mute ➺ camren

Chapter Four

Lauren packed up her things, collecting up a series of paintbrushes and paints, taking a rather large canvas off of the easel in front of her and setting it down on the table beside her. She put her brushes back in the tin she took them from when the class began, and put them in her rucksack, collecting up the paints and putting them away back in the cupboards they came from.
"That needs to be done by next week, Lauren. No more extended deadlines it's been too long now." Lauren's teacher told her, almost scolding her. Lauren simply nodded and slipped the canvas back into her giant folder, pulled her bag on her back, took the folder and left.

She wandered down the wide halls of her school, turning her head to look into the rooms she passed by on her way. She didn't know what many of them were. Some were other art studios which she gathered from the identical setting, others were unfamiliar. As she headed towards the joint entrance and exit, she turned her head to the principle's office, hearing familiar voices coming from the other side of the door. The door opened right as Lauren was staring at it, and she found herself once again in a long, awkward eye contact with Camila. It didn't click in her head for a few seconds, and then she saw Ally out the corner of her eye emerge from the room, her expression drop as she saw the anger of Lauren's realization.
"Lauren." Ally said, pretending to be surprised. Lauren tore her eyes away from the Spanish girl's intriguing brown orbs, and shot a glare at Ally before quickly covering it with a smile as her principle came out of the office.
"Well..my car is here and, we're headed back to the same place so, do you want a lift back or..?" Ally offered. Lauren looked at her watch, contemplating whether it was worth spending 20 minutes in a car with Camila, or waiting 40 minutes for the bus, to then spend another half an hour on it getting back. She sighed and looked back up, her eyes passing through Camila, pretending she wasn't there. Lauren nodded, forcing a smile again towards Ally. She pulled her bag up her shoulder and waited for them.
"Thank you for stopping by, Miss Hernandez. It will be a pleasure taking on Camila." The principle finalized the deal.
"Please, call me Ally. We've met enough times now to be past Miss Hernandez." Ally chuckled, shaking his hand. Lauren rolled her eyes and shifted her weight onto her other side.
"Well, Ally, I'll see you when I see you, thank you again for coming in." He smiled. They finally said their goodbyes and Ally lead the girls back to the car.

*****

Lauren slammed Ally's office door closed behind her as they went into the room.
"Lauren, I'm sorry. There's nothing I could do. Her sister came in to translate what the schools were, she picked that one. It was completely out of my hands you can't take this out on me." Ally defended herself. Lauren paced around the room with heavy feet, biting her nails as she walked.
"She's doing music though, you don't do music you'll hardly see her." Ally tried to put light into the situation. Lauren glared at her, moving her hand in a circle motion, her way of telling Ally to tell her what else she was doing.
"She's doing creative writing also." Lauren had to physically force herself not to groan. The one creative writing class in the entire school, had about 5 people in it, Lauren being one of them. How would she be able to cope being that close to the girl? She was invading her life, completely.
"There's obviously some issues with her doing writing as she doesn't speak English-" Ally stopped speaking as she noticed Lauren smiling and shaking her head.
"What?" Ally asked. Lauren rolled her head back and indicated for her to follow her. They left the office and headed upstairs. Ally popped her head round the door to Sofia's room, finding her and Camila both in there. They continued up the stairs to Lauren's room.

Lauren stormed over to Camila's side of the room and scanned her bedside table.
"I'm not sure you should be going through her stuff-" Lauren cut her off as she held up a book to Ally. Ally looked confused for a moment. Lauren rolled her eyes and handed the book to Ally, and headed back to the bedside table, picking up another random text, written in Spanish. She stood beside Ally and pointed between the different languages.
"Wait, this is Camila's book? An English written book?" Ally flipped through some of the pages to check it was English, coming across some highlighter marks in it. Lauren nodded and sighed.
"She does understand English." Ally half whispered. Lauren nodded, then hesitated, but pointed to the Spanish book. She tapped it a few times, then pointed to her lips, and her head.
"You know Spanish?" Ally asked, wondering if she's understood Lauren well enough. Lauren nodded.
"Does she speak in Spanish up here?" Ally asked. Lauren nodded. "And you understand it all?" Ally asked again. Lauren nodded again.
"Should I call her out on it?" Ally asked advice on her own job. Lauren shook her head.
"I can't just use it against her..can I?" Ally asked again. Luckily, she was used to one sided conversations, what with making Lauren her project for as long as she'd worked there. Lauren shrugged and sat down on her bed. Ally stacked Camila's books back where they came from. Lauren shook her head again and got up, putting the books on top of Camila's bed.
"Why?" Ally asked. Lauren explained with hand motions that if Camila saw her stuff moved, she would complain about Lauren, and Ally could then bring up the "language barrier" situation.
"Lauren, you're very smart, devious." Ally said as she left the room.