugh, "You say that like I'm an evil monster."
"No," he shakes his head, "I just meant, you're quiet unless you're comfortable."
"Ah," I nod and he nods with me.
"I have to go, we're leaving," he looks up at things around him and then back down to me, "bye, Cami."
"Bye," I say, and he hangs up.
I sigh and change back into my regular clothes. My suitcases were already packed, so all I had to do was place the outfit nicely and put my luggage by the door.
The florist in Seattle had texted back, confirming the delivery of the flowers to Joe's hotel room.
No matter how much he denied it, I could tell he was antsy for the game tomorrow. Every time I try to talk to him about it, he changes the subject.
So I figured some flowers might lighten him up a bit.
Other than that, I spent the day trying to come up with a music video idea. Olivia said it would be good to use a new song, but an old song would be okay too. And me being a control freak, I want to be the one to direct it.
But of course, the Joe withdrawals had been strong. My mind kept going back to Daylight. There were so many lyrics that I could bring to life.
So I wrote a script with the help of one of my co-writers, and sent it to Olivia. She instantly loved it. Recently, she'd been 'buying into' Joe and I's love story. She thought we could get a lot of good press from it.
Later, I hear footsteps throughout the house, and shouts of my name, "Camden!"
I look down at my phone and see a missed call from Ella and the time showing 6:30.
"Shit! Sorry Ella!" I shout, and slip on my shoes.
"There you are," she peaks her head in the room, "we have to go."
"I know, I know," I shut my computer and turn off my keyboard, "I've been working on that freaking music video all day."
"What did you pick?" She holds the door open for me as I leave the office.
"Daylight," I whisper, knowing her reaction would be big.
"You are in love!" She shouts, "That song is very on the nose."
"Well, yeah I know. But the lyrics are descriptive and give scenes that I can totally do," I let her out of the house, grab my suitcase, and lock it behind me.
"True," she nods and opens the trunk of her car for me, "and it won't be out for a while anyway, in case you change your mind."
"I hope I don't change mind," I chuckle as I lift up my bags into the car, "I've already made the script and picked out the cast."
She squints at me and clicks a button so it'll close, "That's risky."
I shrug, "I have an image in my head."
We go to the front of the car and get in. Ella nods in agreement, "Fair. Who's going to be your leads?"
"Well, Bill owes me a favor, so I figured he'd be down," I shrug, and look down at my finger nails.
"Bill?"
"Skarsgård."
She gasps and looks over to me, "How did you get fucking Pennywise to be in your music video?"
I laugh, "I haven't asked yet, but he owes me a favor."
"Shit, Cam," she sighs and shakes her head. We sit in silence for a minute until she gasps even louder than the first time.
"HE LOOKS JUST LIKE JOE!" She yells, catching me off guard.
I hold my hands up in defense, "That's a coincidence."
"No," she shakes her head, "in the film industry, you're known for your music videos. You could have anyone."
"He owes me!" I say loud, hoping she'd understand.
"You want him to look like Joe! You are in so deep," she shakes her head.
"They don't even look that alike."
Ella laughs out loud, "Stop lying to yourself. It's adorable that you're subconsciously basing all these things about him."
"It's on accident!"
"But you're still doing it?" She peaks at me quickly before returning her gaze back to the road.
I shrug uncomfortably, "I guess so. Is that bad?"
"I just don't want you dedicating all this stuff to him, and then, hypothetically, you break up, and you're reminded of him in everything," she says softly.
Her words sting. She isn't being rude. I knew exactly what she meant and the fact that she's right is what hurts.
"I know," I sigh, "but something's different this time. I mean, you saw me with Jacob. The entire time, from the very first day, I knew we wouldn't last. But Joe wants more, and I want more, and I think we want more with each other."
"I can tell, Cam, but I know you. And I know you get freaked out when it starts to get serious. But I also know that you love with everything in you. Which translates into your work," she says, taking a beat, "and that's a good thing for most people, but you're still young, and people will perceive it as naive."
"I don't care what people think," I chuckle and she shrugs.
"You don't think you care what people think," she uses her finger to point in the air to get her point across, "I was that way too. I kept casting guys who looked like Tyler, and people noticed it. The movies turned out great, but I got backlash for the lead that I chose who was very problematic. You remember how much it affected me."
I nod, "I do, but you weren't aware of that stuff. I know that %90 of this album is about Joe."
I take a breath and continue, "People can think what they want to think, and I don't care because at the end of the day, I have him and you. As long as I have the two of you, then I couldn't care less about what the world thinks."
"You tell 'em," Ella raises her voice and we both chuckle, "you love him, don't you?"
I pause my laughter and glance over to her, "I think so. I've never felt this way about anyone before. I've also never truly loved someone before, in a romantic way."
