𝔏𝔬𝔳𝔢, 𝔏𝔞𝔲𝔯𝔢𝔫 ✒︎ Camren

Part Eleven: Near Misses

Near miss (noun)
-An unplanned event that has the potential to cause, but does not actually result in human injury, environmental or equipment damage, or an interruption to normal operation.

***

I like to think that real love happens after you truly get to know someone, after you come to know every little detail of their stories; the good, the bad, the parts that no one even knows about. The part of their stories that they're too scared to even have the words leave their lips.

It's when you get to know their darkness, and you try to find a way to shine your light into it.

It's when you get to know every honest and messy aspect of their lives, and it sets into perspective how both your lives will be together.

Real love is practical but it's also every bit of magical. It's when you kiss them and you feel the sparks, but it's also communicating with your partner. It's working your ass off trying to make things work with them, because every fibre of your being wants it to be them.

It comes after all the imperfections have been stripped off from them and they are standing before you, all their flaws laid out in the open, and it's as though you're seeing them for the first time...naked.

So, before you think that you're in love with someone, you must ask yourself this - do you truly know the person who possesses your heart? Or are you merely in love with the idea of them? Because most of us spend so many time locked away in our heads creating scenarios that will never happen or aren't even real about someone, and we find ourselves slowly falling for someone that isn't even real.

Have you ever thought that maybe sometimes, we are the ones who are breaking our own hearts?

We walk into a situation, and get attached to someone all by choice.

Your choice.

And then...then we let them break our fragile hearts.

Why?

Why would you let someone do something so painful to you? Because we're the ones who gave them the opportunity to.

***

"Camilita, darling," I heard my father's thick Spanish accent echo throughout my suite. He wasn't one to show up uninvited, but it wasn't unwelcome. "Where are you?"

I came out of my room, Raven was in the kitchen preparing some breakfast for the both of us; pancakes, I believe she said it was. She had said that I worked too hard and this was the least she could do for me, even though she was one of the best employees to have ever graced my father's hotel. "Hola, papi. What's the matter?" I placed a kiss on his cheek in greeting.

He smiled fondly at me. "You are not working today," he placed a flyer in my hand and I skimmed through it almost immediately.

"An art fair?" I questioned.

My father nodded. "I know how much you love the arts, just like your madre, I think you will have fun. You can take Raven with you as well."

He was absolutely right. I loved art. Being around it; looking at it, drawing, I guess it was just part of me. I had learnt how to draw from Maggie but I always loved being in the presence of art.

In one of my mother's lives, she was an artist.

An artist who my father had fallen head over heels in love with.