Camila’s POV
I wanted to KILL Sofi when I heard the young voice yelling through my apartment. Did she not get the hint when Lauren hadn’t answered her phone call? My entire body was still in frenzy when I threw on my clothes. There was no time to recover from that mind blowing performance Lauren had just delivered. It was definitely a new side to her being so dominant in the bedroom. Obviously, she had a rather bossy personality but seeing it transferred in other ways was still making me blush. Quickly running my hand through my hair, I left the bedroom and tried being as composed as I could.
As soon as I saw my little sister crying, my anger vanished. She was sobbing uncontrollably and I hadn’t seen her like this since our mom passed. There were not a lot of things I hated more than seeing her in pain. Lauren held her tightly and I knew Sofi was in good hands because I had been hugged like that before from the dark-haired woman. It was the most comforting and comfortable place to be when you were upset; Lauren’s arms that is.
The way she wrapped her arms around your entire body and held you so close made you feel safe. Even though my sister was hurting, I loved seeing Lauren being like this. She had always been a great big sister to Taylor and Michael and even Sofi back then. It was instinctual to her. Even with fans back in the day. She was never shy to hug the sometimes hysterical fans. There were so many moments where I would just watch Lauren hugging random fans and making them feel like they were genuinely connected to her because she allowed them to be. My mind was flooded with images.
I had to focus though and approached them both.
“What happened?”, I asked and saw Sofi shaking her head.
“Stephen broke up with me. He didn’t even give me a real reason”, she sobbed and Lauren let go of her so we could all settle on the couch. It didn’t take long before Sofi was cuddling up to the green-eyed woman and demanded more comfort. Which Lauren was more than happy to give by putting one arm around her and gently rubbing the younger one’s back.
“That doesn’t make any sense. I thought you guys were on cloud nine”, I said.
“Yeah, me too. So you can imagine my shock when he just blurted out that he’s not ready for this and all of this bullshit”, Sofi explained but then laughed lightly. “Maybe I should join the other team, as well.”
Both, Lauren and I laughed now too and tried cheering her up for the next two hours. We ordered pizza because Sofi didn’t want to eat my sushi and watched a movie. I had envisioned my night with Lauren differently but watching her be so compassionate and loving with my little sibling wasn’t bad either. Her instincts were always good and maybe that was an older sister thing. She was incredibly cute with little kids and I caught myself thinking what an amazing mom she would be. I gulped a little when I realized what was going through my mind. We had just become a couple and I was starting to think of her motherly skills. It was just so endearing and adorable whenever she found some little child to pay all of her attention to.
After the movie ended, Lauren had fallen asleep on the couch and I assumed she was tired from the flight and all the travelling in general. So, I let her sleep it off and talked to Sofi for a while. She stayed with me and left pretty early the next morning while the older woman was still dead asleep. The exhaustion became apparent when the known pop star slept for almost eighteen hours straight! A part of me was worried and checked up on her regularly but she was sleeping like a baby. I had gone about my day as if she wasn’t with me and was a little disappointed we couldn’t enjoy the little time we had, but most of me was happy she was able to relax.
I finally heard her shifting and groaning quietly as I made my way over to her on the couch. Her green eyes opened slowly and focused on me as I sat down. I actually loved seeing her that sleepy, when her hair was in disarray, eyes dreamy and she just generally looked so much younger.
“Morning”, she breathed in a very raspy voice and cleared her throat.
“I’m afraid it’s not morning anymore”, I said with a little smile and saw her confused face. “You slept for eighteen hours.”
“What?!”, she said and looked at her watch in disbelief. “Oh God, why didn’t you wake me? I’m so sorry, Camila.”
“For what?”
“Oversleeping our time”, she said genuinely apologetic and her eyes carried guilt now.
“You don’t have to feel bad. I’m just glad you got the rest you needed”, I replied and bent down. Being able to kiss her perfect lips whenever I wanted these days was still surreal. I had wished, dreamt and thought of this for so many years. It was a very strange feeling to have your biggest wish come true. My lips kissed her gently but I honestly couldn’t help myself when I was around her. I lay down on top of her and smiled widely. Her arms wrapped around me immediately and she smiled as well. There was no way I could ever get enough of her warmth and closeness.
