Lauren's POV
Three weeks have passed since my conversation with Camila. Whilst those three weeks my mom and her mom have been getting know to each other. They spend an insanely big amount of time together yet Sinu never came to our house. She keeps using excuses, the main one being not wanting to bother us. Generally they get coffee and go for a walk or stop at a café. I went out with them only two times, although I'm a bit saddened about this, it was my choice. Sinu is amazing, I love spending time with her and seeing my mom have such an amazing time with us feels wonderful, but she's my mom's friend. I'm 17 and as much as I love hanging out with these two, I should reunite with my old friends or find new ones around my age.
The problem is, it's easier said than done. I rejected my friends' help when they tried doing at least something to help me and my family. They really tried their best. Eventually they stopped trying, because there was really no point.
Well, not all of them. My best friend Leigh still texts me from time to time, checking how her Lauren is doing. We used to be really close, she made school a bit easier and we basically grew up together. I owe her a lot of things, basically I became the person I am right now, well, more like the person I was before the accident, thanks to her. She made me realize that I don't have to fit in, that society can't make me be someone they want me to be. But her parents are pretty unusual and they suddenly decided to move to Europe, claiming they were looking for an adventure. They've been traveling around Europe for almost 3 years. Leigh made a deal with her parents that she'd come back to her native country at least once a year, but since she's their little girl, we manage to meet even 4 times a year. I miss her dearly and I wish I had her by my side 24/7 like I used to, but she's always been quite wild, I know she's enjoying the life she's having and I'm honestly happy for her. She made a promise that after my graduation she'll take me on one of those trips and she'll even try to convince my mom herself, I'm looking forward to this day.
Anyway, in the end I was too ashamed to reach out for help and too stubborn to accept any of my friends' suggestions, and I ended up alone. The visits, the calls and concerned texts finally came to an end, leaving me to myself.
Laughter and agitated voices tore me away from my thoughts and painting. Wait, voices? It'd mean my mom didn't come home by herself. I sprinted down the stairs to see what was up, curiosity being in control of my other instincts. The second voice must have belonged to Sinu, since she was standing next to my mom, hanging her bag.
"Hello! What finally made you come here? I'm genuinely surprised." I smiled and walked up.
"Hi, Lauren! Well, your mom managed to convince me. It started raining and our favorite café was full, so we came here." She said whilst leaning in to hug me. I wasn't fast enough to react and let Sinu get all dirty because of paint. I reciprocated the embrace anyway, and heard my mom say "Ladieeees, why won't you join me in the living room?"
I made a quick apology, but, thankfully I ended up not leaving any paint on the woman's clothes. We went where my mom suggested and sat on the sofa. I was catching up with Sinu as my mom was making coffee for all three of us.
What I didn't realize immediately, was that the after a minute with this woman, I felt more giddy and happy than I remember. I don't really know how it was possible. I didn't give it a second thought, though. I just let it be, I decided I'd let her make me and my mom feel better, because I'm sure she was experiencing this as well. I just hoped she was to stay for a long time, we still needed her.
We spent some time together, drinking our coffee and talking, but she eventually had to leave. We suggested staying for dinner, but Sinu explained herself with the need of going home, because her daughters would destroy their house. I couldn't stop myself from imagining Camila and her sister, Sofi playing hide and seek, building blanket forts and dancing. The mother of those two really enjoyed talking about them, you could tell by the way her whole face lighted up every time she mentioned at least one of them, and I gladly listened to those stories. I could definitely see the resemblance between the Camila from the stories and the one that I talked to on the phone. What I didn't quite understand, was why Sinu wasn't afraid to leave them by themselves. They sounded a bit reckless, and most importantly, young. There certainly wasn't any babysitters, because then, Sinu wouldn't have to worry about the girls 'destroying the house'. I was so deep in my thoughts that I didn't notice both my mom and our guest stand up. I quickly got up and went after them. We said our goodbyes and promised to visit each other more often. Clearly all of us had a great time.
I closed the door and I looked at my mom, she was smiling. I don't know what made me do it, but I felt an urgent need to hug her, I needed to be close to her. So I hugged her and she gladly hugged me back. We stayed like that for a minute or two, enjoying the closeness. I pulled away when I'd noticed something that didn't belong to neither of us. It was Sinu's handbag. I quickly grabbed it and opened the door, unfortunately there was no sight of her car.
My mom and I agreed she'd give me the address of the Cabello's house and I'd drive there to give the bag back, and she'd prepare dinner.
After I'd found the car keys, I took my driver license and made sure I didn't forget the item left by the woman. Before I searched their house in my satnav, I turned on my favorite radio station and The xx's "Angels" was playing.
