Ever since Lauren had confirmed Brad was the author, she'd been particularly close with him. Actually, the two had been inseparable. It was repulsing and satisfying to Camila all at once. She hated the fact that Brad was constantly lying to her, but she loved seeing how happy he made her.
Lauren and Brad had exchanged numbers. While she was texting him, he seemed different. Something about him was off, compared to the way he wrote. His vocabulary wasn't nearly as expansive, and he never really talked about the things he'd mentioned in his journal. He was able to keep conversation going, but it wasn't what Lauren was expecting. She was hoping to have intellectual conversations with him about the world and life, but he kept the topics pretty neutral.
She was confused. The writing in his journal wasn't all about her. There were his opinions on a wide range of topics along with his beliefs about certain things. Lauren was able to recall some of them and broach them to Brad so they could discuss it further, but his answers were evasive and gave her little to work with.
"It's so weird. It's like he's one person through writing and a completely different person in real life," Lauren expressed to her friends at lunch.
They were all huddled around the table, listening to Lauren update them on her status with Brad. That's how their lunch periods had been going recently. They sat down, greeted each other, caught up a little, and listened to Lauren divulge more details about her and Brad's budding relationship.
Brad reminded Camila of a potato. He was so boring and not right for Lauren at all. He was without substance. He just stole everything Camila said and attempted to mold it into something he could reiterate. Camila called him a potato in her head. What could be more boring than a potato? Bread was pretty boring. She decided to start calling him Bread instead.
"Maybe he just gets nervous when you ask him about stuff he knows he wrote about," Normani inferred.
"Yeah. That's like when people ask me to sing. I'm like no. But I be belting out them notes in the shower though," Dinah added with a laugh.
"Not Ally. She does her Shakira impression at the drop of a hat," Camila said dryly.
"That's because she can sing," Dinah countered.
"You can sing too, Dinah," Lauren laughed.
"Mila can sing," Dinah added as she wiggled her eyebrows.
Camila side-eyed her. She wished Dinah would stop trying to talk up Camila in front of Lauren. She knew it wasn't going to do any justice. She knew that she could be painted in the most beautiful light and still be outshined by Bread. He had Lauren's focus. Camila had been painfully friendzoned now. She was almost coming to terms with it.
Dinah, on the other hand, was not. She resented how she couldn't tell Lauren. She hated the way Camila acted now. She was emotionally drained. Everything concerning Brad had sucked the life out of the brown-eyed girl. She was merely going through the motions. She missed her old Oala.
"I know she can," Lauren acknowledged. "Oh my god, and Brad can sing too," she tacked on with a reminiscent smile.
Brad this. Brad that. She was growing to resent the curly-haired piece of Bread. He took over Lauren and corrupted her mind. All of her thoughts were now tainted or linked with him in some way. And Camila hated every second of it. Lauren's voice didn't make her smile anymore. Her presence didn't make her feel like she was on cloud nine now. Now it just reminded her of what had been taken from her.
"So are y'all dating now or...?" Ally assumed.
"I guess we are. He hasn't asked, so I guess it's not official or anything... But we kiss and stuff so basically," Lauren answered.
Yeah, twist the knife in Camila's stomach, why don't you. That hurt more than she let on. Lauren was supposed to be kissing Camila. The thought of those perfect lips being pressed against someone else's made her heart hurt.
"Well when y'all do start dating, you're gonna be the power couple of the school," Normani smiled. She was so happy for Lauren. Hearing her talk about him every day at lunch wasn't annoying to her at all. She practically waited to find out more about the pair.
"Thanks, Mani," Lauren smiled and hugged her awkwardly from across the table.
Camila tried to play off the way she just blatantly looked at Lauren's behind. But some things were inexcusable. Dinah laughed and Camila knew she had been caught. She didn't care though. Nothing really mattered to Camila anymore. She had no shame.
Lunch came and went. The days passed by and Camila really just didn't feel like doing anything. She lacked any type of motivation. Although she had never been the type of person to let her personal problems interfere with her schoolwork, the lines started to blur. Whenever she got into one of these moods, she found her escape through reading or writing. She couldn't write anymore. Lauren was her inspiration most of the time, but she oddly wasn't feeling very inspired at all.
Somewhere deep within Camila, she knew she was happy for Lauren. But the circumstances for Lauren's happiness made it hard for Camila to accept it. Lauren hated being lied to. And she felt like she was lying to Lauren as well. It was lying by omission. Dinah was guilty of it too. The desire to tell her lessened every day. Dinah feared that Camila was becoming depressed. She wanted to do whatever she could to help her get back to normal.
