Lauren feels like she's falling.
She feels her body hit something warm and soft, something moving underneath her, but she's too exhausted to even lift her eyes open.
She falls back asleep.
//
Normani couldn't believe what she's seeing.
When Lauren asked to meet up for another Sunday brunch earlier in the week when Lauren called her to catch up:
("It's fucking labor day after day, Mani, I'm tired."
"Okay, Lo, because writing for an newspaper article is so tiresome."
"Bitch. You don't know how my boss works. And you do remember that I also write for the online blog, right?"
"Okay, Ms. Political Rants, 10AM this Sunday, then?")
The older woman didn't expect her best friend to ditch her and not pick up her multiple missed calls when Lauren was late to picking her up.
She also didn't expect to find her best friend still asleep, dead to the world, at 1PM on a Sunday when Normani let herself in with the spare key Lauren keeps taped on top of the door jamb.
So that's how Normani saw her best friend, sleeping on the floor, and on top of a dark brown werewolf who's staring at Normani dead on with a clear look that says help me.
"Oh my god," Normani huffs, dropping her bag by Lauren's bedroom door, rolling up her sleeves and chucking her heels to the side. She comes near, sees the drool dripping off of her best friend and matting the wolf's fur. Normani visibly cringes. This is so not one of Lauren's finest moments. "Let's get you out of under there, yeah buddy?"
Camila blows out a breath. She's been wanting to use the bathroom for two hours now.
But she also could've easily thrown the human to the ground if she rolled over.
And maybe she doesn't want to give up Lauren's weight and heat pressed up against her, snuggling closer at every shift Camila does when she tried to get away. But that was like three hours ago, so.
"Come on, Lo," Normani groans, hooking both arms under her best friend's armpits, hauling her up. She feels Lauren stir slightly, the wolf under her pushing upwards to help Normani. "Sweetheart, you gotta wake up sometime this century, come on."
She props Lauren up against the side of the bed, watching the dark wolf slink from under Lauren and stretch its body near the door before it disappeared to somewhere inside of the apartment.
She hears a door close, and then the unmistakable sound of a toilet flushing. Smart, Normani thought.
"Mani?" Lauren croaked out, her limbs feeling heavy and body feeling warm from her sleep. "What're you doing here?"
Normani rolls her eyes but she reaches for the glass of water Lauren keeps on her bedside table and handing it over to her best friend, leaning back against the side of the bed as she sits next to Lauren. "Brunch, remember?"
Lauren's eyes widens. "Oh shit, Mani, I'm so sorry," Lauren quickly stands up, rushing over to her closet. "I can get ready in like ten minutes, then we can go."
"Laur, it's fine," Normani laughs, watching her best friend run back and fro from her closet, murmuring different pieces of clothing under her breath.
"No, I swear, we'll have like a late lunch, just wait for me."
Lauren exits her bedroom, sees Camila sitting at the end of the hallway, tail thumping at odd intervals by the apartment floor. The wolf turns its head to the side, a light going off on Lauren's head.
"Shit you're—Mani!" she calls out to her best friend, leaving the bathroom door open for her voice to carry out into the apartment. "Can you give Camz water and something to eat? There's a dog bowl by the rack and leftover pizza in the fridge."
Normani raises an eyebrow, follows the wolf into the kitchen as it sits in the middle, looking up at Normani.
She swears she sees a smile.
"So," she starts, heating the last two slices of pizza left in the box, leaning against the counter and watching as the wolf drink up. ", you're Camz?"
The microwave dings, the sound of Lauren's shower carrying all the way to the kitchen, and the wolf's tail hitting the counter cabinets in uneven beats.
Normani's voice hardens. "I know you're still human, somehow," she says, placing the pizza by the wolf. ", and I'm sure you know that Lauren trusts you, immensely. Enough for her to turn her back to you when she's asleep." Normani breathes in, wary of the way that Lauren turns off the shower, cabinets opening and closing inside the bathroom. "And I swear, if you so much as hurt her or use her trust against her, I won't hesitate to do the same to you."
