Three Is A Crowd

Chapter 29: Beanies and Chocolates

Lauren arrives early at the airport.

She's brimming with too much excitement for her to stay any longer at her parents' house so she asks her brother, Chris, to drive her to the airport two hours early. She doesn't care if she has to wait for a while, she'll just read her book.

Besides, she doesn't want Camila to be here first and have her wait for her. That's not a good way to start her quest to win Camila's heart.

She smiles as she adjusts the panda beanie Camila gave her a few days ago -- a lucky hat for the trip, according to her. At first, she was horrified at the idea of wearing that atrocity in public -- it's so not her style -- but seeing Camila beaming happily when she grudgingly allowed her put it on her head, she couldn't bear to not wear it. Hell, she'll wear it all day long if it meant so much to Camila.

Besides, the gift shop lady told her she looks cute, so she now indeed feels cute, so she wears the panda beanie with a certain pride and confidence.

She shifts in her seat, her left buttcheek numbing a little, the giant bar of toblerone (she could murder a piñata with this shit) she bought at the gift shop almost slipping off her lap. It's just a last-minute purchase. She knows Camila gets uneasy in airports and planes (she bugged Dinah to tell her all she needs to know to make Camila's trip comfortable), so she figures that chocolate is the easiest trick to distract her. She also saw a flower-shaped bookmark, and bought that too, noticing how Camila dog-ears her books -- which makes Lauren cringe. It's about time she learns the basics of proper book-handling.

Time passes by so quickly when she has a great book to read (there were several times she couldn't help but draw comparison from the Orwellian plot she's reading to this current administration and mutter 'Fuck Trump!' which, unfortunately, was loud enough to be heard by a guy wearing a red cap with the letters MAGA on it, and he glared at Lauren, which Lauren was only too willing to return and more), a snack to munch on, a good conversation with a stranger, and the thought that any minute now she'll see Camila stumbling towards where she's waiting.

She has texted her several times, making sure she knows where she's at so she won't get lost, but the last text she has gotten was from an hour ago.

It doesn't matter, she's probably on her way here already.

• • •

Camila gets a text from Lauren last night, telling her that she'll just meet her at the airport (don't be late!, she types in caps lock and multiple exclamation points) because she has to do her obligatory familial visit since she wouldn't be able to be at her mother's birthday (and she had to suck up to her mom just so she wouldn't have any more reason to hate her), and so, Camila asks Dinah to go with her to the airport -- for moral support, because airports make her antsy.

For what feels like the twentieth time, she checks her backpack again to be sure that she doesn't forget anything. Okay, truthfully, she has opened her bag a little over thirty times already, just because she has nothing else to do but wait for Dinah to come pick her up.

She gets another text from Lauren telling her that she's already at the airport, and she smiles as she texts back telling her to chill her butt and she's just waiting for Dinah.

She's really doing this. She's doing something totally unplanned (well, maybe she did a little bit of planning already, but her point is, this is so unlike her). A trip this huge would have normally taken her at least a month to plan and finalize, and it would have needed approval from her parents. The fact that she's doing this without asking them makes her feel both scared and liberated, and it confuses Camila a lot. She's not used to this kind of dilemma and mixed feelings.