My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose

Chapter Ten

This sucked. This totally one hundred percent sucked.

Camila had a crush on someone who not only didn't like her back but also worked in a shop she's allergic to, so she can't even hang out there?!

That had to be the universe playing some kind of cruel trick.

What did she do to deserve this?

She always braked on the road to avoid hitting animals. She donated money to charity. She'd never killed anyone.

Not directly anyway.

So why was her life like this?

"If I can't stay here, why don't you come hang out at the parlour for a while?" Camila suggested desperately.

Lauren shook her head, maybe a little too quickly. "No can do, Camz. I've gotta stay here."

"No you don't," LaFontaine said. "The cacti... well, cactus has been delivered, that was what I needed you for really."

"Well... I should stay in case we get a lot of customers."

"Do you see any customers here? I think we'll be lucky to get one all day," LaF laughed.

"Well, I should stay just in case," Lauren insisted.

Camila tried not to feel insulted.

Camila failed at not feeling insulted.

"Why not? Do you not like hanging out?" She asked.

"Are you kidding?" LaF said, before Lauren could reply. "I haven't seen Laur this happy since..." they trailed off, looking at Lauren warily.

"Since what?" Camila asked.

"Since nothing, LaF's just being overdramatic," Lauren said pointedly, and LaFontaine nodded furiously.

"Just me, putting my foot in my mouth like I always do, you know," they said, but Camila didn't buy it.

Something was up with Lauren, and Camila was going to find out what.

She spent the rest of the day thinking about it (probably wasn't a good idea to let your mind wander when you were giving someone a permanent and irreversible sleeve tattoo but, you know, whatever.)

When she finally turned the sign on the door to 'closed', she steeled herself before turning around to face Owen, who was sitting at his desk with his feet up.

"So... Lauren says her brother was in the band with you?" She winced. That was not a good opening. Owen probably didn't want to talk about the band.

"Uh, yeah, it was me, Chris and some guy called Mitchell. Then Chris left, then JP joined, then Dennis joined then Mitchell left and now..." he laughed, "it's a completely different set of people than we started with."

"So you knew her in high school? What was she like?" Camila pressed on. A look of recognition crossed Owen's face as he realised what the conversation was really about. He kicked his feet off the desk and stood up.

"She was... different. Younger I guess. I mean she's a total hottie obviously and probably could've been one of those popular chicks you always see in movies but she just didn't care about that. She kept herself to herself. I mean, I was in her English class for two years and I never even noticed her!"