the broken mirror ➸ camren

Chapter Nine

Camila watched the girl she had saved a couple of nights ago walking away, entering the dark alley.

The sky was black and there were no stars. The night was one of Camila's favorites, quiet and peaceful. The respite in the atmosphere was giving her feelings of isolation, which made her mood.

Life had been so difficult through the latest years for her. Since her father had left her and her mother when she was only two, things had begun to go downhill. Sinu (her mother) had lost her job, and there were plenty of days with no food for them. They begged together in this exact same neighborhood where the Latina lived now, the world recognized them everywhere. When Camila turned thirteen Sinu started suffering from a plague, which soon led her to sudden death. The loss of her mother was the final blow; Camila fell into depression and started working as a waitress at a neighborhood café. The money never was enough and one year later her boss got her fired. Then was when, at the age of fourteen, she met Cameron, a blond fifteen-year-old boy coming from a similar family. He was an orphan and a stray from a very young age. The two teenagers had become friends, and soon ended up depending on each other, as none of them had any other living relative. One year after that Normani also entered their lives. Since then, life had always been tough - but Camila has become accustomed to these conditions.

The homeless sighed and moved away from her corner, lying on the small mattress on the cold warehouse floor. Though her body ached every singe morning, she didn't have anywhere else to lie down on and was grateful for Cameron, who had dug it out of the dump.

Normani was busy reading a book she had borrowed from the public library. She was squatting in a corner of the wooden building and was already lost in what she was reading. Books always fascinated her - and the public library was the only place she was accepted as she was, dirty and all old-clothed.

Cameron was missing from the house, probably looking for food. Having experienced every aspect of life in the streets and every possible danger or threat, he didn't allow his friends to be the ones finding food; the two girls were the only people he had ever considered his family. In fact, he thought they were way more of a family than his real parents, two junkies who only cared about getting the needle deep down into their skin.

Camila watched Normani without paying the dark-skinned girl a great deal of attention when her friend's eyes moved away from the book and fixed on her. Normani's eyes were always warm, ready to welcome anyone who was kind enough to her. Nevertheless, they were also always ready to attack anyone who threatened her and her friends.

"What were you staring at?" Normani asked, referring to the habit of the younger girl to stare out of the window every night.

"What I stare at every night... the street... the people."

"You never usually stay there untill ten, you don't like the cold. Were you waiting for something?" she said. Normani had never gone to school in her life but she was the smartest person Camila had ever met.

"No... what would I be waiting for?" The Cuban said calmly, knowing that this was the first time she was lying to her friend. Because there really was something she was waiting for. Something she wouldn't be waiting for under other conditions.

Camila never lied - she hated lies. Her life was already quite difficult, lying would make it even worse. She refrained from resorting to the solution of lies. Besides, if she wasn't entirely honest with her friends, with whom she had lived her half entire life, who would she be honest with?

"You know Mila... a lot of things look pretty outwards but are the darkest and ugliest you've seen on the inside."

How could Normani know exactly what Camila was thinking of? Did she also know that her friend was waiting for the girl who looked like an angel to make sure she was okay? She had been nothing but awful to her but Camila could not get herself to dislike and forget her. Her divine face was captured in the memory of the homeless and wouldn't leave that place. The girl tried to shake it off but it was futile. And she didn't like this, she did not like it at all. The only person Camila'd devoted so much time of her thoughts for was her mother, whom she had been missing every day since she died. How was it possible, just like that, an indifferent girl to with rude manners and racist perceptions to appear and make the young Latina so skeptical? Those emerald-green eyes, however, wouldn't stop haunting Camila's mind. They reminded her of the ocean, though she had never even seen it. She could listen to the sound of the waves, though she'd never heard that sound before in her life. She was able to smell the salt of the sea, though this smell had never reached her nostrils. It was all just so strange that Camila wanted to rid herself of all these sensations.