When Cami moves in with the 2 most popular guys in school in a new foster home placement, she realizes that her tragic past just might make it so that she will stay lonely forever.
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Cami has...
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The crickets and frogs and trilling insects created a symphony of sound that drowned out the pounding of my heart in the night air.
A cool breeze wound by me and stirred underneath the hem of my shirt, bringing chills to the surface of my flushed skin.
The rough wood from the planks on the bench bit into my palms.
Camille was standing in front of me with a shared look of horror and confusion on her face.
Of course she was horrified.
I'd just told her how I'd tried to off myself.
She had no idea when or why, just the how...and after her story of her family's fucked up history, I could understand the distress at how gruesome my attempt had been.
I immediately followed up by signing everything everyone always asked after they found out.
"No, I didn't think about my family and how it would've felt to find me. I didn't really think about anything except the escape. It was a few years ago, so I don't feel that way anymore. Therapy and all that, right? Parker found me. It messed him up. I've had a few surgeries, but I destroyed my vocal cords basically. They want to do a surgery where they do a structural implant and see if that will work since the repositioning and replacing the damaged nerves haven't worked. We'll see, but I'm not planning on being able to speak again."
"Wow. So we're about equally matched in our fucked up-ness, huh?"
I laughed. I couldn't help it, but the ugliest sounding half grunt squealing gasp sound came out of my throat, and at first it was dead silent, like even the frogs and crickets had stopped their singing to cover their tiny ears in protest of the sound.
And then Cami opened her mouth and let out the dorkiest sounding snort laugh I'd ever heard, and somehow, it made everything so much better.
I could read the short story in my head in that very moment.
'The Laugh That Changed the World'.
Parker and his friends would be the animals and insects watching this moment between us in jealousy that they couldn't ever match up to the beauty and intrigue that was Camille Astor.
She was like a filament of translucent gold, impossible to catch and hold like a tangible thing between your fingers, but free and wild somehow, even with all this pain and fear blanketing her glow.
She seemed to shine through even the darkest of clouds.
She came to sit down beside me, close enough for our thighs to touch.
So, she was brave, too.
I guessed she had to be feeling pretty good around me. I hadn't shown her the bad side yet.
