Three Is A Crowd

Chapter 26: Nuclear Fart Bomb

A/N: after Camren (the fish) has received numerous death threats and hate mails (they wanted him to drown, and they keep calling him a duck, which confused him a lot because he's a fish) for giving you false hopes about a certain kiss, I'm taking over the story once again. Poor Camren needs to be sent to a series of therapy sessions for the trauma he has endured. Let's hope for his speedy recovery, and maybe he'll come back less sassy and he learns how to not be a smart-ass.

Anyway, here's 9500 words worth of camren (the ship, not the fish) for you guys. Thank you for your patience.

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If there's one thing Camila has learned from Lauren, it's the fact that life could be completely random -- unpredictable and beyond anyone's control.

Sometimes, when you think that everything is going well, shit happens. Sometimes, when you're feeling hopeless and confused, life surprises you in an unexpectedly good way. Most of the time, life is just a series of twist and turns, so spontaneous that all you can do is witness your life either fall apart or come together, from afar, as if you're watching yourself in a movie while eating popcorn.

'That's why I never plan my life.' Lauren casually tells Camila one time, shrugging nonchalantly as she sips her beer. 'Life is like a bowling ball, y'know. Its main purpose is to shatter all your carefully-constructed plans and dreams for sport, little stiff bowling pins falling down one by one, or all at once, and everything changes in the blink of an eye. So why plan?'"

'That's easy for you to say, Lauren, when you have an enormous trust fund waiting for you. You can afford to not plan anything."

"Camila, I'm not talking about the boring stuff.' Lauren scoffs. "I meant the little things in life. The journey, not the destination. The take-a-break, sniff-the-flowers kind of moment. That surprise drizzle when you're expecting a sunny morning and you didn't bring an umbrella. Something that's out of your control, so all you have to do is smile, don't overthink, and wing it.'

That's what Camila has been struggling to accept - that she's not in full control of her future. Her entire life has been all about planning and setting goals, basically creating her own by-the-number painting -- color number one yellow, color number two blue, color number three green (not red!) and voilà, you have your very own Van Gogh painting! You're living your perfectly set-up life that our society approves.

She's been led to believe that a good life is a matter of following rules and procedures; a step-by-step routine which would lead you to long-lasting happiness and peace of mind. The littlest setbacks could send her in a downward spiral of panic and overanalyzing, and that's why she always makes it a point that she's in control of everything as much as she's capable of. Her life is a blueprint of carefully-drawn lines and angles which she always follow to avoid being blindsided.

That's what she's been doing her entire life. She follows orders to make her family happy, and she believes that by doing so will, in turn, make her happy, as well. It's the logical order of life. Without her plans, without her goals, what will she be? She'll be lost.

Since knowing Lauren, her life has been one random surprise after another, something that Camila never thought she could tolerate, but then the most surprising thing so far is the realization that it isn't that bad like she imagined it to be. It's like waking up one day without a plan and realizing that it doesn't give her a panic attack; well, at least not all the time. That's progress, right?