I rested my head on her chest and felt her fingers running through my hair lovingly. Taking a deep breath, I was able to take in her distinctive scent. There had been many times where I had asked her for clothing because I just wanted to take it in. I could hear her heart beating steadily. It was one of those moments we didn’t have to talk. The bond we shared was so special because I could sense what she was thinking or feeling most of the time and vice versa. Sometimes it was just a look that triggered so many emotions in either of us.
———————————————————————————————
No matter how many times we sang “Who are you”, I was still getting emotional singing it for our acoustic version. We had been in the nicely set up studio all day and recorded several live videos of us performing. The last song on our agenda was definitely the most emotionally charged. I had a feeling this would end up being a battle against my emotions once more. The best thing to do was to focus on the song and nothing else. But it was so hard singing the song that meant so much to me, when she was singing it with me.
Lauren was not looking at me or anyone else. That’s how I knew she was struggling as well. I avoided meeting her eyes or even glancing in her direction throughout the performance because that never ended well. But when Dinah started belting, I felt my eyes wander to the beautiful, dark-haired girl who looked so incredibly sad right now.
“It’s so strange how the same thing
Can make you feel so right
And bring you so much pain.
It’s so strange how the same face
Can you make you love until it hurts.”
Quickly averting my eyes, I tried regaining my focus but couldn’t recover fully. I still managed to finish the song. Even though I didn’t see her; I felt her. Felt her looking at me at the end of the song because she had noticed me trying to hold back tears. She was probably smiling at me; in need of that look we usually gave each other at the end of that song. But I couldn’t reciprocate because I knew.
I knew I would burst into tears when I’d meet her sad, green eyes. I knew she was sad because of me. I knew she missed me and our friendship. I knew there was no way I could give her what she wanted. I knew she’d do anything to fix whatever was broken. I knew she blamed herself. I knew I wasn’t being fair. I just knew.
That’s why I forced myself to look away and bit my lip to hold back the burning sensation in my own eyes. As soon as the director called cut, I got up and went to the dressing room. The girls followed while I was doing my best to calm down. Rummaging through my bag, I suddenly felt someone coming up to me and instinctively knew who it was.
“Are you ok?”, Lauren’s careful voice said and she placed one hand very cautiously on my back. I flinched unintentionally and she pulled back instantly. The fact she was trying to be my friend in moments like these made me fall for her even harder; and hate myself more for making things so difficult. How do you keep up a friendship with someone when all you think about, is how much more you actually want?
“Yes, I’m fine”, I said and just met her eyes for a split second before walking into another corner of the room, pretending to look for something.
She tried. I rejected her. Unfortunately this had happened so many times in the past couple of months, I lost track how many of those horrible moments had occurred. I didn’t want to hurt her and knowing that I was doing it anyways was eating at me every day. Most of the time, I wished I could just forget about my stupid feelings and move on. Ever since we had kissed that once, it had triggered something so painful I wasn’t sure how to deal with her anymore. I had to admit to myself that I had fallen for someone who would never fall for me. Her words kept echoing in my head: I was like a sister to her. Having heard that a few weeks ago, my way of coping was to distance myself once again.
The worst part about this was that we were flying home today; which meant I had to spend several hours next to Lauren on the plane. My anxiety was building up quickly when we reached the airport and said goodbye to everyone else. Boarding the plane to Miami, I felt my legs being shaky while we hadn’t talked since that uncomfortable moment in the dressing room earlier. She took the window seat and sat next to her. I put on my headphones immediately and by that made sure she couldn’t approach me again. Browsing through my ipod I felt it again: her eyes on me. She didn’t know it but I wasn’t playing any music yet and heard her loud sigh.
It took some time but Lauren had fallen asleep and I couldn’t stop myself from looking at her. Of course, she didn’t notice now. That was the point. Her relaxed facial expressions looked flawless. Only the dark circles under her eyes showed the amount of stress we had all gone through lately. Her head was propped up against a pillow she had placed on the window. A dark strand of hair was covering her face and I gently brushed it aside to see her beautiful face in all of its glory. Now, I was the one sighing.
“Lauren…Lauren, time to wake up”, I said gently because the older one had slept the entire flight while I had stared at her like a creep. She was opening her eyes and looked at me with an unreadable expression. It was a hint of a smile that disappeared quickly when I frowned.
