gravity
There is a certain entity, a welcoming, to dreams.
Varying, of course, but they are always something that she has looked forward to after all these years, an escape to the harsh pings and pangs of reality and heartbreak, piles of pain building on top of one another until they overflow, drowning in the head high water. Dreams are beautiful, Cammie reminds herself, throwing sets of kicks and punches to reinstate that idea in her mind, but it just won't stick, and the simple thing is that Cammie doesn't want to let the best things go.
Josh had already left to somewhere else; somewhere important, away from Rosewood ever since he had learned that she had been lying to him, all along —it was a great opportunity, and it was something that she would have done as well. He had never bothered to make contact with her after that fight, not even once, and though she had fell out of contact with her older friends, Cammie was aware that he had made contact with them.
It would have hurt too much, Bex would have told her, repeatedly, laying a reassuring hand on her shoulder; she was right, though, like usual. It would have been too hard to say the goodbye, which was why they had written those letters. She had been lying down on her bed, fluffing the pillows once last time before curfew and the time had come to read the letter. There had been various blows to her heart, and at the end of the night, she ended up disposing of entirely.
It was no use in trying to retrieve it, when it was half-burned and the scented candles of apple and cherry filled the darkening room, so she had slept, and tried to escape, like she always had. There was only so much she could try, however, before she broke herself in the process.
.
Certain people are watched at high school balls.
There's the common blur of lace, satin, and tuxedos, that reminds all of the individuals of more of a wedding than a prom. Sweeping across the floor, mixing golds with silvers, savory majorelle blues with alizarin crimson reds —she is standing at the top of the staircase, her lips pursed together as she stumbles down onto the ground, obviously intoxicated with some sort of drink; tinkles of delicate laughter light up the room. She is a princess, a primadonna girl, in her own right, if we could all forget. Night comes, and we all know that this is her time to shine. She spins endlessly around the room, her dress flapping in the wind, a chill coming in from an open door, her blonde ringlets falling out of her crown as she takes no time to pause, obviously, the most energetic individual in the room.
On her right arm is the escort. He has light blue eyes, golden brown messy hair, and a carefree, light smile, a light Italian accent as he tells a joke, tinkles of light laughter following him wherever he travels throughout. The girl is beaming, pearly whites brilliant underneath the shining lights above, and it looks as though she could be the happiest girl in the world.
She leads him to the middle of the room. He places his glass down on the floor, and they break into a gentle slow dance, her eyes never leaving his.
The boy could be a different matter, entirely. Every now and then, he breaks the eye lock that the two share, and looks above her shoulder at one of the other girls who swirls past, with something longing in his gaze but she's already taken, so it doesn't matter anyway. The girl looks back at him, noticing that his gaze is somewhere else and goes off to get some drinks, watching sadly from the distance because her dreams aren't as bright as they could have been. She notices the boy near the outskirts, but doesn't feel the need to make her way through the crowd and the lights towards him, instead turning completely away, trying to ignore him.
There's another person standing near the edge of the room —he's sipping a martini, a sour look on his face as he throws the glass angrily onto a plate, demanding something stronger. The bartender tells him take it easy, mate, but he doesn't have to listen anymore, not to anyone. He's not looking anywhere in particular, to the untrained eye, but though it's a prom, there are at least fifty highly trained spies throughout the room, watching your every move and marking it for a final grade.
He's glaring, however. Glaring at the boy who's standing in the middle of the room, dancing with a few of the other girls while his date is somewhere else, innocently taking the glass of punch that isn't spiked. He's looking through the nearest reflection, a stainless steel juicer, and examining how horrified the girl looks at the fact that she knows that she'll be replaced, soon enough. There's hate and jealousy and anger in his eyes towards the boy, and the glass breaks within his iron grip.
If anybody cared enough to notice, which they probably all didn't, they would see the love triangle in the room.
.
The night's not over yet. Another girl makes her way over to the moody boy in the corner of the room, taking away the glass that he's holding so tightly in his hands, shaking almost. "Take it easy, seriously, Zach."
"You can't tell me what to do," he snaps, laughing a little to himself. "I'm Zachary Goode. You can't tell me what to do; nobody can tell me, Macey."
The girl winces a little, hiding it however, at what he's become. "You can't be like this, Zach. I know that you're hurting, we're all hurting at one point or another but we have to hide it, and we have our friends. That's how we get through all of our problems —with our friends, not by hiding every flaw behind fake smiles and what's that —you reek of alcohol." This time, Zach gives up the martini, setting it down on the table and swivels the stool. "What did you even do?"
"She didn't tell you?" he replies, in a sniveling voice, condescending almost. "I can't believe that she didn't tell you." He picks up the glass, and sips it.
"What was she supposed to say? That you broke up with her? Because—" Macey lunges for the glass, throwing it to the floor. People glance their way, but turn back soon enough. "—what the hell was she supposed to tell us? We all know what happened. You had this cover relationship, that ended your real relationship. Are you going to fix it, or what?"
She leaves, and he's faced with a decision.
.
Ten years passes, and life moves on —it's mostly bittersweet, but it's more bitter than sweet.
He rather likes it that way, however, where everything's just so expected because life has no surprises besides the sudden deaths of your best friends or the fact that their might be a knife plunged into your chest when you walk out of the grocery store. He knows that somebody's following him —four times, and it's not exactly a coincidence anymore. It's first a woman with the grey beard and pink slippers, then a man with a baby in a stroller, then a little girl in braids, then a woman. The last disguise isn't a disguise anymore, and he recognizes her, then runs towards his apartment; she catches up, though. She's always been the faster one.