"One of my favorites." I thought to myself.
I was driving through the city, realizing my destination wasn't as far as I suspected. The Cabello's family lived in a quiet and nice neighborhood, just like us, and if my satnav was giving me the right information, I stood in front of their driveway. I parked my car, turned off the engine and left. With Sinu's handbag hanging on my arm, I walked up to the front door. I knocked as taking a deep breath.
I heard music and a little girl's laugh, it sounded familiar. I might have heard it while talking to Camila on the phone. Suddenly I heard footsteps and I quickly fixed my hair.
Was it excitement or the nerves that I felt? Probably both of those mixed together.
Hold up, what was I excited for? It was too late to come up with an idea, because I saw the knob turning left and a second after, the door slowly opening.
My gaze was fixed on the ground but I slowly started looking up. The first thing I saw were bare feet, after that, tanned long legs and jeans shorts, a baby pink plaid top, and finally a face. A beautiful face, I might add. The girl's whole body seemed quite slender, but still curvy, which made me think all the positive things about the girl. She was a bit shorter than me which meant that her legs weren't as long as I thought they were. I finally focused on her face. The first thing I noticed were her eyes, I often do that, though. Eyes are always the most interesting part to me. But hers were unique, although they were brown and some people's opinion is that brown eyes are the most boring, it was definitely not the case with her. It sure as hell wasn't boring brown, it was more like nutella kind of brown with glitter in it, because they were so sparkly. From now on, my favorite kind of brown. What also attracted me, were her high cheekbones, I found them really attractive. Her naturally wavy hair hugging her long neck and loosely laid on her shoulders looked flawless. After noticing her pointed chin and cute nose, I was certain I considered her pretty, beautiful even.
There was something about that girl that made me pay my whole attention to her looks, she was fascinating. So fascinating that I didn't realize how long I must had been staring at her, now she probably thinks I'm rude or some kind of a creeper. But I also didn't realize she was doing the exact same thing, her eyes were traveling and scanning every inch of me, almost as if she was trying to put it all into her memory. Her mouth was wide open, just like mine, I stood there agape and waited for something to bring me back to earth.
A few more seconds had passed and the girl slightly shook her head. She looked at me and sent me one of the most adorable smiles I've ever seen.
"Hi? May I know who you are?" she asked shyly.
"Hey! Yes, sure. I'm sorry. My name is Lauren. A woman named Sinu apparently lives here and she left her purse in my house. So I brought it back, I didn't want her to panic she lost it or something like that. Thought I'd save her." I laughed casually, but talking to her came a bit harder than to others strangers. What was going on?
I noticed her face change when I told her my name. "Wait, you're Lauren? And your mom's name is Clara?"
"Correct.." I said, wondering where I knew this voice from.
"Oh well, it's great to finally put a face to a voice. I'm Camila, we talked on the phone."
Camila! That was Camila?? I thought she was like..10 years old, and she seems around my age. And now she seemed a lot cooler than she sounded on the phone. I smiled at the thought of the most awkward yet most interesting conversation I've had on the phone.
"Wow" that slipped out before I could react and think of what I was doing. The girl-Camila gave a questioning look.
"Camilaaa! It's nice to finally meet you. So is your mom home or should I just give the bag to you?"
What the heck was I saying? I've never acted this way around anyone. Now I was the awkward one.
"Where are my manners? Come in! And my mom's home, yes. It's lovely of you to bring it here, but I don't think she even noticed the bag is gone. Want to join me and surprise her with this?" Camila said as I was starting to enter their house. A delicate and sweet smell was the first thing I felt.
"I must admit, that sounds a bit like your mom. And I'd love to join you." I treated it as an excuse to spend some time with that girl, as I said earlier, there was something fascinating about her, and not only her looks. I started to realize that all I wanted, was to get to know her.
The brown-haired girl laughed softly at what I had said and the first thing that came to my mind, was that the sound made warmth spread in my whole body it made me so happy. Was this family supernatural and were their superpowers healing sad people with just the way they were or?
"I guess that's where I get my clumsiness from.." I heard her say more to herself than to me as we were walking through a hallway.
The next thing I noticed about their house were boxes, lots of them. Most of them were empty, but I did notice some full ones. I could see frames with pictures in one, was it Camila as a little girl? Sinu mentioned something about moving here recently, so I assumed they were still settling in and unpacking.
She pointed her finger at a balcony door and said her mom was there. She let me walk on the front, but she was the first one to speak up when we could finally spot Sinu in her garden.