Dinah and Lauren had anatomy together. The other girls were taking different science classes, and luckily Dinah and Lauren had been scheduled for the same class. They sat next to each other most of the time. Today, their assignment was a lab. They picked their spot in a corner in the back to begin. Dinah picked it so they would have some conversational privacy.
"What are we supposed to do first?" Lauren asked Dinah, who was holding the lab instruction sheet.
"I don't know. What's going on with you and Brad?" Dinah changed the subject.
"We're good... But he's still being so weird. I thought it was just because he was nervous, but we hang out so often now, I know it's not that. There's literally nothing to be nervous about anymore. We're so comfortable with each other but he's just so..." Lauren trailed off as she struggled to find a way to accurately describe him.
"Boring?" Dinah assumed as she set up their materials.
"No, not that. He's pretty funny and stuff. I mean, I can talk to him... But I don't know. I don't know how to explain it. I read more of his journal every night... And I'm almost finished with it, but sometimes he just doesn't seem like the person that wrote all of that stuff," Lauren admitted.
Dinah smiled in spite of herself. Lauren was slowly figuring it out. If she could find a way to pave the road for Camila, they would be home free. She had to be careful though. She had to drop little subtle hints. Camila would kill her if she did anything else. It was risky, but Dinah was willing to brave it.
"Did you ever think that maybe the journal wasn't his?" Dinah challenged.
"Yeah, I have. If I'm being honest, I think about that all the time. But I'm like, this is Brad. He wouldn't lie to me," Lauren disclosed. She wanted to have faith in her boyfriend. Was that what he was now? Nothing was official yet. Everything concerning Brad was starting to give her a headache.
"I don't think so either... But I mean, have you considered anyone else on the list?" Dinah asked quietly as she skimmed over the lab sheet. Yeah, there was no way she was about to do that right now. She put it on the table next to her stuff.
"No. You guys saw me talking to all of those guys. It wasn't any of them. And the only person I haven't asked was Camila..." Lauren recalled.
Dinah raised her eyebrows and gave Lauren a thoughtful look. "Well... Have you asked her?"
"No? Why would I ask her? It's clearly not hers," Lauren scoffed.
"You thought it was her handwriting at first," Dinah stealthily reminded her.
"What are you trying to say?" Lauren questioned. But there was no malice to her tone. She was genuinely wondering what Dinah was hesitant to disclose.
"Nothing..." Dinah shrugged. "But you wrote her name for a reason, Lo."
Lauren considered that. She did write Camila's name for a reason. What that reason could've been, she had no idea.
"Oh, I guess so... But let's go ahead and do this," Lauren said determinedly, eager to finish their lab.
She was working quietly and diligently. Dinah noticed the way her eyebrows were furrowed, meaning she was deep in thought. She knew Lauren well enough to know that it wasn't due to concentration. She hoped she was really thinking about what she'd said. Dinah had merely planted the seed in Lauren's head. Now she had to play the waiting game to see if it was worth it.
Lauren was seriously beginning to consider Camila as the author of the journal. It made sense, but if she was the one who'd written it, why hadn't she said anything? All of the factors had lined up perfectly, except the confession. If Lauren was the one who'd written that journal, she would've taken no hesitation to claim it. Especially if she supposedly had deep feelings for whoever she was writing about. That was a big part of why she had trouble seeing Camila as the author.
Also, that would mean Camila had feelings for Lauren. Deep feelings. They had professed their love for Lauren multiple times throughout the journal, and she wasn't even finished reading yet. As dense as it was, it held so many secrets. The potential that those were Camila's secrets made her uneasy. She had no problem with it, she was just doubtful that she could reciprocate.
Lauren knew she and Camila shared a special bond. They were the closest out of the group of five. She couldn't explain why she felt so drawn to her, she just was. Intimacy was a component of their relationship with no questions asked. She was questioning it now. And it wasn't one-sided. Lauren initiated half of it. But why? Their friendship had been very touchy from the get go. Lauren didn't have an explanation for that.
Multiple questions ran through her mind all day. Camila consumed all of her thoughts. She thought about her behavior with her. She was always so happy, always smiling, always staring. Lauren was guilty of that too, though. Camila had undeniable beauty. Lauren stole glimpses of her from time to time as well. And she reflected on how Camila always seemed timid, nervous, and antsy whenever Lauren was around. The handwriting in the journal did seem awfully familiar...
Lauren tried to push Camila from her mind for a little while. Brad had formally asked her out on a date. She wasn't expecting anything spectacular, they were only having a little coffee date. On her way there, she desperately tried to get in the right mindset of going on a date. But her second-guessing about Camila took no time off. She saw Brad push through the door of Starbucks and the butterflies followed soon after. When he sat down, the atmosphere shifted. Her anticipation of her first real date with Brad quickly overshadowed her doubts about Camila.
