For the following week Camille had suffered through the immense embarrassment that anyone would feel after facing rejection; she lost much of her confidence when it came to daily activities, and even worse, her job. She even found herself paranoid that others could sense the significant drop in her self-esteem - as if the failure had an aroma that they could smell, or it was written in bright permanent marker all over her skin.
It took a particularly long conversation with her grandma before she realised the extent of her mental slump. It had been difficult to deal with the mortification, but she slowly realised that self-pity wasn't going to change anything either. The fact was that Arthur didn't reciprocate her feelings, and she wasn't going to dwell on that for any longer than necessary. Camille had more important things to worry about anyway; like that report on the supposedly 'spontaneous' fire that she had been delaying...or the red-head wandering around the city as if she were completely lost.
Camille's grip tightened on her steering wheel and she eased her foot off the accelerator, much to the dismay of the cars behind her, then slowly crept forward until she could clearly see the woman in the mass of people. Realisation hit Camille like a truck on the freeway, and it took a great deal of effort to not accidentally crash herself into the myriad of drivers passing by. It was Mera, and she was staring into a shop window as if it might move if she even blinked for too long. She touched a finger against the smooth glass and flinched at its solidness - she had been expecting her hand to go straight through it like the surface of the ocean.
The police vehicle rolled to a halt in the parking lane and Camille slowly rolled her window to yell. "Hey! Need a glass of water?"
Mera jumped at the familiar voice and swiftly turned around. Her eyes lit up at the sight of Camille inside of the moving metal contraption Surface-dwellers used to travel. She shuffled towards the officer, gaining even more attention from the people passing by as she cut right through the crowds. It was already difficult to overlook her in that glimmering, skintight Atlantean armour but her cluelessness towards the world above water certainly didn't help.
"Thank Poseidon! I thought I'd never find you!" Mera exclaimed, watching with confusion as Camille reached over to open the passenger door. She stared at the metal arm for a few seconds, then gave it a firm poke. The door wobbled on its hinges and Mera held her arms out as if she were ready to attack at any moment.
"Umm...Mera?" Camille said, grabbing the other woman's attention for a few brief seconds. "It's not gonna do anything...it's a door. It's inanimate."
Mera's arms fell back at her sides limply and she huffed. "That's a weird looking door."
Camille glanced at the metalwork with a raised eyebrow. "Is it?"
"They're rounder in Atlantis but it's rare that we use them at all." Mera stumbled closer to the car, eyes never leaving the subject of her concern. "We have more efficient methods."
"That new embassy building you built had a pretty human-looking door..."
"That's because Arthur insisted that we make everything as 'close to home' as possible for our guests." Mera bit her lip. "Still didn't look like this though."
"Yeah cars are a little different." Camille sighed. "Hop inside, we can talk a little less publicly."
Mera only now seemed to realise the dozens of eyes that were fixed on her. Some had even whipped their phones out and started recording her. The existence of Atlanteans had recently been revealed to the public, and it sparked an entire network of different conversations. People were scared, but also curious. It was inevitable that someone soaked in sea water and reacting strangely to the surface would attract a lot of attention.
With much hesitation, Mera ducked into the vehicle and slid onto the empty seat. Her gaze flickered to everything within; the gear shift, the speedometer, the dashboard, and the radio. It was by no means similar to the Submarine, but certainly of the same purpose. Transportation. Mera seemed to relax after assessing the lack of danger, and instead turned to the many buttons in front of her. She hit one and music started blaring through the main street. The Atlantean swiftly covered her ears with her hands and squealed like a banshee in confusion.
Camille turned the radio back off and tapped her finger against the wheel as she stared at the incredibly concerned Mera. "What was that?!" She yelled in alarm.
"It's a song. You know...music." Camille answered.
"You call that music." Mera scoffed.
"Come on, dude. Stone Cold Crazy by Queen! It's awesome!" Camille encouraged, turning the volume down before switching it back on and bobbing her head to the guitar.
"Your Queen sings this?" Mera said, almost appalled by the thought. "But it's so loud...and it sounds like a man."
"It is a man." Camille shook her head and decided against trying to explain it to the Atlantean. "Never mind. Can you please shut the door?"
