FATED | camren

14

They tell each other, they love each other for the first time when they have sex, also for the first time, three days after getting together.

It starts with them cuddling and watching Netflix when Camila makes a joke about 'netflix and chill' and things kind of escalates after that.

Lauren already knows everything there is to know about Camila—her fears, dreams, hopes, her love for romantic comedies, her idealistic heart, how well she sings and plays guitar, how beautifully she can weave words together, her endless capacity for love. She's watched her grow from a little girl in a fluffy pink dress, to a young woman with a heart of gold.

That day, she learns just what makes Camila whine, what makes her gasp and her back arch, what makes her moan and scream. And boy, Camila is loud in bed, Lauren properly shouldn't be as surprised as she is.

They're both nervous and awkward at first, but then Lauren cracks a joke and they laugh and everything is easy as it's always been with them.

"I love you!" Camila screams as Lauren makes her come with three fingers up her cunt and her tongue on her clit.

Lauren's face jerks up, lips slicked with Camila and stares wide-eyed at her.

"Say that again," she pleads.

At first, Camila looks confused and dazed from her orgasm but then she smiles and pulls Lauren down for a sweet kiss.

"I love you."

Lauren's heart grows bigger than her ribcage can contain and she kisses Camila over and over again.

"I love you too. I love you so much."

Lauren makes her come three more times, because Camila is deliciously sensitive.

She tells Lauren that she's never come that many times in a row and Lauren is smug and proud of herself.

+++

Camila is 9 years old when she becomes obsessed with weddings after watching too many telenovelas depicting the perfect, fairy tale wedding; and she begins planning her own future wedding.

Lauren is beyond frustrated whenever she wants to play outside but all Camila is interested in is gluing cut-outs from wedding magazine into her 'wedding book'.

"I want my wedding to be perfect," she says, eyes bright.

"You're 9 years old," Lauren replies dryly, "You won't be getting married for a long time."

Camila shrug her small shoulder, "Abuela says it's good to always be prepared."

"I don't think she mean this," Lauren gestures to her 'wedding book' where she's fawning over a wedding dress.

Lauren can't talk some sense into Camila, but she's confident this phase will pass just as the phase with minions passed. Hopefully soon.

"I want to have a practice wedding," Camila says one day when they're at Lauren's home.

At first, Lauren thinks she's joking and she laughs but as it appears, she's very much serious. Lauren is strongly reluctant at first, however, Camila talks her into it of promises of it being 'fun'. Once she's talked Lauren into it, she goes to ask Lauren's mom if she will play the priest.

Her mother is entertained. "First the kiss then this?"

All Camila has to do is clasp her fingers under her chin and spill her eyes wide open for Lauren's mother to cave.

And that's how they get fake-married at the age of nine.

Camila is ecstatic. She wears this pretty, white dress that she wore for her latest birthday and Lauren's mother helps her set up her hair and even allows a smidge of lipgloss on the lips.

"Why do I have to be the groom?" Lauren complains. She's wearing a white t-shirt and dark pants which is the closest they get to a suit.

"Because, only one of us can be the bride," Camila explains in a 'duh' tone like it's so obvious that the bride has to be her.

They have the wedding in the backyard of the Jauregui household. Lauren watches Camila walk towards her in her pretty dress and huge, happy smile, clutching a bouquet of fake flowers.

Her mother snaps picture the whole time.

When Camila comes to stand in front of her, Lauren grins back—Camila's grin is too infectious not to.

And because she's Camila, she's prepared some wedding vows.

"You're my best friend," she says, "I promise to treat you right and love you forever and ever."

Lauren smiles wide, "I promise to learn how to make blueberry pancakes so I can make it for you every morning."

Lauren's mother aaaws in the background and Camila's eyes widen a bit.

"Wow. Really?"

Lauren nods eagerly, "Really."

"Wow. Thanks."

They slip cheap, plastic rings over each other's fingers and kiss on the cheek.

Later, when they're up in Lauren's room, they continue the role-play, but this time, Camila kisses her on the mouth for the second time.

+++

13 years later and Lauren can conclude that dreams do come true.

She's 22 years old and today is the day she's marrying her best friend. She watches her soon to be wife, walking down the aisle, looking like something out of her wildest dreams, gorgeous beyond description and Lauren can see the tears in Camila's eyes, glittering like diamonds in her eyes and she can feel the sting in her own.

"I should've seen this coming," her mother told her in the dressing room while she'd been helping Lauren get ready, "That pretend wedding was foreshadowing."

She proposed to Camila a few months ago on the playground back in their hometown where they'd first met. She'd built her a sandcastle and placed the ring on the highest tower. Camila had broken out in tears and screamed yes, before Lauren even had a chance to respond.

As she looks into Camila's eyes, she knows that she's the luckiest woman in the world. It's not many that are lucky enough to marry their childhood best friend, it's not many that find someone who knows them better than themselves, who's been with them through all the stages of their life, the good, the bad, the awkward, who protected you from bullies without knowing you and who continued to protect you no matter the cost, someone who messily patched you up after you scraped your knees after falling down from the bike and wiped your tears away, who tried hard to make you soup when you were sick even though they knew they couldn't cook, who never let you hate yourself for the way you were born, who pushed you to go to your first lesbian bar, your first pride, who have loved you unconditionally through so many years.

The "I do' comes easy, natural, like the words had been sitting on her tongue for ages, waiting for the day they could fall from her lips and tie her to the woman of her dreams.

When they kiss, Camila tastes of promises and future and endless amounts of happiness.