Perfectly Wrong

31. Detention

Camila meets Maisie outside the door to Shawn’s classroom at three-thirty like he asked, and she could tell her friend was not happy about it.

 “ You know, the more I think about it, this really sucks.” Maisie says. “ Why couldn’t he just call me or something if he wanted to talk about what I know? I had plans today.”

 “ Maybe we won’t have to stay long.” Camila says.

 “ I hate detention. It’s boring.” Maisie tells her. “ I would rather lay on Shawn's floor with you than sit in detention.”

 “ Maybe we can try and make it fun.” Camila replies.

 Maisie turns to open the door and Camila follows her inside the room.

 “ Afternoon, Mr. Mendes.” The blonde says with an overly happy tone of voice.

 “ Take a seat.” Shawn says as he wipes what he wrote earlier off the board.

 Maisie makes some stupid joke she heard from Noah that would usually annoy Camila, but instead she laughs and follows her friend to the back of the room. Shawn doesn’t laugh as they sit as far from his desk as they can. He doesn’t even smile, he just sits behind his desk and glares at them while they giggle like high school girls.

 “ Listen.” He says as he stands back up and walks to them. He leans against the window and folds his arms across his chest. “ Maisie, I need to know where your head is at. I know you were at my house. I know you know Camila spent the night. I know she told you about our date. I just need to know what you plan to do about it. If you plan to do anything about it.”

 “ Shawn, I already told you.” Camila says. “ She’s not saying anything. There’s nothing to say.”

 He doesn’t look at her, keeping his eyes on Maisie while waiting for her to answer him. Camila is not sure if it’s nerves or the fact that the last three days of her life were the most strange she ever had, but she starts laughing. Maisie looks at her with questioning eyes, but she fails in holding it in and starts laughing too.

 “ What the hell is so funny?” Shawn throws his hands up in the air, clearly upset.

 “ Nothing.” Camila tells him, trying to control her laughter. “ It’s just weird. You gave us detention, Shawn. Couldn’t you just like, come over tonight or something? Talk to us about it then? Why did you give us detention?”

 Shawn waits until they stop laughing before he continues.

 “ This the first chance I had to talk to either of you. I didn’t sleep all night. I wasn’t even sure if I had a job to come back to today.” He looks at Maisie. “ If anything gets out, if anyone finds out that a student slept in my bed with me, I would get fired. I would get kicked out of college.”

 “ You slept in his bed with him?” Maisie asks in shock, looking at Camila with a smile. “ You’re holding back vital information. You didn’t tell me that.”

 Shawn walks back to his desk and takes his seat, leaning forward and holding his face with his hands. Things are clearly not going how he planned.

 “ You slept in his bed?” Maisie whispers, low enough so Shawn doesn’t hear her.

 “ Nothing happened.” Camila whispers back. “ Like you said, he’s such a bore.”

 Maisie laughs again, causing Camila to do the same.

 “ Is this funny?” Shawn says from his desk. “ Is this a joke to you two?”

 Camila can see in his eyes that he thinks they’re enjoying detention more than they were supposed to. Maisie makes another stupid joke and Shawn lays his head on his desk in defeat, which makes Camila stop laughing because she can see he’s trying to have a serious conversation.

 “ Mr. Mendes?” Maisie sighs, stopping her laughter too. “ I won’t say anything. I swear. It’s not that big of a deal anyway.”

 “ It is a big deal, Maisie.” Shawn says, looking at her. “ That’s what I’m trying to tell both of you. If you don’t treat this as a big deal, you’ll get careless. Something might slip. I’ve got too much at stake.”

 Both Camila and Maisie sigh as Shawn stands up and walks to them, taking his wallet from his pocket. He reaches a small picture and places it over one of their desks. It’s a picture of Aaliyah.

 “ This girl is a big deal.” Shawn says pointing at the picture of his little sister.

 “ I don’t think we’re following you, Shawn.” Camila says as Shawn grabs a desk and sits down facing them. “ What does Aaliyah have to do with this?”

 “ She was with them… when it happened. She watched them die.” Shawn whispers, looking at the picture with a somber look on his face. “ They said it was a miracle she survived. When the first person came to the scene, Aaliyah was still buckled up in what was left of the backseat. She was screaming for my mom, trying to get her to turn around. For five minutes she had to sit there alone and watch them die.”

 Shawn clears his throat as Maisie reaches for Camila’s hand under the table, squeezing it as neither of them dare to say a word.

 “ I sat in the hospital with her while she recovered for six days. Never left her side, not even for their funeral. When my grandparents came to pick her up and take her with them, she cried. She didn’t want to go, she wanted to stay with me. She begged me to take her with me back to campus. I didn’t have a job. I was nineteen. I didn’t know the first thing about raising a kid, so I let them take her.”

 Shawn stands up and walks to the window, watching the parking lot slowly empty for a while. His hands go to his face at some point, wiping tears that are probably in his eyes. If Maisie wasn’t there, Camila would have hugged him.

 “ Aaliyah hated me. She was so mad at me she wouldn’t return my calls for days. It was the middle of a football game when I started to question the choice I made. I was choosing a ridiculous game over my own flesh and blood. I was putting myself, my girlfriend and my scholarship over this little girl that I loved more than anything in the world.” Shawn says, turning to face them again. “ I dropped the football and walked right off the field. I drove to my grandparents’ house at two in the morning and took Aaliyah out of bed. I brought her home that night. They begged me not to do it. That it would be too hard on me and that I wouldn’t be able to give her what she needed. I knew they were wrong. I knew all Aaliyah needed was me.”

 Shawn walks back to the desk in front of Camila and Maisie and they can see the tears in his eyes.

 “ I have spent the last two years of my life trying to convince myself that I made the right decision for her. So my job? My career? This life I’m trying to build for this little girl? It is a big deal. It’s a very big deal for me.”

 He calmly returns to his desk after taking back Aaliyah’s picture, collecting his things and leaving the room. Maisie reaches inside her bag and takes a box of tissues, offering one to Camila.

 “ God, Camila.” She says. “ How do you do it?”

 “ How do I do what?” Camila asks, wiping the tears from her eyes.

 “ How do you not fall in love with him?”

 Camila’s tears quickly return and she grabs another tissue.

 “ I don’t not fall in love with him.” Camila replies. “ I don’t not fall in love with him a lot.”

 Maisie laughs and squeezes Camila’s hand as they sit there in detention for a bit more.

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A/N: Double update because of Camila's birthday! Hope you enjoy it! 🥳💖