Bad Things

9. Uncertainty

  I know, oh yes

I know that we can't Be togetherBut, I just like to dreamIt's so strange The way our paths have crossedHow we were brought togetherHmmm, it's written in the stars it seemsFeel so niceOh yeah you feel so niceI'd love to spend the nightBut I can't pay the priceOh no.

- Jem.  

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"You did what?" Hailee slid on her stomach down to the foot of the bed, where Camila sat on the floor with her back against the end, trying so hard to draw anything but Shawn: Shawn's eyes, Shawn's hair, Shawn's hands, Shawn's mouth ... Shawn's mouth. She swallowed back the memory of that mouth and drew the river instead. A cop-out, she knew, but it was better than the alternative. At least it was better than admitting to Hailee and herself that she hadn't been able to think of anything else since the night before. "You kissed him and ... then said you wanted to be friends?"

"Well," Camila held her hand up, her pencil balancing between her fingers, "technically, I told him I wanted to be friends before I kissed him."

Hailee's mouth opened then closed, and then opened again. "Smooth, Mila. Way to get your point across."

Camila tossed her sketchbook and pencil to the ground and lifted her hands to her hair. "I don't need a lecture, Haiz, okay? I know it wasn't really the best thing to do, but he was all over me about how I felt and how he felt and I just ..."

"You just what?"

She lifted her fingers to her mouth, tracing over her lips and still feeling the heat of his on them. "I just did it."

"Mmhmm. I would have thought you'd have learned your lesson by now, since 'just doing it' was how you got in this predicament in the first place."

Camila picked up her sketchbook from where she'd dropped it and flung it back at Hailee. Hailee put up her hands to block it, but not before Camila caught a glimpse of Hailee's satisfied grin.

"That wasn't funny."

"It so was funny and you know it." Hailee flipped over onto her back, her long, black hair hanging over the end of the bed and sweeping the floor. "Seriously though, what were you thinking?"

Camila sighed and laid her head back against the mattress. She was so tired. Tired of thinking. Of feeling. Of everything. "I was thinking that here was this really cute boy telling me he liked me—or that he thought maybe he liked me—even though he doesn't know why, even though I'm pregnant, even though I'm a Cabello and he's a Mendes, and that he remembered kissing me and it wasn't bad." She reached over and twirled a piece of Hailee's hair around her finger. "And I was thinking that felt pretty nice." What she didn't add was why it felt nice: because someone seemed to want her. Someone noticed her.