"Hey mom, look who's here." She looked at me and sent me one of those smiles that made my legs feel like jelly. My legs never felt like jelly. I was seriously questioning my reactions.
Sinu looked up and her whole face changed she when she'd noticed us.
"Lauren, what are you doing here? Do you know Camila?" She asked pretty puzzled.
"Well, I do know her now, plus we've talked on the phone. But I'm here because of this," I said whilst lifting my arm and with that showing her handbag.
"Is this mine?" she sounded even more confused.
"Yes, mom.." Camila said and let out a breathy laugh.
I felt kind of sorry for Sinu's confusion and decided I'd explain the whole situation. They didn't let me do that in the garden, though. Sinu went to the bathroom to wash her hands, since mud was all over them. But before that, she'd asked Camila to take care of me and walk me to living room where we could talk.
We did exactly that, I helped prepare drink for all three of us and when we walked into the living room, holding the glasses, Sinu was already there. We smiled at each other and Camila and I sat on the sofa.
"So how about you fill me in? I'm still confused!" She said dramatically and we couldn't stop ourselves from laughing.
Camila and I took turns in explaining what had happened and I swear, the woman's facial expressions were priceless. She was hilarious. And her daughter was pretty funny, too. I couldn't wait to meet Sofia, to be honest. Unfortunately she was at a friend's house, like her mom said, and I had to get going since I'd left my phone in my room and mom still thought I was only dropping the bag at their house.
Obviously they tried stopping me for dinner, but I told them my mom was waiting for me and they let me go. Sinu didn't realize it was this late and said she'd get Sofia home. On the other hand, Camila decided to be the one to walk me to my car.
Slowly, we started walking down the driveway, the silence lingering between us. I was standing in front of my car when I turned around to be met with the brown orbs, shyly looking in my eyes. I slightly smiled at her and decided to be the one to break the silence.
"It was really nice meeting you, Camila.. you're pretty cool, a lot cooler than on the phone." I joked to break the tension which I didn't realize that was even there. My ears could enjoy the sound that was her delicate giggle once again.
"Don't even remind me, please. I was so awkward, I hoped you'd forgotten, but I was wrong, obviously!"
"That was our first encounter, I don't want to forget it." I paused and looked at Camila who was strangely silent. "You know, back in your living room, I was kind of hoping we could spend more time together. I meant what I said. Do you think we could hang out anytime soon?" I asked, shyness was taking control over my whole body.
"I-uh..you want to?" she asked and I nodded eagerly. "Um, sure! Of course, I'd love to! I'm sort of in need of a friend, the only people I talk to are my mom and Sofi." The girl laughed, as if nervously.
"I'm pretty much the same. Good thing our moms found each other!" I smiled and looked at her, but her head was bowed down. "Um.." I started awkwardly, "is this your mobile in your pocket? Maybe I could give you my number so we stay in touch?"
"Uh, yeah. Just type it in." she said while handing me the phone.
The drastic change in her behavior was quite noticeable and I just had to start to wonder if I did something wrong. Except from my shyness, I couldn't think of anything else that was different in the way I was acting while talking to someone I've just met.
I did what she'd asked me to and handed her the phone back. She finally looked at me and the moment I saw those eyes, I smiled widely. She smiled, too. I was thankful for that, I don't know why, myself.
"Text me anytime you want, I'll be waiting. Have a god evening, Camila." I said simply.
"You're not going to wait long..." this time she was the first one to send me a smile. "Have a good evening yourself, and I'm really, really glad my mom left that bag in your house."
"Oh yes, I'm really glad as well. Bye for now." I replied and opened the car door.
"Bye, Lauren. See you soon!" she added quickly as I was getting in.
"I'm looking forward to it." I sent her a smile and then closed the door and waved. I saw her standing where I left her, she didn't flinch until the moment I was starting taking the turn. That's when I looked in her direction for the last time, I noticed her slim arm waving. I grinned to myself and turned on the radio reliving every second of my meeting with Camila.
a/n hey peeps.
soooo camren met! i feel the next few chapters will be a lot more interesting (especially 9th and 10th, i loved writing them), there'll be less of their moms and more of c and l, thank god, right? i know. i kind of had to focus on the mothers first, tho. after all they're the reason they met, and i don't want the fic to be ALL about camren, you know? i hope so.
but i'm hella busy. today and tomorrow especially. preparing a surprise birthday party for your girlfriend and being the boss of everything is much harder than i thought, so i doubt there'll be an update tomorrow. hopefully i'll find time to publish one or two more chapters tonight.
anyway, hope y'all are okay. stay positive x
pola