We still weren’t talking and I just wanted to go home. Lauren was running towards our families who were waiting for us together. I watched her pulling her little sister into a very big hug. A little smile crept up on my lips because I loved seeing her be in her element as the older sister. Then it echoed it again in my head: she considered me her sister.
I walked a lot slower to my own family and just fell into my mom’s arms. She held me close and kissed my hair for a while until I noticed Sofi and my dad weren’t there.
“Where’s the rest?”, I asked.
“Sofi had fallen asleep and we didn’t want to wake her so dad stayed home with her”, she answered and I was trying not to be upset.
“Maybe they’ll come after to the Jauregui’s”, my mom added and my eyes widened.
“What do you mean?”, my voice almost cracked.
“They invited us over for dinner tonight to celebrate you girls coming home.”
“Um…can we not just go home?”, I tried carefully and saw her frowning now. I didn’t say anything because I couldn’t possibly tell her I wanted to avoid Lauren. How would I justify that when the green-eyed was willing to be my friend and I was being an asshole.
“You’re not fighting with Lauren, are you?”, she caught on somewhat and I hated the fact my mother was able to see right through me.
“We’re not fighting”, I said quietly. That would require us actually talking, I thought. “I’m just tired.”
“Alright, then we’ll just eat and stay for a little while, ok? We don’t want to be rude.”
Since I had no choice in the matter, I had to spend the evening with Lauren and her family at her house. Usually, I had no problem with that but everything had changed so drastically. I could not even enjoy the amazing dinner they had prepared and that said something. Of course my mom wanted to stay a little after dinner and sent me upstairs with Lauren and Taylor. Oh God, this was just getting worse and worse.
All three of us sat down on Lauren’s bed and the awkward silence was killing me. Lauren was busy with her phone but Taylor finally talked to me. It was mostly just about stuff we had been doing with the band until she caught me completely off guard.
“Are you still not dating anyone?”
I gulped and saw Lauren’s eyes looking up from her phone. Those damn green eyes focused on me and I was looking right into them before I refocused on the younger sister.
“Um…no”, I said very simply and hoped she would just drop it.
“So, all these rumors are not true?”, the blonde kept asking and I knew people were saying stuff about me and some guys but that was just gossip. I had no interest in any of them since I was already in love with someone else. Someone so close yet so far.
“No.”
“What do you like in guys? Like, not personality but looks-wise. I’ll find you one.”
Lauren had gone back to her phone but I knew she was listening still. My palms were starting to sweat because I had to say something. Anything else would be suspicious, right? There was no reason for me not to date at this point unless there was someone else. My brain must have had a seizure when I said something that was even more suspicious.
“I like green eyes.”
The mentioned body part was now looking at me in disbelief or complete confusion. I couldn’t read it well enough before I added quickly.
“Like Channing Tatum or Harry Styles”, my voice said surprisingly confident and Taylor had not even noticed the weird exchange of looks between Lauren and I. Instead the youngest grinned and then squealed.
“Oh my God, you should totally date Harry!”
My heart was racing because this was not how I had planned to spend the evening. I had been keen of getting as far away as possible from Lauren and now I was acting like the biggest idiot in front of her. She was probably laughing at me on the inside; or hating me. Well, I couldn’t really blame her. When I looked at her for another round of secret glances, she looked…hurt.
“I’m not trying to be mean but I have a fucking headache from hell. Could you both go to your room, Taylor?”, Lauren suddenly spoke up.
It wasn’t really a question, more like a demand in the tone the oldest said it in. The fact she was cursing just proved she was mad. Knowing she was probably irritated by me, my heart sank. Of course it was my fault for treating her so badly but the sharp pain in my chest was unbearable.
“What’s wrong with you?”, Taylor asked annoyed. “We’re all happy you’re back home and you’ve been weird all night.”
“Maybe I am just sick of hearing the same girl talk and boyfriend shit every day because I’ve spent the last few months with nothing else”, the oldest spat and I was surprised to see her fighting with her sister and taking shots at me and the other girls.