"Zach, we can talk about this," Cammie pleads desperately, stumbling over her own shoes to follow Zach through the suite. "Zach! Slow down!"
He pauses at the doorway, opening it with one key and keeping it slightly propped, in case he needed to rush it, yet slam the door quickly after him. There were suitcases lying around the apartment, clothes strewn carelessly and the smell of scented candles somewhere very far away. He turns around, his emerald green eyes showing nothing but fury, and she steps back for a moment, as if Cammie's almost afraid of him; Zach winces at well. He loves her (though she could never know), and she shouldn't ever be afraid of him. This was what he was afraid of —turning into a monster.
It was inevitable, however. "I have nothing to say to you, Cameron," he says coldly, trying to close the door in a vain attempt.
She feels tears spring unexpectedly into her eyes. Though Cammie tries to wipe them away, she remembers that it can't be stopped, and instead pinches herself weakly on the arm because this is what always helps, but it doesn't seem to working right now because the tears are too hard, and they're falling too fast. "I'm sorry," she sobs, rubbing the edges of her eyes and tears spill onto pale cheeks, crimson red lips speaking quickly. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to have this happen... I just thought, you'd deserve -"
"We already discussed this," he replies coldly, closing the door. She opens it moments later, and strolls in carelessly, a slight limp to her right leg as she withdraws the soaking wet umbrella from it. "I can't believe that you would do something like that. I thought that we had an agreement." Pain leaks into his voice.
She coughs. "Excuse me?" There's less sadness now, and more of a regret, more of the anger that's usually not there. "We had an agreement? I-I can't believe that you'd actually bring something like that up. Actually, you're a horrible person so I can believe that you brought something like that up. You should be the one apologizing. You're the one who cheated on me!"
"Yes, I did," Zach replies, not a hint of emotion in his voice. She wants to cry, but she knows that he'll hit her, or she'll hit herself cold first. "I did cheat on you, but it was a cover relationship," he emphasizes.
Cammie rolls her eyes, and pours herself a glass of water, pressing her fingers to her temples as if she's trying to forgive and forget, but it's been too long now to do something as stupid as that. "I don't even understand what you mean, Zach. Iloved you, I still love you—"
"You don't get it?" he asks; everything stands still, just for the one precarious moment. "You might have loved me, but I never loved you! We were never in love; it was just an agreement that we had settled on. Back in high school, back at Gallagher and Blackthorne, maybe then we had fallen in love, but love fades, Cameron! So, grow up, and find somebody else who's going to be your Prince Charming, because I'm not going to ever be that person, and you're just going to have to learn to live with that fact, and move on!"
"Fine," she only says, sipping the drink. "Then, tell me what I did to deserve this." She's already twenty-seven years old, but logical reasoning is always set behind screaming and fighting, something that's done much more often in this coldharshcoldreality, that just keeps on biting and exposing wounds that haven't healed.
He doesn't respond —she leaves.
.
You are cordially invited
to the marriage of Joshua Nate Abrams and Cameron Anne Morgan
at the WestInn Hotel on the Thursday, the 5th of May
We hope that you can attend the event
.
He tells her that she's beautiful, and she giggles; they're holding hands beneath the delicate tablecloth at the first table, and it's a wonder that they even invited him to this in the first place.
Then again, they seated him by the aunt that smells as though she had rolled around in ham, a few children who have rolled around in mud, moody teenagers who reek of alcohol, reminding him of something like himself. The ceremony is fuckinghard —for the both of them. Even as she's waking down the aisle, Cammie contemplates running back down the aisle towards him, and maybe they could run away; even from the back row, he contemplates objecting to the I do, I do too.
But he knows that he loves her, and this is the best thing for her.
Zach chokes back his sobs, because this is all he's ever wanted for her, the happy ending that she's dreamed of with her Prince Charming, and he's just the dark knight, the villain that's going to be killed in the perfect, picturesque fairy-tale ending. Hours later, there's a reception; with the white picket fence house choosing in mind three tables over, he taps a fork to his emptied glass of champagne, several other empty glasses left carelessly around the table.
"I'd like to make a toast," he calls out. "I'd like to make a toast to the bride, and the groom?" Nobody seems to respond. "I'm Zachary Goode." They turn towards him, and he laughs a little —even though they could all be killed at any time, the spy world has time for a wedding, not like Josh knows anything about it. "Though it's been hard on me, being Cam-Cameron's ex-husband," he says; people look disgusted at his very presence at the ohsohappy occasion, "—I could not be prouder of her. She deserves all the happiness in the world, and I could not be happier for Cammie and Josh. So, I wish you both all the luck and the happiness in the world."
People look less disgusted now, beaming more at him. He raises his glass. "To Cammie and Josh!"
"To Cammie and Josh!" the crowds echo, and the newlyweds beam, one of them more than the other. Josh turns his attention to Dillon, the best man, who's going to be making a speech in a few minutes, and Cammie turns him, beaming as she mouths, I love you.
I love you, too, he mouths, back, smiling brighter than he every has. He nods, taking a sip of decorative champagne.
Maybe everything would be alright, after all.
Leave a comment? Tell me if you hated it. Tell me what song you can't get out of your head. Tell me how you feel about high school. Tell me what you think of Cammie and Zach's relationship. Really. Just tell me.
Also read my other stuff. Because I think they have these author's notes so you can advertise your work and leave notes.
So read it, and leave a comment. Okay, :)
x clara