Mera frowned, but attempted to comply by placing a solitary finger on the armrest and slowly pulling it inward. The door barely made a sound and Camille smiled awkwardly at the cautious woman. "Umm...could you maybe do it a little harder? It didn't shut properly."
Mera nodded her understanding, and this time she pushed the door open only to slam it closed so violently that the entire vehicle almost toppled over. It rocked threateningly from side to side, but that was only second to the loud smashing noise that pierced the air as the window's glass shuttered. Camille closed her eyes so tightly that she thought they'd never open again, and when they finally did she was met with a door that was almost completely caved in. Camille blinked with a complete lack of emotion, because quite simply, she didn't know how to possibly react to that.
"Is it suppose to do that?" Mera enquired innocently and Camille finally started feeling the dread weighing on her chest. How was she going to explain this to the chief?
The officer took a few very deep breaths to calm her rattled nerves. "No it's not, but that doesn't matter anymore."
Desperate to get away from the awe-struck eyes of the large crowd Mera had lured, Camille quickly rejoined the wave of traffic creeping down the wide road. Whilst Camille was silently stressing over the now unsalvageable door, Mera sat upright in the leather-bound seat with an expression of complete distaste on her face; eyes narrowed, nose scrunched and lips tugged into a scowl.
"I can't believe you call this music." She stated in revolt.
Camille glared at the woman out of the corner of her eye. "Hey, listen, you're on my turf now. And up here we don't insult Queen...ever. Especially not in my car."
Mera huffed, crossing her arms and glaring at the radio as if the sound might morph into a physical form and crawl from the device to assassinate her. Camille, noticing her unease, committed the unthinkable crime of skipping a Queen song. Instead, Phil Collins made his way through the speakers, and as Camille hummed, Mera looked a little less disgusted.
"Well, this is better...I suppose." She said, unwinding the stress tensing in her shoulders. "Do you still have that glass of water?"
Camille's forehead wrinkled. "Oh, that was just a joke..."
"A joke? I don't understand..." Mera stared at her as if this was some massive betrayal. "So you don't have any water? Why offer if you can't give it to me?"
Camille felt as if she had suddenly been burdened with all of the stress that Mera had been freed of. Her nails dug into the cover over her steering wheel and her back ached from the tension she was holding in the muscles there. "I'll go get you some. There's a Burger King near here I think. First you need to tell me what you're doing here though."
Mera's attention had been directed out of the massive hole in the car door where the window used to be. The scenery slipped by in a blur of tall buildings, shops, and crowds larger than she could ever imagine. More overwhelming than that was the strong wind blowing in her face; it intensified with the speed of the car. Mera had never experienced the strong breeze in such a way, and so she would take large gulps of it - making it fairly difficult to breathe. "I came to see you."
"Me?" Camille said in obvious surprise. "Why?"
"Well, you know how I mentioned before that Arthur wants this embassy in Atlantis to be perfectly fitted to the humans coming down?" Mera said, finally managing to tear her gaze away from outside and fix them on Camille. "The problem is I don't know much about humans."
"Could've fooled me." Camille smirked sarcastically.
"Whatever." Mera groaned. "Anyway, I need a surface-dweller's opinion."
"Can't you just ask Arthur? He'd know what you need."
Mera sighed. "I tried, but he's the king now. He has no free time at all."
The officer rolled her shoulders uncomfortably, shifting in her seat at least four times before finally replying. "I wish I could help, but I'm pretty sure Arthur banished me the last time I spoke to him."
"Oh please." Mera chuckled with amusement. "Do you know how many times he's banished me? Too many to count. I just refuse to leave. He always changes his mind eventually."
"Something tells me he won't this time."
"Won't know until you try." The Atlantean insisted with a grin. There was something about her expression that made Camille paranoid that she knew exactly what was going on between her and Arthur. "You never let him boss you around before. Why start now?"
Camille exhaled heavily, the memory of her last encounter with Arthur weighing heavily on her mind. Thankfully, the large sign for Burger King came into view before Camille could feel too defeated over Mera's words though. She entered the drive-thru, gladdened that there weren't many others there.