There was no chance of Lauren and I fighting because I didn’t give her an opportunity to do so. She had to bottle up whatever frustration she surely had with me. A part of me almost wanted to fight with her to let out all of these emotions we both felt. But we couldn’t. I couldn’t. There wouldn’t be a way back if I ever crossed the line of telling her how I felt. It was selfish but I couldn’t bear the thought of losing her completely.
“Are you jealous because Camila has more attention from guys lately?”
My eyes widened when Taylor said that and I had a feeling Lauren would explode now. Her temper was known amongst the girls although she rarely fought with us really. It was more with other people where she would stick up for someone else. But once she snapped, there was no holding back.
“Are you fucking kidding me, Taylor? At least I don’t have to worry about my reputation when I’m being linked to a hundred guys at the same time”, the green-eyed shot back in my direction and our eyes met now. My heart was racing and I couldn’t hold back either after that cheap shot.
“Are you saying people think I’m some sort of slut?”, I said with more anger than I wanted. My best laid plans of not fighting with Lauren were gone out the window now. But how could I let her say something like this? I had kissed one person in my entire life; once! And she was saying people would think I’m a tramp? I was hurt because she should know how vulnerable I was when it came to that topic. On the other hand, she had her reasons for being angry with me since I was playing her hot and cold for a while now.
“Well, maybe you should make up your fucking mind and chose one of the gazillion crushes you have”, her agitated voice filled the room louder while my heart was cramping up. If she only knew there was just one person I truly had feelings for.
“I should go home”, I said and got up because I was so dangerously close to saying the wrong thing and ruining everything. Fighting with her would just make it worse.
“Yeah, walk away…it’s what you do best”, Lauren mumbled as I gulped.
Without another word or look, I left Lauren’s room and closed the door since I knew how she hated open doors. Maybe I would find a way to get over it at some point. Until then, I just had to avoid the looks she gave me that made my heart flutter, race and break at the same time.
———————————————————————————————————————-
Lauren’s POV
I felt horrible after finding out I had basically slept through the entire day I was supposed to spend with Camila. She had probably imagined my stay differently and I was trying to find a way to make it up to her. Apparently she wasn’t mad though. She just cuddled up to me in the couch and I was happy to share some affection. Her silky hair fell perfectly and I loved running my hands through them. She started stroking my arm in return, giving me goose bumps.
“Did you have anything planned for us today? I feel so bad”, I confessed.
“It’s not a big deal, honestly. This right here is perfect. I don’t care what we do as long as I can be with you”, she replied and was still trying to make me feel better.
“I want to make it up to you. What can I do?”, I asked still deep in thought.
The younger woman lifted her head off my chest and came closer. A smile formed on my lips instantly because I knew she was coming in for a kiss now. If that was what she wanted, I would gladly oblige. My hand tangled up in her hair and pulled her closer when our lips met. I sighed with pleasure because her heavenly lower lip was trapped between mine. Her entire body weight rested on me but I loved feeling every inch of her.
I bit my lip when she kissed my jawline and went for my neck afterwards. There was no way I could deny that I was a little on edge after last night. Every little thing she did was causing an uproar in my body. I knew we wouldn’t be able to stop for a while if we started now and I had to get one thing done for work.
“Camila…”I breathed but she just kept kissing a very sensitive spot on my neck. “I have to do a video chat with Chelsea because of some upcoming events and…holy shit!”, I exclaimed suddenly, because Camila had settled one leg between mine and unexpectedly pushed her thigh right into the throbbing area. I gripped the light-brown hair and heard her laughing quietly.
“Trust me, I want to do this but I don’t want any more interruptions if we start”, I said shakily and heard her sigh quietly. “It won’t take long, promise.”
She got up reluctantly and I decided to go freshen up a bit before setting up the video conference with Chelsea. I hooked up my phone to Camila’s TV so Chelsea appeared on the big screen. I settled back on the couch with Camila who had made us some tea.
“Hey Chelsea”, Camila greeted the blond woman.
“Hey, you guys. How are you?”
We exchanged pleasantries for a while but then went back to business. I had a lot of appearances coming up and we needed to go over some promotional things. The last topic we had to cover were the Teen Choice Awards tomorrow. I would fly to LA with Sofi very early so we’d make it in time. The teenager needed some distraction and I was happy to help with the birthday present I had given to her. I had an idea though and decided to tell my PR Manager about it.
