Always been you

2020 (1)

Shawn's POV

I put my cup down and rub my eyes before paying attention to the email I've been trying to read for the last 10 minutes without success. I can't focus. I'm too tired, but I have to keep going.

I run my fingers through my hair and force myself to get some work done as I planned this morning before coming here.

Life as an audio or music engineer hasn't been easy so far. Like many other people, I moved to L.A. chasing my dreams and that worked at the beginning but now I was struggling. It was my fault so I knew I had to work my ass off to get back in the game again. Maybe if hadn't hooked up with a certain someone and then, like an idiot, ghosted her, I wouldn't be here begging for a second chance at the music industry, but I had.

I finally finish reading the email and then reply back. I cross my fingers because this has been the biggest chance I've got at working at a studio again and I don't want to mess it up.

I'm checking other stuff when a laugh sends shivers down my spine. It sounds familiar but I can't place it. I take a look around and I see girl on the counter talking to the barista. She's wearing a sport top and yoga pants with a low pony tail. She looks stunning, like the kind of person that has her life together and can walk with ease around because she knows where she's going.

"Matcha green tea late for Camila?", a guy says and I hold my breathe when the girl moves to take her drink. Something sparks in my mind when I hear that name.

"Thank you", she says and then turns to the girl that first took her order. "See you Abby, have a nice day".

I'm shaking when I finally make the decision of going after her and see her face with my two eyes because the sound of her voice and her name couldn't just be a coincidence. I run outside the coffee shop leaving all my belongings forgotten on the table and step outside on the brasing L.A. sun but she is nowhere to be seen. I look at both sides of the street but sigh and I give up.

"Hey, sorry to bother you, but the girl you were talking to, do you know her last name?", I ask the girl at the counter, Abby, I suppose, when I go back inside.

She looks at me suspiciously and I can see she's starting to think the worse of me, like if I was some stalker or creepy dude. The way I ran outside after that stranger didn't help, I guess.

"Uhm... no, sorry", she says slowly.

"Is she a regular costumer?", I ask again.

I'm scaring Abby, that I know. I shake my head and try to explain myself.

"I'm sorry, I know this sounds weird but she looked a lot like an old friend, but I couldn't see her face".

"I don't know her last name", she says still evaluating if she can trusts me or not. "She comes here regularly though".

"Ok, thank you", I say and give up. I don't know if she knows more and doesn't want to tell me, or if she is being honest with me. Either way, she isn't going to give me more information, so I walk back to my seat.

If it was Camila, what would she be doing here in L.A.? I hadn't heard from her in years though, she could be anywhere. My hands are shaking and my heart is beating fast. I haven't felt like this in so long and I hadn't thought of her in a while too. I can't let go of the idea of running into her after all these years apart, so I make my research to make sure there's a real possibility it was her or not. I open Facebook on my laptop browser. I haven't used this account in a long time as well but I'm hoping I can find something. I type her name and click on her profile. She last posted two years ago, not a great start. It's an album of photos from her volunteer work in Southeast Asia. She has plenty of photos with little kids smiling with her, some pics at some paradisiacal beaches, others of her trying local food and even one of a monkey pulling her hair. I spend too much time going over the pictures that I forget what I was initially looking for, but as I dig down on her page, I come across memories I don't want to relive so I just close the tab immediately. There was nothing there anyways, I tell myself.

Abby at the counter follows me with her eyes when I grab my things and leave the place. I probably scared her and she will tell whoever that other girl was that she better stays out of this coffee shop for a while. I hate it, but that's how girl's codes work in this world that keeps on letting them down.

Camila is now in my head. I wonder how she is, where she is, what she looks like. The photos from 2 years ago were very nice and I hope she's glowing just as much as she was on them. In these 22 years of life I had never wished more good to a person than Camila. Ever since we were kids she deserved much better than what she was getting. I always worried for her and even though we haven't see each other in years, the sentiment reminds the same. So much that I can't think of anything else when I should be trying to get control of my life again. If I could only hear from her to ease my mind... but since she went away, I never got back in contact with her and calling my mom to ask about her is something that to this day still makes me nervous and uncomfortable.

Maybe I should have... Maybe I should have stopped her when she changed her plans after everything that happened and decided to get away from it. In a way, we all got away from it, so I couldn't just blame her, but the rest of us didn't leave the continent to do so.

Would it have been different if I had sucked my pride and told her how I felt in that moment? It had been in my mind for quite a while, but when things went south, I just didn't know what to do. None of us knew and I guess that has haunted all of us for years. I tell myself once again that if I can get a hold of Camila and I can make sure she's alright, I'll feel better.

I fall asleep and all I see is 17 year old Camila, on the verge of crying because of laughing so much and that image makes me miss her more. All I want to do when I picture her is kiss her like I did, but if I could turn back time, among other things that I would absolutely do, I would make sure to not keep us a secret. I would scream it to the top of my lungs that I was in love with her, that the animosity was just fun for us and it made things so much interesting. Maybe that way our lives would've turned out differently.

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a/n: Hello again! I hope you're ready to join me with a new story. This time I want to try my hand at a friends to lovers story. Few things to keep in mind while reading.
- There are two timelines happening simultaneously, you have to check the chapter title to make sure when the story is happening.
- The present story is narrated by Shawn, while the past story is an omnipresent narrator.
That's it for now. I'll post two chapters now, please vote and comment on both. I'm excited for this one.