Camila gathered up the paper plates and pizza box and whispered to Lauren, "I should go." She nodded in the direction of the sofa, where Kyle had fallen asleep. Lauren looked ready to join her.
Lauren had been drifting, her feet curled under her on the sofa, a baseball game on television. Camila sat on the floor, her back against the front of the couch, where she'd been since they'd finished the pizza an hour earlier. It had been an unexpectedly pleasant evening.
Voice still heavy with lassitude, Lauren said, "I still have to take Pooch for his nightly neighborhood reconnaissance. If you wait until I get Kyle upstairs, we'll walk you home,"
"Okay." Camila glanced down in the direction of her left arm, which was still restrained against her side. "I'd help carry her, but—"
"It's no problem. I'm used to it." Lauren smiled and got to her feet. "But thanks. If you could give Phyllis a hand taking that stuff into the kitchen, that would be great."
"Sure." Camila continued with the cleanup detail and watched as Lauren easily lifted Kyle, who curled up into her mother's arms without waking. It was obvious that the maneuver was second nature to them both. When Lauren headed upstairs, Camila went into the kitchen.
"Where should I put the trash?" she asked Phyllis.
"The bin is underneath that cabinet there to your right, but you don't have to do that, dear. Just leave it on the counter."
Camila shook her head. "It's no problem. I've got it."
"It was nice of you to have dinner delivered. And especially to bring the model for Kyle." Phyllis smiled fondly. "She loved it."
Faintly embarrassed, Camila shrugged. "It was the least I could do after all of your hospitality last night and this morning." And I wanted to see Lauren again.
"Well, you are very welcome, any time." Phyllis leaned against the counter and observed Camila with interest. "How old are you, dear?"
"Twenty-eight." Camila waited, curious.
"You seem older than that."
"Really? Why? Most people think I'm younger."
"Well, let's see—you just moved here, you just started a new job, and you suddenly find yourself temporarily incapacitated." Phyllis nodded toward Camila's shoulder and laughed. "Nevertheless, you seem to be taking it all in stride. That's pretty impressive."
"Not really." Camila laughed. "I'm still living out of cartons, I'm worried about missing work because of my shoulder, and even without that, Lauren might end up firing—" She broke off, blushing uncomfortably. "Uh..."
"As I said," Phyllis stated evenly, allowing the reference to Lauren and Camilla's professional business to pass, "you're remarkably calm."
Settling on the stool beside the table, Camila contemplated Phyllis's words. "I'm not sure I'm actually calm. I just seem to have this place inside me where things stop moving for a while. I go there, I guess, when everything outside of me is moving too fast."
Phyllis smiled softly at the simple way Camila described something so essential. "I think there are a lot of people who would pay a lot of money to find a way to do something like that. That must be helpful when you're performing surgery."
"Yes," Camila replied pensively. "In the operating room, even in the middle of a trauma, I can feel myself go there...everything becomes very clear and very sharp and very, very focused."
"A truly important skill, I imagine." Phyllis was captivated by Camila's expression, a look both amazed and sad at the same time.
"I don't know if it's a skill." Camila sighed softly, giving Phyllis a weary smile. "It just seems to be the way I'm made."
Lauren leaned against the door from the hall, listening to the tail end of the conversation between her mother-in-law and a woman whose appeal she was finding very hard to resist. From where she stood, she could see the brunette's face in profile, and, listening to her speak of surgery, she recalled their first meeting over the body of the gunshot victim. That day, her very first impression of Camila had been one of intensity and competence along with a healthy dose of surgical arrogance. Now when she looked at her, she could still sense those things, but it was Camila's exquisite tenderness and innate sensitivity that pulled at Lauren's heart. Seeing the melancholy darken the gorgeous features, Lauren wanted nothing more in that moment than to cross the room and put her arms around her. You 're hurting, I can feel it. God, how I hate to be the one to hurt you more.
Feigning a mood far lighter than she felt, Lauren crossed the kitchen and announced, "She's out for the count." Glancing at Phyllis, she added, "I'll just take Pooch for a short run around the block."
"No need to hurry. I'll just watch television until you get back. I don't have anything else planned." Nodding to Camila, she said, "You get some rest now. I'm sure everything will be fine."
