Three Is A Crowd

Chapter 16: Five By Five

Sometimes, life is like a bitch on her period with menstrual cramps who ran out of ice cream and pain reliever.

It could be the most ordinary day, doing your routines, being your most boring self, and bham, your hormones explode like some kind of an intergalactic planetary collision which results into a big jumble of emotions messing you up.

In short, sometimes, a girl could snap and dive headfirst into a pool of self-pity and depression even in the middle of orgasm, and nobody can do shit about it, because that's life -- shit happens.

No, Camila isn't having an orgasm right now, and, no, there's nothing spectacularly shitty that has happened. But, now that she got your attention, might as well get to know her better.

All Camila wants is to spread love and receive the same thing; she wants peace and happiness, she wants to make the world a better place. But when life intervenes, it becomes one giant chaotic complication. It's a constant battle of trying to please people, to gain acceptance and a sense of belongingness, to be as unobtrusive as possible, and at the same time, to do something that feeds her soul. Is it so hard to balance that?

All her life, Camila has tried to be this perfect person that everybody likes; a good daughter, a role model to her little sister, a supportive friend, an awesome girlfriend. But it's exhausting. It's suffocating. She has always played by the rules, making sure not to step on anybody's toes, sacrificing her happiness just to make the people around her smile, and yet, why is life so mean to her? Why can't she get a break?

Being the kind of person that she is, she stays silent and process her pain alone, usually with her guitar and her notebook full of poems and unfinished lyrics.

It's her therapy. It's her catharsis.

And that's what she's doing now; sitting cross-legged on her bed, experimenting with different melodies in her guitar, ripped pages strewn all over her sheets and floor, and basically, just trying to calm the undercurrent of longing and anxiety deep within her soul with the soothing effect music brings her.

By the time Lauren gets back from her last class for the day, Camila, while still sad because of the upsetting phone conversation she had today, has managed to be as calm as a Buddhist monk meditating in a secluded temple in Tibet, and she even flashes Lauren a sincere smile as the latter grumbles her way towards the bathroom and complaining about an obnoxious frat boy spraying spit all over while he tries to hit on her.

When Lauren emerges from the bathroom, all freshly showered and wearing just a long tattered shirt and tiny boxer shorts, she goes straight to Camren and taps on the glass bowl, giggling when she sees the little fish wiggling her tail as she swims towards the sound.

Once satisfied that she has given Camren her daily dose of affection, she goes to her bed and gets her bag of marshmallow which she hid under her pillow awhile ago.

"What are you playing?" Lauren asks, watching Camila with a curious expression.

"I don't know. Just random sounds and words." Camila shrugs, eyeing Lauren who's happily chomping on her snack. "Uhm, I'm sorry, can I have a marshmallow, please?"

Lauren's eyes sparkle as she sees Camila hungrily looking at her marshmallow with a childlike excitement, and she stands up to hand the bag over.

"I'll give you my marshmallow, but you give me guitar lessons." Lauren says.

Camila raises an eyebrow, not expecting to see Lauren care about something other than her books, her vinyls, and her hair, so she shrugs and agrees without hesitation.