Lauren skids along the floor, hearing her best friend talking with the wolf but not understanding a word. She sees Normani looking at Camila, the wolf giving a nod as she stares back at her best friend.
"Did I miss something?" she asks, noticing the weird mood in the kitchen.
Normani, satisfied for the mean time, smiles at her best friend. "Nothing, just talking to Camz?", she finishes with a question lacing her words and Lauren tries not to face palm—the point of their brunch is to fill her best friend in on what happened in the past week that Camila's been back.
"I'm getting to that," Lauren says, lacing up her boots by the door, an idea forming in her head. "And is it alright if she tags along? There's a new place to eat that I want to take you to."
//
Dinah's waiting by the side of the road by the time Camila's scent reaches her nose.
Camila's flying down the road, running so fast that it only took Dinah a second to stand up on four legs, before Camila crashed into her, sending them both flying across the parking lot.
They're snarling and growling at each other, nipping at each other's legs playfully and biting like the wolves they are, when another scent reaches Dinah's nose. She stops in her place, Camila raising a ear in question at her beta's sudden change in mood.
Dinah sniffs, going around Camila before she settles on the top of the alpha's head, sniffing there once, tasting the scent on her tongue.
"Dinah?" she hears Camila ask, snout nudging against the side of her neck. "You okay?"
Before Dinah can answer, the scent assaults her nose far closer now, rather than the lingering scent on Camila's head.
She sees Camila head towards the car now turning from the road and into the parking lot, sitting by the driver's door patiently, looking back towards Dinah for a moment saying you're acting weird.
And then there she is.
Her scent reminds Dinah of cinnamon barks, hot cocoa, and musk.
She's gorgeous.
And she smells like mate.
//
Normani had about two seconds to get her feet on the ground before there's another werewolf there.
Light brown fur, brown eyes flashing blue for a moment, before the wolf stands on its hind legs, trapping Normani to the side of the car. She sees a tongue roll out of the wolf's mouth, tail swishing harshly back and forth behind it, looking at Normani eagerly.
"Uh," she hesitates, noting the way she hears Lauren whispering with Camila—she learned the wolf's name on the car ride over as Lauren gushes about the wolf running alongside the car—", hi?" she settles, suddenly yelping when the wolf licks a wet stripe on the side of her cheek.
And then the wolf hops off of her, circling once, and then there's a naked woman in front of her.
A hot naked woman.
Oh god.
"Hi," the woman says, blonde hair whipping in front of her face, mouth stretched in a grin and the tips of her ears are red. "I'm Dinah Jane and can I take you out on a date? Like, right now?"
What?
//
The second hand embarrassment is so painful to watch.
Ally sighs, taking out a long robe from under the host's podium—that's 90% decor and 10% used—near the diner's entrance, before she marches outside, catching the end of Dinah's question and the look of pure shock at the woman's face.
She glares at Camila, who's sitting by Lauren's feet a few paces away, snorting at her beta.
"Hi," Ally intervenes, chucking the cloth at Dinah. "I'm so sorry for her springing up on you like that. I'm Ally that's Dinah Jane, and I'm assuming you've met Camila?" When the other woman just nods dumbfounded at her, she continues. "She usually doesn't attack newcomers with date offers, so forgive her—"
"I'm being, like, a hundred percent honest with my offer though," Dinah breathes, tying the robe, and sidling up to the woman, offering a small smile.
"Uh," the woman says, looking between the Ally and Dinah before looking at Lauren with a clear message for help and Ally feels momentarily bad when she sees Dinah's face fall. ", how about we eat first?" She then turns to Dinah, smiling slightly. "I'll assume that you're a regular, anything you can recommend?"
//
If Camila's shifted, she swears she would've been laughing so hard and loudly with how Dinah's looking like an actual lovesick pup.
She catches Dinah glaring at her every now and then, face softening when Normani asks a question or even so much as speaks.
