"a reason for you to stay?" she chuckles emptily. lauren feels it kicking her rib cages. that's a sign, isn't it?
"it'll hurt. it'll hurt thinking about you wearing someone else's favourite shirt, humming someone else's favourite song, shouting someone else's name when you'd come home every night. you- you bring life to empty spaces, voids. and i'm not sure i can watch everything slowly fall apart," camila pauses to stare at the girl who gave her the world for a thousand something days.
"i don't know what you'll gain from me if you stay, because no one really gets what goes through your mind, right? but one winter you said that this wasn't a give and take. it wasn't, it's not, but i'm not sure if it'll remain like that if you stay,"
"but i'm offering you what's right in front of your eyes, and if it's not enough, then hell, it is what it is. you're free to walk out, but please, don't ever look for me again."
lauren can't resist angsty confessions. she'd always cry and mop around for days watching romance chick flicks, and camila was better than her favourite movies. she knows she's ugly cried and camila has seen it more times than her mother ever did.
lauren knows camila. she was a college student who teases lauren to no end, a video game junkie who hasn't got her life planned out, an indecisive teen who breaks their furniture more often than the average person, a competitive girl who will never give up on winning even in the littlest competitions.
but she was also the one who'd run back to their dorms from the other side of the campus just to meet lauren on time. she was also the one who'd be willing to have water gun fights in the auditorium. she was also the one who'd drop everything if it meant having lauren sleeping in her arms. she was the one who gave lauren every bit of her heart even when lauren doesn't deserve it.
and maybe, those are more than enough reasons to stay.
so lauren kisses her pink lips one last time and walks out the door without looking back.
camila remembers warm hands and tear-stained cheeks.
and now, six years and who knows how many months after, she's dead in her tracks staring at the same eyes who left her with a shattered heart and destructive thoughts.
"cat got your tongue?" the honeyed girl asks with a familiar glint in her eyes.
little did she know camila knows exactly what to say.
but she would never admit that.
camila forces an empty chuckle to erupt from her throat and lauren still remembers the difference between real and fake, yet she keeps it to himself.
instead she reaches her hands to camila's shoulders and pulls her into a timeless embrace. maybe it's lauren's way of saying 'hey, i still care about you,' and maybe it lasted for two seconds or maybe it lasted the amount of time camila spent blaming herself for everything that happened, but that's a start.
camila feels comfortable in her own skin once again.
"Hey!" an unfamiliar voice rang through their ears only to find another woman with plump lips and a confused gaze piercing through camila's soul.
camila realizes that she doesn't stand a chance. not anymore.