Everyone keeps saying that. But I still don't see how. Camila got to her feet. "Good night, Phyllis. It was good to see you again."
Having heard his name a moment before, Pooch had rushed to the back door and now sat expectantly, tail wagging, head cocked at an angle and bright black eyes fixed on Lauren's face. A fow-pitched whine reverberated in his throat.
"Just a second," Lauren grump in the dog's direction as she fished his lead out of the closet. "God, you'd never think that a walk around the block, smelling every little bit of odious detritus, could be so exciting."
Camila laughed out loud. "My life should be so simple."
As Lauren clipped the lead to the dog's collar, she laughed along with Camila. Together, they walked down the back steps with the dog forging happily ahead.
It was just after nine, and it was not yet completely dark. Here and there the faint echoes of neighborhood children still at play drifted in the air. The aroma of a late-night supper on a backyard grill floated on a faint breeze. Camila took a slow deep breath, and amazingly, felt some of her tension ebb as she looked at the woman beside her. Lauren had changed into another pair of shorts and a baggy PMC T-shirt. She looked like the medical student that Camila had mistaken her for on first sight. She looked beautiful.
As if feeling Camila's gaze upon her, Lauren turned her head and looked into those brown eyes, smiling.
"What?"
Camila considered not answering, or not acknowledging the truth. But there wasn't room inside her to keep one more secret—not from herself, and not from Lauren. "With everything that's going on in my life right now, I can't figure out why I should feel so happy, but I do. I think it has something to do with being with you."
For a few seconds, Lauren was speechless. From anyone else, it would have sounded like a come-on line, but Camila had delivered it with such quiet sincerity that Lauren knew that it wasn't. And because of that, she did not dismiss the sentiment with her usual quick brush-off.
There had been a few women over the years who had expressed interest in getting to know her socially. Some had been acquaintances of hers and Terry's, and they had waited what probably seemed to them like an appropriate length of time before calling to ask her out to dinner or a party. Others were women she met at the hospital or at neighborhood social functions who knew nothing of her past, at least not from her. Lauren was certain that if anyone had asked around, they would have been able to hear some version of what had happened to her lover. It was not a story that she shared easily. She had said no to all of them, and eventually, the invitations, at least for dates, had stopped.
"Sorry," Camila said quietly as the silence grew. "I didn't mean to offend—"
"No," Lauren said swiftly. "No, you didn't. I...enjoy your company, too."
Lauren knew that she could leave it at that, and sensed that Camila would not press her for anything more. But that somehow seemed unfair, and Camila had had so much unfairness to deal with lately that Lauren could not add to it. "I do enjoy your company, Camz. More than I have anyone's in a very long time. But—"
"Lo, you don't need to explain—"
"I know that." Lauren reached over and brushed her fingers down Camila's arm. "I just want to."
Having said that, Lauren didn't know how to go on. It wasn't as if Camila had even once intimated that she was interested in anything beyond friendship. But it was impossible to deny that some kind of attraction existed between them. It went beyond mutual respect or friendship. There was an emotional and, yes, a physical pull that had her doing things she wouldn't have conceived of a few weeks before. For God s sake, I almost kissed her yesterday afternoon in the ER!
Taking a deep breath, Lauren squared her shoulders and plunged ahead. "I haven't been...involved with anyone...any woman,..since Terry died. I haven't wanted to be. It never even occurred to me."
Camila's stomach dropped and her pulse rate soared. She was pretty certain that she didn't want to hear what Lauren was about to say, but she kept quiet, knowing that she had to. While the dog stopped to inspect each board in a picket fence, she and Lauren slowed until they were barely moving.
"Terry and I were together from our junior year in high school." Lauren laughed softly. "Phyllis came home unexpectedly one afternoon and found us in the act in a hammock on the back porch. I was never so scared in my life."
"I can imagine," Camila replied. "Or, actually, I can't. Jesus."
"While we were scrambling for our clothes, she informed us that if I was staying for dinner, it would be ready in an hour." Lauren pushed her hair behind her ear with her fingers, watching Pooch try to pull a candy wrapper out from underneath a bush on the other side of the fence. "We weren't exactly sure if she meant I should stay or what. Finally, we just decided to tough it out."