"That's good," she nods, but has a weary look on her face.
"What?"
She shrugs, "I am just worried about when you start doing more. He's only ever known you to be a homebody, someone who likes to be in the shadows. But I know that you like going to red carpets, and you like parties and dressing up. You might not realize that...those things...they aren't him at all."
"It's not that big of a deal, though, right?" I look over to her and watch her face, "I'm still the same person he met six months ago. Just because he's more private than me doesn't change that."
"I understand," she nods, "and the reason I'm talking about this is because I know you were invited to the Wonka premiere. Tyler's going with me. Is Joe planning to be your date?"
I bit my cheek. Of course he wasn't, I hadn't even told him about it. But obviously I wanted him to go. He's the person I want to be with all the time, especially in places like that.
"I didn't ask him because I know he gets bad anxiety," I lean my head against the window. I felt like a kid again, trying to avoid talking to my mom by keeping my gaze elsewhere.
"So you're going on your own?"
I shrug, "I go to a lot of things on my own."
"Touché," she says, "but if you change your mind and end up asking him, you cannot be mad if he says no."
"Ella, I know it's out of his comfort zone. I'm not going to do that to him," I say with a slight chuckle, hoping to lighten the mood.
"Great!" She nods, "I think Tyler and I want to change the baby's name."
"To what?"
"Odette," her face turns into a huge grin, "keeping the Amelie, of course, but we really like the name Odette."
"That's a really unique name," I lift my head from the window, "why did you want to change it?"
"One of Tyler's cousins just had a baby. And they named her Rosie," she sighs.
I wince, "Ooo. Odette is more unique anyway."
"Yeah we think so too," she grins.
✧
"Shit," I say under my breath as the clock runs out. Joe's perfect season came to an end. His first loss happened to be against the Seahawks, not necessarily a team we wanted to lose to.
Yet here we are, shuffling out of the stadium with screaming Seahawks fans around us. The security guys Ella brought were big and scary, but that didn't stop the taunting.
"Your boyfriend sucks as bad as you do, Camden!" A grown man yelled. He had to be in his fifties. How immature of him to yell at a twenty-something year old girl who sings songs for a living?
Luckily, Tom and Jerry, yes those are actually their names, were able to get us to the golf carts and out of the main area. Tianna and Cydney were right there with us too.
"Ugh, Cody's gonna be so pissy," Tianna sighs and opens her phone.
"Ty, too," Ella nods, "he's never dropped that many in his entire career."
"Yeah they seemed off," Cydney nodded. I stayed quiet because Joe had a really good game, if the receivers would catch the ball. I mean that in the nicest way possible. Joe was on fire tonight, dime after dime, but the ball just kept slipping through their fingers.
But...what are you gonna do about it now?
One of the stadium security people helped us out to the cars. We were immediately taken back to the hotel where the whole team was staying at and went up to our rooms.
The guys had the option to stay with their wives or girlfriends, but I didn't plan on Joe being excited enough to want to stay with me.
So I took a shower, got my comfy clothes on, texted the girls that I wasn't feeling up for drinks in the restaurant in the lobby, and waited until Joe answered my call. Which, he always did.
I was halfway asleep while watching a different football game when my phone rang.
I flinched and picked it up, "Hello."
"Cam," Joe says, his voice neutral, "do you have a roommate?"
I look around the room and into the main room, which was twice the size of the bedroom.
"Nope," I say, squinting to myself as if it could give me a better idea of his mood.
"Now you do," he says, "what's your room number?"
I give him the number and tell him to text when he was in the elevator so I could let him in.
About five minutes later, my phone dinged. I got out of the comfortable, giant, king sized bed and shuffled over to the door.
I peaked my eye through the peep-hole and see Joe walking up. I open the door and let him in.
"Hey," I say solemnly, "sorry about the game."
"Thanks but," he sits his bag on the counter, "I did everything I could."
"I know," I walk up to him and hug him. He wraps his arms around me and lifted me in the air. I kissed him quickly and looked down.
"Nice shirt," I grin, and he mirrors me.
"I got quite a few questions about it in pregame interviews," he chuckles and sets me down, " a lot of them were jerks about it, but it's going to help people."
"Damn straight," I nod proudly and hug him again, "I missed you."
"I missed you," he squeezes me and then gently pokes me in the side, "thanks for the flowers."
"Sorry they didn't help," I wince and pull away, holding his hands in my own.
He shrugged, "I did good. There's just a few things we need to work on."
I nod and smile, "Let's go to sleep."
"Baby, I don't want to sleep," he has a mischievous grin on his face as he throws me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, and takes us into the bedroom.
⇜⇝
Ah it's been a while! My bad guys.
But I hope you liked it, kinda short, kinda boring, but oh well!
Thanks for reading! Love you all!