Trials & Tribulations

Chapter 34. "She's pretty smart, Mila"

"Camz is late," Lauren observed as she sat in the cafeteria with Dinah, Ally, and Normani at their usual table. "Do you think she's alright?" she asked the others glancing around the room in search of her girlfriend.

"She's probably up to something entirely too cute to conceive," Ally commented in response, taking a sip of her drink. "Remember the last time she was late for lunch and she came back brandishing a pair of tickets to the winter formal for the two of you?"

"Yeah," Normani agreed with Ally. "Christmas is coming up and I wouldn't put it past her to have organized some elaborate surprise. You know how much she enjoys them."

"Maybe," Lauren replied doubtfully, a nagging feeling in her stomach. "She's just normally not this late to lunch..."

"Mila is rarely ever late to lunch," Dinah granted. "I mean, there's food here..."

"Guys," Lauren interrupted Dinah thoughtfully, looking around the room and noticing a number of faces looking in their direction, watching the group closely. "Is it just me or... are people staring at us?" Dinah and the others scanned the room for a moment to validate Lauren's remark.

"Uh, yeah," Dinah acknowledged, her eyes briefly making contact with a number of students whose attention was piqued in their direction. As soon as they realized Dinah was observing them, they averted their gaze, seemingly embarrassed at being caught gawping. "What's that about?"

"I don't know," Ally answered, puzzled at the excessive interest they were getting. "This is weird..." she commented, trailing off as she noticed Miss Lovato approaching them from across the room.

"Girls," Miss Lovato said as she reached them, her tone serious. She stopped behind Lauren and
Dinah, placing a comforting hand on both their shoulders, standing between them. "Can you come with me for a moment?" she asked. Lauren turned in her seat to look up at the teacher who had a solemn expression on her face and she felt her stomach drop in response, a sudden sense of dread and inexplicable foreboding coming over her. "Please,"

Miss Lovato prompted and the girls' collected their belongings together before following her out of the cafeteria and down the hallway towards her classroom, no one speaking for the entirety of the journey, everyone pondering the meaning of their sudden summons. "Have a seat," Miss Lovato instructed them all, gesturing to the vacant desks in her classroom as the girls' entered. She closed the door behind them as they all descended into a few chairs nearby, each one watching her attentively, anticipating her next words. Miss Lovato walked over to a desk opposite the girls and perched herself on it so that she was facing them.

"What's going on?" Lauren asked her anxiously when she didn't say anything.

"I don't really know how to tell you this," Miss Lovato started, lowering her gaze to the floor for a moment before meeting Lauren's eyes. "So I'm just going to say it." She paused briefly to look at each of the worried faces before her. "Camila had another seizure during French class earlier,"
she informed them, her tone neutral. "She's been taken back to the hospital." For a while, no one said anything, each of them looking round at the others apparently lost for words.

"Is...is she alright?" Lauren finally managed to ask. "I mean, she's ok isn't she?" Miss Lovato pulled up a chair and positioned it in front of the pair of desks where Lauren had sat next to Dinah.

"Lauren," she started, reaching a handout and taking the youngsters in her
own supportively as she sat down. "I know this is scary but I really
need you to try not to worry..."

"That's not an answer," Lauren noted, sensing Miss Lovato's attempt to avoid directly answering
the question.

"No, it's not," Miss Lovato replied simply in agreement. She sighed to herself at having to be the bearer of bad news. "The truth is that Camila's not ok." Lauren felt tears sting her eyes and she looked over at Dinah who looked just as taken aback by the teachers' brutal honesty as she did.