"I can't see Phyllis giving you a hard time."
"I could almost see her coming to a decision when she discovered us. She loved Terry like crazy, and that's what mattered the most to her." Lauren gave a tug on Pooch's leash, and they all started walking again. "She told us to be careful, because not everyone would be accepting of us being together." She laughed again. "And she told us if we planned on sleeping together, we should do it indoors, preferably in Terry's room."
"Whoa. You got lucky,"
Lauren nodded thoughtfully. "Yes, I really did. On all counts."
Camila couldn't miss the love in Lauren's voice, for Phyllis and for Terry. It was strange, because it didn't hurt the way she'd thought it would. It was hard to begrudge Lauren's happiness, with anyone. Camila cleared her throat. "I'm really sorry, about Terry."
"Did anyone tell you?" Lauren stopped at the corner of the intersection of her street and Camila's and leaned a shoulder against a large tree. Her face was partially in shadow, but Camila's was highlighted by the glow from a nearby streetlight. Lauren was glad for the cover of darkness, because she wasn't certain what Camila would see in her face.
"No." Camila wanted to step forward, to touch Lauren in some way, if only to offer a small comfort. But she stood still, letting Lauren control the moment. Some part of her wanted to tell the other Latina doctor that it wasn't necessary to explain, but she also knew that Lauren would only tell her as much as she wanted her to know.
"We were together almost nine years. For the first few years after high school, we lived with Phyllis. My parents weren't crazy about my relationship with Terry, but they also knew they couldn't change it. I went to college and medical school right here in the city."
As she spoke, Pooch must have heard the change in her voice because he came to sit by her side, pressing close against her thigh. She dropped her fingers onto the top of his head and slowly stroked him.
"For a long time, I couldn't decide if I wanted to be a doctor or an architect, but Terry only ever wanted to build things. She was so good at it, and she'd been helping guys in the neighborhood work on their houses since she was a kid. Right after high school, she started in with a construction crew, got her union card, and before long, she was running the crew." Lauren laughed. "I don't think they even realized she was taking over until one day, she was just the boss."
Camila had a feeling that Lauren and Terry were very much alike, but she kept her own counsel.
"One day..." Lauren's throat suddenly tightened, and she struggled for the words. "Ah God, I'm sorry."
"Lauren," Camila said quietly.
"I'm okay. Really."
It was killing Camila to hear the pain in her voice and to be helpless to assuage it. "My house is right up the street, What do you say we go sit on the porch for a few minutes?"
"Yes. Okay." Lauren gave Pooch's lead a tug and fell into step beside Camila. A moment later, she followed Camila down the narrow alley between the brunette's building and the neighboring one to the rear of the house.
"You'd better take my hand," Camila said when they reached the stairs that led up to the deck off her kitchen. "It's dark back here. Will Pooch be okay?"
"He'll be fine. He'd climb trees if I'd let him." Lauren slid her hand into Camila's as they made their way up to the second-floor landing.
Once there, she released Camila's hand and sat shoulder to shoulder with her on the top step, while Pooch stretched out behind them, pressing close. It was fully dark now, and the sky overhead was clear. The moon was out, the stars were bright, and the night was as gorgeous as any summer night could be.
Lauren took a breath and tried to see past the memories of that morning when they had brought Terry into the emergency room. "She was in the basement of the house her crew was rehabbing, inspecting the joists. Something happened, no one knows what for sure, but a supporting beam came down while she was under it."
Camila felt the fine tremors that coursed through Lauren where their shoulders touched, and she gently placed just the tips of her fingers against Lauren's knee.
"It was a freak accident." When she continued, Lauren's voice was firm, but hollow, completely devoid of emotion. "The beam hit her in the back of the neck. Just like that. From one second to the next—she was here, and then—she wasn't."
"I'm so sorry."
"They brought her to the ER, but there was nothing I could do."
The ache in Camila's chest intensified, and without realizing it, she reached for Lauren's hand. Lauren's fingers when they closed around Camila's were cold, and Lauren drew the later's hand against her middle and held it there, as if warming her hand would somehow ease her pain. She couldn't bear to think about Lauren having suffered Terry's loss, let alone feeling responsible in some way.
