Faking It | Wattys 2022

Bonus Epilogue

"We're going to be late!" Leonardo shouted down the hall.

"And whose fault would that be?" Camila set down her newspaper and finished off the rest of her tea.

Lauren carefully stepped down the staircase, not wanting to trip in her heels and fall flat on her face. "Sweetie," she laughed. "You're more in a hurry than we are,"

"That's because I was the one who planned everything and I need it all to go perfectly,"

Celia, his younger sister, poked her head out from the living room. "You planned it?"

"Alright, fine. I may have only picked the colors and let Auntie Mani do the rest, but what's the difference?"

"Literally everything," Celia said. "Don't take credit for somebody else's work, loser,"

"Celia Jauregui-Cabello!" Lauren appeared like a witch out of thin air. "Don't speak to your older brother like that,"

"Yeah, you heard her," Leonardo egged her on.

"Don't gang up against her," Camila adjusted the collar of her dress shirt and beckoned for everybody to begin heading toward the front door. "She's a baby,"

"She's ten," he grumbled under his breath. "I wasn't getting treated like that when I was ten,"

"That's because you were punching holes in the wall at ten,"

"It was one hole!"

Camila glared at him and smacked Leonardo upside his head. "I'll add that bill on top of your future college tuition,"

Leonardo huffed. "Mama..."

Lauren swiped her house keys off of the kitchen table and scurried out the front door. "Okay, enough talking. Let's get there before Mani kills all of us."

"C'mon," Camila pulled both of her kids closer to her and flung her arm across their shoulders. "It's a big day for your mom. We don't want to piss her off."

"I'll be worse than pissed if we're late," Lauren said before ducking her head into the car and getting into the passenger seat.

"I'm gonna be sleeping on the couch for the rest of the week at this rate," Camila grumbled.

-

Camila let out a deep breath as she sat down on the bench outside of the venue, her head throbbing. They had been at the party for nearly three hours and she wanted nothing more than to go home and fall asleep in her comfortable bed.

Yes, the party was for them, but now it was beginning to feel like torture rather than pleasure.

"Mama?" Celia's quiet voice startled Camila.

"Hey, sweet pea," Camila patted the bench. "Why aren't you in there?"

She sat down next to her mother and shrugged. "I could ask you the same thing,"

"Touché," Camila laughed.

"So..." Celia trailed off. "How does it feel to be married for ten years?"

"I feel like my bones are about to shrivel up like a raisin,"

"Mom's having a blast in there. In case you were wondering."

"Oh, trust me," Camila rubbed her eyes tiredly, images of her wife chugging down glasses of champagne briefly flashing in her mind. "I know she is,"

"Does it ever get boring?" Celia suddenly asked.

Camila looked over at her daughter, frowning. "Does what ever get boring?"

"Y'know," Celia made weird gestures with her hands. "Being married and stuff. The movies make it seem nice, but is that how it actually is?"