“What if I brought Camila with me as well?”, I suggested and saw the brown-eyed woman smiling at me. “I kind of feel bad because we didn’t get to spend that much time together and I’m sure they wouldn’t mind me bring one more person to the show.”
I looked back to the screen and saw Chelsea’s concerned face.
“You mean as your date? Like officially with red carpet and everything?”, Chelsea asked carefully.
“Yeah”, I replied simply but saw her growing uncomfortable. “You don’t think I should?”
“It’s just…as your friend, you know I am so happy for the both of you. But as your PR manager I would strongly advise you not go public with this right now.”
“Why?”, I got defensive immediately and crossed my arms.
“Because you’re about to release an album, your single just came out and people are going to think it’s a publicity stunt.”
Wow…that hurt for some reason. The rational part of my brain told me she had a point but my heart did not want to listen.
“Well, it’s not and I don’t give a fuck what people say”, I snapped and felt Camila putting one hand on my thigh to calm me down.
“I’m not trying to upset you, Lauren”, Chelsea said. “But it is my job to warn and prepare you. Are you ready to answer all of these questions that are going to come your way if you do this?”
“I’m just going to make sure they won’t be allowed to ask those questions. What else do I have management for?”, I argued.
“Then they’ll just make up stories, which is even worse”, the blonde countered instantly and my anger was building quickly.
“So I should hide away and pretend to be single? That’s fucked up and I don’t want to live a lie. Why would want to hide the one thing that actually makes me happy? I always take crap from everyone so this is not going to be worse”, my voice grew louder and more resentful.
“Lauren, relax”, Camila whispered and rubbed my leg.
“No!”, I almost yelled now and Camila looked at my phone.
“Can we call you back?”, she addressed Chelsea who agreed because she could probably see there was no getting through to me at this point. The video chat ended but I was still enraged.
“She has a point, Lauren”, the light-haired one said and I kinked an eyebrow.
“What?”
“You have worked so hard on the album and if we do this right now, it’s going to take away all the focus on your actual music. Don’t you think it’s better to wait until things settle down? We haven’t been together that long and technically we’ve seen each other only a few days and the media is going to scrutinize every little detail of us. I don’t want you to burden yourself with even more stress”, her voice spoke softly.
My temper was not one of my favorite traits about myself and no matter how much yoga I practiced; there were still moments like these where I would go ballistic on the inside. That stubborn part of my brain connected with my anger and that was a recipe for a fight.
“Great, of course you would want to hide”, I hissed and got up from the couch.
“What is that supposed to mean?”, she asked confused.
“This feels like a fucking déjà vu, Camila. You don’t want to deal with things so you’d rather run away from the issue than face it head on”, I kept going although I knew she wasn’t the one to blame in this. No one was but I had to vent.
“I’m not running away. This is not about me anymore. It’s about us and if you want to go public then I am okay with that. I am only saying that it might take away from everything you’ve worked so hard for”, she tried soothing me.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore”, I got defensive again.
“Lauren, stop”, Camila said and got up as well. She placed her hand on my cheek and forced me to look at her. “I’m not leaving you anymore. This is going to take some time for you to actually believe me, because I know how much I hurt you in the past but you’ll see it, I promise.”
I took a very deep breath and felt my anger dying down with every second she looked at me so tenderly. That was very rare because once I snapped there was a rather long phase of me being submerged in my rage. Those big brown eyes had caused so much of that anger and confusion in the past but they also had the opposite effect like now. I relaxed even more when she put her arms around my neck and hugged me tightly. Feeling her slender body against mine was the perfect remedy to my tension. We stood there for a while and just cooled off until Camila pulled away a little.
“So, was this our first official fight as a couple?”, she asked and succeeded in making me smile.
“I guess so”, I replied and smirked a little.
“When are we getting to the make up sex?”, Camila asked and I laughed wholeheartedly.
“God, you are such a perv”, I teased her but kissed her tempting lips softly.
“So, what do you want to do about this now?”, she asked after the kiss and shrugged. I was genuinely torn because I didn’t want to risk my relationship with Camila by putting too much pressure on it. Maybe she was right and we should wait. I wasn’t concerned that much with what people would say, but I was worried how it would affect our relationship. We couldn’t see each other that often and I was afraid of misunderstandings with the added scrutiny.