"Hey," Brad waved sweetly and leaned across the table to kiss her cheek.
"Hi," Lauren smiled. She felt like a dork. She always smiled at his simple gestures.
"How are you, love?" he asked casually. He looked down at his receipt and idly wondered when his drink would be ready.
"I'm great," she answered too quickly. She was alright.. decent.. okay rather. She wasn't great. She was far from great. Her mind was cluttered with far too many things for her to be as great as she said she was.
"I was doing okay earlier, but I'm great now," he emphasized with a smirk.
"Why now?" Lauren played along with a goofy grin.
"I'm on a date with the most beautiful girl in the world," Brad answered.
Well, she'd heard variations of that line about a million times. And that wasn't the way he would've said that if he was writing. He usually stayed away from typical cliches like those. But whatever.
"Aww," Lauren continued to smile, although she was starting to doubt him again in her head. "I'm so glad I found your journal."
"Yeah... Me too," he stated nervously.
Brad really did like Lauren. Over the past three years of spending high school with her, he'd grown to have a very deep affection for her. He'd never had the balls to make a move on her, and when he saw the opportunity like the journal, he took advantage of it. But the guilt from it was eating him alive.
Every kiss and hug shared between them made him feel terrible. He was genuine whenever he was with her, but he couldn't ignore the fact that their relationship was founded on a lie. He always tried to sway the conversation whenever she started talking about it, but he never could do it successfully. She always seemed a little hurt or offended whenever he abruptly changed the topic.
"I was reading it last night, and the page where you said 'You look so beautiful in this light, silhouette over me. The way it brings out the blue in your eyes is the Tenerife Sea' was my favorite," Lauren disclosed.
"Really? You liked it? I was just writing, you know... Because you um- you have really pretty eyes," Brad stuttered. He had no idea what she was talking about, but he was going with it.
He lied. There was no such thing in that journal. She'd said that because the song by Ed Sheeran was stuck in her head, that line specifically. It had been a mere test, and he failed.
"That wasn't in the journal..." Lauren informed him.
"Yeah, I was just thinking that I didn't remember writing that..." he excused his slip with a timid laugh. Then avoided eye contact.
"Those are song lyrics," Lauren added.
Maybe Dinah's accusation held some truth. Perhaps he wasn't legit as he seemed to be. Lauren glanced at him awkwardly. The two of them ran into awkward moments like those quite often. In fact, it was nearly every time Lauren brought up something about the journal. But it was terribly cute.
The way Brad refused to look at her was kind of adorable, in a way. It was like his eyes were glued to the table. The only time he looked up was whenever Lauren spoke, and even then, it was just a glance. And his cheeks seemed to be permanently flushed. He had the nervous habit of playing with his fingers. Either twiddling them or drumming them on the table, he couldn't sit still.
"Yeah," Brad shuffled uncomfortably. He looked at his receipt again, then back up at the counter. Thankfully, it was prepared. Starbucks had provided a distraction. He gestured towards the front awkwardly and quickly walked towards to to claim his drink.
When Brad came back, he had his drink in hand along with two straws. Lauren smiled at the gesture, thinking of how cute he was. The idea of sharing a drink was cute to her. She just hoped she liked it. The color was uninviting. But she peeled off the wrapper of her straw and stuck it into the drink nonetheless. It was surprisingly sweet and very tasty, contrasting everything she was expecting.
Brad stuck his straw in as well, leaning in to take a sip once Lauren pulled away. The two of them begin to take turns swigging their frappuccino. They were both nervous to go in at the same time, but Lauren decided to take initiative. Now she was close to him, disregarding all established rules of personal space. But neither of them pulled away. They both stopped sipping, oddly not having the desire to keep drinking - although it was delicious.
Lauren thought about what poetic things he was thinking as they stared at one another. She'd read various entries about how fond he was of her eyes. A smile graced her lips at the thought of it. He was so sweet. Just then, Brad mustered up enough confidence to lean in a bit further. He connected their lips gently. When they parted, they just grinned wildly at each other.
"Sorry," Brad blushed as he resumed his seat.
He apologized. He apologized for kissing her. She thought that was the sweetest thing in the world. Lauren realized in that moment that she was completely smitten with the boy sitting across from her. It didn't really matter to her if he was sketchy sometimes. That behavior only surfaced whenever she talked about the journal. So she just wouldn't bring it up anymore.
A/N
Enjoy Brauren while you can. Because ew. Camren is coming soon, just be patient with me. I promise it'll be Worth It (see what I did there?)
DONT HATE ME FOR THE KISS OKAY I THOUGHT IT WAS CUTE.
Don't forget to comment, vote, and share. ily all xx