Lauren shuddered as if shaking off a dream and gave a small tremulous laugh. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to tell you all of that. I never have before."
"That's okay," Camila said gently. "Are you all right?"
"A little embarrassed."
"God, why?"
"You certainly didn't ask for my life story." Carefully, Lauren withdrew her fingers from Camila's grip, instantly feeling the chill return, even though the air was warm.
"You said we were friends, right?"
"Yes. I did." Lauren shook her head, feeling slightly disoriented. "And what I started out wanting to say was that I value your friendship, but that's all I want. All I can offer."
"I understand." Camila kept her voice steady and even, imagining that Lauren must be vulnerable, emotionally raw, after revisiting Terry's death. She didn't want to do or say anything to add to her discomfort. "I'm so sorry about Terry, Lo. I feel privileged that you would trust me enough to tell me about her."
"You made it easy." Lauren turned in the small space until she could face Camila. Their knees touched, and although she wanted to reach out and take Camila's hand again, she did not. "You're a remarkable woman, Camila Cabello."
"I'm not so sure of that, but thank you."
Lauren did touch her then, just a brush of fingers against Camila's cheek. "I'm sorry, sorrier than I can say, about the situation at work. I'll do my best to clear it up quickly, I promise."
"I know you will." Camila stood, because she needed the distance to say goodbye. "Will you call me as soon as you know anything?"
Standing as well, Lauren nodded. "Of course. It might take a day or two until I can meet with the appropriate people."
"I'll be here." Camila tipped her head toward the house.
"Good night then." Lauren started down the stairs, Pooch scrambling after her. Several steps down, she turned and looked back up to where Camila stood silhouetted against the night. "It helped, telling you about Terry. Thank you for that, Camz."
"You're welcome. Be careful going home."
Then Camila turned and disappeared into the house.
* * * * *
Lauren let herself in the back door, hung up Pooch's leash, and walked through the house into the living room. Phyllis sat on the couch watching one of the pseudo-forensic cop dramas with the volume turned down low. Lauren leaned over and kissed the top of her head, then sat down with her. "Everything quiet?"
"Not a peep."
"She could sleep through anything."
"That she could." The final credits rolled and Phyllis clicked the remote to shut off the television, then turned to regard Honor. "Did you have a nice walk?"
"Yes, it's a beautiful night."
Phyllis waited, wondering at the brooding expression on Lauren's face. The explanation wasn't long in coming.
"I told Camila about Terry. About what happened to her."
"Did she ask?" Phyllis kept her surprise to herself. Camila rarely discussed Terry's death with anyone.
"No, she didn't. I just...wanted to tell her."
"How do you feel?" Phyllis asked gently, sliding closer until she could thread her arm around her daughter in law.
"Sad." Lauren rested her cheek against Phyllis's shoulder and sighed. "I miss her."
"Me, too." Phyllis gave a little squeeze. "You okay?"
"Yes, I am." Surprisingly, Lauren realized that she was. Terry's loss hurt to the depths of her soul, and probably always would. But the sharp edges of her pain, the ones that made her bleed, were tempered now in a way they never had been before. She wasn't certain when that had happened, but it had taken telling Camila to make her realize it was so.
"How was Camila with it all?"
"She was wonderful."
* * * * *
Camila tried to get comfortable, but it was impossible. She'd taken off the shoulder immobilizer in an attempt to find a position in which she could hope to fail asleep. After three Tylenols, her shoulder still throbbed insistently, but that wasn't what kept her awake. She couldn't stop thinking about Lauren, Lauren and Terry. Childhood sweethearts—fairy-tale lovers. It made sense, now, that Lauren still wore Terry's ring.
The love in Lauren's voice had been unmistakable, and the pain that rippled beneath every memory obviously unmitigated by time. Camila reminded herself of her own words the very first time she had seen Lauren Jauregui. Never get involved with a married woman.
Now, when her career was in the balance and she already felt more than she should for the woman who controlled her future, it was definitely time to heed her own advice.
AN: Opps, where back to square one again.... Sorry guys, hope you keep on reading though. :)