“I’m going to call Chelsea and tell her we won’t make it public just yet”, I gave in and sighed.
“It is better this way, I think. We’ll have enough time to make this official and then we can flaunt it wherever you want”, she said and placed another quick kiss on my lips.
My guilty conscience was starting to eat at me because I had gone off at Chelsea before. So I decided to call her right after and apologized for my little freak out. She wasn’t even mad and just happy we were able to settle things quickly. Afterwards I took a shower and that alone did wonders. I desperately needed one and felt like a new woman after the hot water had washed away the long sleeping hours. Camila originally wanted to go out for dinner but we had to change our plans because of the conversation with Chelsea. The paparazzi was crazy these days, even in Miami when they saw me. If they were to see me with her, I knew the plan to keep us under wraps for a while would fail immediately.
So we stayed in again but it wasn’t that bad. The most important thing was we had each other. I decided to make dinner for a change and we ended up cuddling on the couch while I read and she watched something on TV until we decided to go to bed. Camila was in the bathroom as I scrolled down my twitter feed on my phone and saw something that made my heart stop for a second. Someone had tweeted me a video of Shannon. Usually, I tried avoiding those things but my mind was racing when I saw the title of the song she apparently performed in the video: All I Want.
It was a song that I had written about Camila after the Hanna thing had happened. I had written it but was never able to perform it without getting too emotional. That was why I decided to give Shannon the rights to have it on her album. It was a good song but I hadn’t been able to do anything with it back then. Seeing that the young singer had chosen it for a performance was causing me a headache because I hadn’t heard it in so long. Obviously the blonde hadn’t known who the song was about back then and she probably didn’t care now. I was struggling but then put in my headphones and clicked on the video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dOCT7LjZAg
“All I want is nothing more
to hear you knocking at my door
‘cause if I could see your face once more
I could die as a happy woman I’m sure
When you said your last goodbye
I died a little bit inside
I lay in tears in bed all night
alone without you by my side
But If you loved me
why did you leave me
take my body
take my body
All I want is
all I need is
to find somebody
to find somebody
‘cause you brought out the best of me
a part of me I’d never seen
you took my soul wiped it clean
our love was made for movie screens
But If you loved me
why did you leave me
take my body
take my body
all I want is
all I need is
to find somebody
If you loved me
why did you leave me
take my body
take my body
all I want is
all I need is
to find somebody
to find somebody
like you”
My heart was bursting with all of these unwanted feelings coming back. The pain, anger and sadness of the time I had spent wondering why Camila would run away or be with someone else. The worst thing was that it still sparked that shred of insecurity in me about the younger one’s ways of distancing herself from me. I had made peace with her choice of not going public; at least that was I thought. Hearing the song, I felt the fear of this being another way of not wanting to commit fully to our relationship. God, my head was spinning and I had to block whatever negative feelings were starting to rise up and pulled off my headphones, placing my phone on the nightstand.
The damage was done, though. I rolled on to my side and closed my eyes in hopes the stupid thoughts would disappear. The bathroom door opened and I heard Camila approaching the bed and kept my eyes closed. I knew she wanted to enjoy our last night together. She had made that pretty clear but I couldn’t do it with the mixture of emotions inside me.
“Lauren?”, she whispered and I felt her settling behind me. “Are you awake?”
If I were to say yes, she would need an explanation why I didn’t want to sleep with her and I couldn’t give her one without hurting her feelings. So I pretended to be asleep and felt even more horrible. I just wouldn’t be able to go through with it right now. Camila sighed quietly and turned off the light before wrapping her arm around my waist, cuddling up to me from behind. Her body warmth felt good and made me calm down a bit.
I hated being this insecure because no one brought that out more than her. No matter how hard I tried to really forget everything that had happened, that little voice still warned me to be cautious sometimes. It would probably just need time; more time together especially. Unfortunately those times were rare and I would leave tomorrow morning for another few weeks. The thought alone was killing me, and almost made me regret my decision to not be close to her tonight and make it memorable. There was no going back now and I had to accept the fact there was still a little bit of doubt about Camila’s capability to commit to me permanently.