f.m. ~camren

chapter 7

Dinah is flipping through the clothes she brought over, trying to pick out an outfit for the night with Camila's input. She is surprised when there's a knock on the door and Camila ignores the question she's in the middle of asking to answer it right away. Lauren's voice carries through the apartment and Dinah exits the bedroom to greet her with the dress she just put on left unzipped.

"Hey Dinah, getting ready to go out?" Lauren asks casually although she already knows the answer.

"Yeah...but why do I get the feeling you two aren't?" Dinah replies upon inspecting Lauren's outfit.

She is wearing a t-shirt and sweat pants. She also appears to be carrying a laptop case in her right hand.

"Clubs aren't my scene, so Camz invited me over for a quiet night here," Lauren explains.

"Camz?" Dinah questions, looking between her two friends.

Camila gives Lauren a thumbs up from behind Dinah where she cannot see, showing her approval for the new pet name.

"Dinah, you know I love you, right?" Camila starts, attempting to soften the wound of blowing her off.

"Uh uh don't you start with me. If yall wanna be boring tonight then Mani and I will go live it up without ya."

Dinah turns around and walks back to Camila's room, preparing to text Normani and send pics of her trying on a couple more outfits before they meet up.

Lauren sets her laptop case on the coffee table and unzips it, retrieving the power cable first to look for the nearest outlet. Camila points to a space between the right end of the couch and a bookshelf to help her out. Once she is all set up she plops down on the couch while Camila continues to stand by the bookshelf, contemplating what she would like to read. She settles on The Client by John Grisham before moving the coffee table out of the way, pulling out a footrest, and getting comfortable beside Lauren. They focus on their individual tasks without interruption, Lauren writing and Camila reading, until Dinah returns to the living room wearing the outfit she finally settled on for the club.

"Matchmaking skills on point," Dinah brags while getting out her phone to snap a picture of the two introverts in their element.

"Was that really necessary?" Camila asks, looking up from her book to address the not-so-sneaky photographer.

"You'll thank me later for documenting these precious moments. Anyway, time to bounce."

Dinah lifts her purse over her shoulder and walks toward the front door.

"I'll pick up my extra clothes tomorrow," she adds before exiting the apartment.

Once she leaves Camila breathes a sigh of relief.

"I thought for sure she was gonna put up a bigger fight than that," she admits, turning to face Lauren's direction.

Lauren pauses her typing and hits CRTL + S to save her document in progress.

"Normani sent me a really long text when she found out I'm not going. But that was also back when she was under the impression you planned to go, so most of her argument centered around how ridiculous I was being for sending you out to a club by yourself when our relationship is brand new."

"She has a point. If I wasn't tragically uncoordinated it would be a poor decision to dance with strangers and have them hitting on me, thinking I'm single because the person who would claim me isn't around."

"Or I could just be secure in our relationship. Although I've been burned before," Lauren reveals, eyes meeting Camila's during the confession.

"What happened? You don't have to talk about it..."

"No, that's fine. Ally and I broke up five months ago. It's probably about time I get it out of my system."

Camila listens intently as Lauren summarizes her relationship with Ally. She was a graduate student and a teaching assistant in one of Lauren's classes during her final year of undergraduate studies. They would flirt during her office hours and began meeting off campus for coffee. After Lauren received her degree they made their relationship official and within seven months they had moved in together. Within a year, Ally began to distance herself and was home less often. Lauren discovered evidence Ally was cheating and immediately moved into Normani's one bedroom apartment before they applied together and got approved for a two bedroom unit. They haven't seen each other or spoken since.

"Ariana and I weren't nearly as serious as you and Ally seemed to be. Don't get me wrong, I was still heartbroken when it didn't work out, but I can't imagine living under the same roof and drifting apart like that," Camila reacts to Lauren's story with a frown.

"I think the problem is how in denial I was for the longest time. Ally and I, we had chemistry, and she is so full of energy and life. The contrast in our personalities should have tipped me off, but it was part of what made me appreciate her in the beginning. In the end, there were quite a few areas of our lives where compromise wasn't happening and it was probably easier on her to find someone else who won't ask her to change as much."

They are interrupted by Camila's phone vibrating multiple times to indicate an incoming call. She looks at Lauren apologetically as she reaches out to look at who's calling her. It's the same number, not in her contacts, that she ignored a text from earlier.

"Speaking of ex-girlfriends," Camila cuts in after hitting the 'ignore call' button, "that was Ariana."

"Are you still speaking to her?"

"Nope. Not since we broke up," Camila confirms.

Lauren has another question in mind but is interrupted by a knock on door.

"Are you expecting someone?"

Camila shakes her head.

"I don't think so..." Camila trails off as she gets up from the couch and leans against her door to look out the peep hole. "Oh my god, it's her!"

"Her?"

"Ariana. She's on the other side of this door right now," Camila explains in a hushed tone, "and she's holding flowers."