She wonders if she's like that with Lauren, too.
//
Lauren comes home late on Thursday, keys dropping once before the door opens, and Camila's suddenly on her feet, growling.
"Camz," Lauren almost screams, jumping in place and admittedly a little scared when she hears the werewolf growl. ", what's wrong? Is something the matter?" She asks, dropping her bag by the door, as well as the bouquet of flowers on top of the counter.
The werewolf follows her hands, before pouncing forward, snatching the flowers out of the counters and saunters outside.
Lauren is quick to follow, heart racing when she saw Camila shaking her head violently side to side, letting the petals fall to the ground. She's got a theory inside her mind on why Camila did it, but she's saving that one for herself.
Or maybe she can pry something out of Dinah in the future.
They're sitting in silence over dinner. Camila's more growly than usual, Lauren notes, eyeing the way the wolf's nose would twitch before growling lowly, and then blowing out a large breath from the nose like she's sneezing.
When they've finished with their dinner, plates messily thrown on top of each other on one end of the coffee table, Lauren watches when Camila hops from her place on the couch, sniffing around and then growling at a piece of petal stuck under her heels.
So that's what it is, Lauren thinks, chuckling at the werewolf as she picks the petal up, making a show of opening the window and letting the petal fall outside. Camila huffs, walking away slinking inside to the darkness of Lauren's bedroom.
"You're not sleeping without brushing your teeth, Camz," Lauren tells her, seeing the werewolf's snout peek out from out of her bedroom door. "Get your ass to the bathroom, I'll be there after I finish washing these dishes."
And so to say that Lauren was surprised when she heard the bathroom door close, lock, and the when the water starts running with the unmistakable sound of teeth being brushed, Lauren runs to the bathroom door so fast she thinks she's left skid marks on the floor.
She takes a breath in, tries the door knob and isn't surprised that the door's locked. "Camz?" But then the brushing sounds continues and then Camila gargling. Lauren doesn't think she'll ever be happy with hearing someone gargle.
A smile creeps up into Lauren's mouth as she leans on the opposite wall, sliding down as she sits facing the bathroom door. There's an awful amount of warmth spreading to her chest with the thought of Camila shifting knowing that Lauren can reach for her keys and open the bathroom door—the amount of trust the wolf is putting on Lauren's hands right now makes her feel pretty damn good.
"Camz?" she asks again when she hears the water stop.
She did not expect a hmm? floating between the cracks under the bathroom door and into her ears.
It was just a fucking hum but Lauren could already feel it down to her bones, making her giddy.
She's not even mad when she hears the door unlock and is only mildly disappointed when she sees Camila has shifted back, tail hitting Lauren twice as the wolf passes her by on the way back to the bedroom.
When Lauren's settled back down on her bed, she figured she owes Camila an explanation for the flowers earlier.
"They're from Ty, an ex of mine," Lauren says, hearing the thumping of Camila's tail stop as ears and head perks up in sudden interest but not expecting the low growl. ", the flowers, I mean. They're from him. We work together but he's working on a different department so we don't really run into each other. Except for today, he's, uh, asking me to get back together with him again."
She looks at the way Camila slumps back down on the floor, growl ceasing. "I won't be getting back together with him soon," she says, adding a haste, so don't worry about it at the end because she feels like she owes Camila that.
She dangles a hand, smiles at the way Camila rests a paw near, licks the back of her palm once in return to Lauren's night Camz.
//
i might update again on my birthday (which is this saturday, if anyone wants to know) but we'll seeeeee
i've had a particularly hard time to get this chapter out so i hope that you guys can send me prompts of what you'd like to see and stuff
also!! head over on my tumblr: fxbricxtedrexlity to send the prompts
and my ao3: fxbricxtedrexlity and leave kudos because why the hell not?
AND ALSO!! check out my other shit, too much, it's a camren friends with benefits au and it'll mean a lot if you checked it out
thanks for reading and have a good one!!