"Welcome to Burger King, what can I get you?" A voice echoed through the speaker, making Mera jump in her seat. It didn't take her long to figure out where the sound had come from, and when she did it was quite a shock.
"Just a bottle of water thanks." Camille replied, leaning over the bewildered woman to ensure she'd be heard.
"Would you like that in a meal or by itself?"
The officer had barely opened her mouth to reply before Mera shot her an enthusiastic look. "Can we get the meal?"
"You won't like the food here, I can already tell."
With an expression that wasn't fitting of a grown woman, Mera mumbled something under her breathe and shot a glare in Camille's direction. "I'm not a fussy eater."
Despite Camille's best efforts, Mera had somehow convinced her to order a large array of food as well. Upon stopping in the carpark, however, Mera had taken a massive chunk out of her burger then spat it back out again...all over the dashboard.
"I told you." Camille turned her nose up at the mess left in her car. Not that it mattered anymore with the door in shambles. "It's not your kind of food."
"It's not that I didn't like it... I just can't understand how anyone could eat it. That's all." Mera stated stubbornly.
"Oh, is that so?" The human found herself chuckling, though she had no clue why. "Seriously, you should head back before people start worrying."
"I can handle myself. They know that." Mera shrugged. "I'm not going back without you anyway. I need your help, remember?"
The woman's head rested on the back of her chair in exhaustion, brown eyes staring blankly at the grey roof. "And I told you I can't. I'm not wanted in Atlantis."
Complete quiet hung in the air for a few moments. The silence was poisonous in it's nothingness, cruelly underscoring how vapid their conversation had become. Camille had just started to accept the embarrassing memory of Arthur's rejection. She was ready to move on with her life...but now it had come crawling back out of the water like the sole-survivor of a shipwreck. She refused to let this small encounter dredge up the feelings she'd worked so tirelessly to bury. Arthur Curry was not the centre of her universe, and life would continue just fine without him.
"He misses you." Mera said so softly that it was barely a whisper. "He doesn't say it but I know he does."
Camille crossed her arms, averting her gaze away from the red-head. "If you're saying that to get me to go with you it won't work."
"This isn't about that, I promise..." Mera said sincerely, searching her mind for any possible way to make the other woman understand. "It's not an easy job, being king. He's always got the eyes of Atlantis on him; every move he makes and every decision. When I dated him we had to pretend that we had been arranged to be married just to ensure that the people would accept it."
Camille watched the people pass by, holding their take-out bags and scavenging it for a few chips as they journeyed to their cars. Focusing on this helped her ignore the feeling of sympathy that stabbed in the pit of her stomach. "Skipped the first date and went straight to marriage? Classy."
"We never actually went through with it, we blamed Orm's take over but our relationship had been over long before that." Mera noticed Camille's distracted gaze and her shoulders slumped. "It's just the way of our people. He didn't want you involved in it."
The officer shrugged as if this information was inconsequential. It's not how she felt, of course, because honestly she was beginning to feel the threads of anger that had somehow been ignored for weeks until now. "Well, he got his way. I'm not involved. It's probably for the best."
Camille's facade was strong, but not enough for Mera to be fooled. She could see right through it. Still, it was apparent that Camille's own feelings for Arthur weren't enough to convince her to return to Atlantis, nor were his affections for her. She was too headstrong for a crush to provoke her actions. It was something that Mera had to admire, no matter how difficult it made things.
"Please." Mera finally pleaded. "These peace talks are more important than old drama, and so is the embassy. We need this to work if both of our people are going to avoid war..."
Within seconds the Atlantean had caught Camille's full attention again. She was skeptical, that was plain to see, but she also knew that Mera was right. If she didn't help then she would regret it for the rest of her life...like the day of the bank robbery. Even now Camille could still hear the gunshot, and see the worker's face immortalised in fear. She could remember the blood flowing from his head like a river, and sense the echo of his family's grief. Most of all she could recall herself sitting there, so stricken with terror that she did nothing. That scene was enough to haunt her every waking hour and stalk her worst nightmares. She wouldn't let it happen again. She couldn't bare another regret so heavy.
"Alright, fine." She agreed with a quiet huff of defeat. She wasn't looking forward to seeing Arthur again, but this wasn't about him. This was about Atlantis.