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silentexplorer18 · 4 years

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A Holly Jolly Christmas: A Draco Malfoy Short

Summary: You throw a party on Christmas Eve for some Hogwarts alumni. However, the weather has other ideas in mind for you this holiday season.

Pairing: Draco Malfoy x Female Reader

Warnings: Slight mentions to before the war and not seeing your family at Christmas time.

Read it here on AO3.

Masterlist

Golden flickers trailed up the wall and over the glittering tree that burst from the corner of your parlor, the warmth of the fire adding a glorious heat to the otherwise chilly room. The tree was real, charmed to retain it’s deep green hue, and adorned with a plethora of festive ornaments. Garland trickled up the mantle and through the room, teasing doorways with hints of holly and mistletoe. For the second time that evening, you bustled through the homey space, assuring all the presents were snug under the tree and the cookies, one of many assortments of holiday treats, were arranged delicately on your favorite platter.

Everything was in order for a perfect holiday celebration. Thus, you were eager to open the door when the first set of sharp knocks echoed through your home.

Swinging open the sturdy wood, a cold gust of wind slapped against your figure as your blond guest slipped through the entryway, tailored shoes resting stiffly against your old, woven rug. His face contorted in distaste. Presumably, that’s what happens when a man of polished wood furniture and marble pillars and pristinely pressed outerwear encounters a woman of mismatched furniture and homemade holiday decor and distinctly overzealous Christmas apparel. That’s just what happens when Draco encounters you.

At least he had the decency to withhold a sneer; undoubtedly, his cheeks were too numb to form a proper one.

“Draco,” you spoke warmly, attempting to hide the discomfort in your voice at being alone with someone who quite earnestly abhorred your lifestyle, “I’m so glad you could make it. If you’d like, I can take your coat. Then we can wait in the living room for the others.”

He eyed you with an expression you couldn’t quite place, already beginning to unwind the snow speckled scarf from around his neck. “No one else is coming,” he stated, the sharpness of his tone forming a pit in your stomach with each new syllable. “The local floos are all shut down from the blizzard, and the weather is far too unfavorable for people to be apparating tonight.” Your look of shock morphed to one of disappointment and dismay before his very eyes, an expression he did indeed scoff at. “And as if things couldn’t possibly get any worse,” he huffed, “I’m trapped here until the storm lifts.”

Numbly, you took his scarf and coat, draping them over the coat rack near the door. Nobody was coming. All your festive excitement had been a waste. “I suppose you should make yourself comfortable while you wait,” you suggested, attempting to ignore his blatant disgust, instead opting to attempt a civil evening for the both of you. With a wave of your hand, he stepped into your all too festive living room. Draco spared you any scathing remarks on the decor, instead perching himself uncomfortably on one of your mismatched chairs. The beige paisley was hideous, even you had to admit, but the joy of it being yours, your first piece of furniture, made up for the unsightly pattern.

He held his hands toward the fire. Again, you were struck with what he had said: a blizzard. On Christmas Eve no less.

“Tea?” you queried.

“No, no thank you.” He mustn’t have been as cold as you thought.

“Is there anything you’d like?”

Another scoff. Pronounced even more with an eyeroll. Somehow, he still managed to make them appear elegant, posh even when they were directed toward you. “I’d like to be home on Christmas.” Tone icy, heat rose to your cheeks as he continued. “I don’t see why you feel it necessary to hold these parties so close to Christmas anyway.”

“Christmas Eve is as good a time as any to celebrate,” you shot back, not bothering to mask your irritation.

“Christmas is meant to be spent with family. These parties encroach on that time; it’s rather selfish of you.”

“I know,” you snapped, noting the way his brows arched in surprise. “I know.” With a huff, you plopped down on the carpet beside the tree, hands pulling out the carefully wrapped parcels. Silently, you began to sort them.

Potter. Weasley. Weasley. Weasley. Longbottom. Potter. Potter. Weasley.

The silence was almost peaceful until Draco had to break it. “What in Salazar’s name are you doing now?”

“Sorting,” you sighed, eyes raking up to meet his own. “I’ll need to owl everyone their presents now, won’t I? All of them but yours.” You continued sorting.

“Mine?”

Reaching under the tree, you pulled out a thin box with golden wrappings. The paper was ornate and glimmered in the firelight as you slid it across the carpet to him. When you’d done the wrapping, you’d adored the beautiful, golden cover, and figured Draco would find it lovely. The sinking feeling in your chest suggested you were wrong.

“You got me a present?” he asked, eyeing it warily. With a nod, you finished sorting the last of the packages, allowing yourself to look up at him again.

He’d picked it up while you weren’t looking, turned it in his elegant hands and examined it with a scrutinous gaze that seemed to bore through everything.

“I simply can’t take this,” he stated, holding the package out toward you. “I haven’t gotten a thing for you.” Aggravation still ebbed into his voice despite the fact that his gaze had softened considerably. “Your invitation clearly stated not to bring presents.”

Rising, you perched on the couch, clearly avoiding taking the box from his hands. “I know what I mailed out.” His pointed look prompted you to continue. “It’s just nice, is all, giving a little something to everyone. That’s what Christmas is all about, mind you, bringing people kindness and joy.”

“Well providing presents to people who can’t provide anything back certainly isn’t joyful,” he snapped. “Just take it, give it to someone else. Why waste your money on a gift for me, for any of us?”

“Not all of us have family to give gifts to.” You offered him a sad smile, and the look of surprise and discomfort that washed across his face, through his body, stiffened his spine all the way down to the bones in his dapper shoes, sent a pang through your heart.

“I thought your parents were muggles?” It was more a statement than a question, as you both remembered the word mudblood fall from his lips as you crossed paths in Hogwarts.

You bit your lip, choosing your next words wisely as he studied you. “They are.” Your tone was awkward. “I needed to obliviate them to protect them from…”

Death Eaters. You both knew the end of that sentence, both too uncomfortable to finish it.

Although you’d forgiven Draco for his part in the war, knowing wholeheartedly that his decisions, while seemingly wrong, were based on his upbringing and protecting those he loved, Draco seemed far less accepting of his choices. It seemed he would never forgive himself for what he’d done. What he often failed to forget was that regardless of what side he’d chosen, Voldemort’s or Harry’s, people would have died either way, and, regardless, he would have blamed himself for those deaths. Over time, he’d gotten much better at being unruffled by the mentioning of Death Eaters and the war, but tonight, on Christmas Eve of all nights, he wasn’t prepared for it.

“I should go,” he rushed out, rising and heading toward the coat rack quickly, having gently deposited the present on the coffee table. His coat was pulled on rapidly, scarf in his fist as he pulled the doorknob.

The snow was a good half a meter high with fluffy flakes still floating downward rapidly. Having followed him to the door, you stared in shock at the vast amount that had accumulated. With a shiver, you placed a hand on Draco’s elbow. The blond glanced at you, pushing the door shut again with nominal effort.

“I think I’ll take that tea now.”

The two of you sat on the couch together, a little farther from the fire but still warm nonetheless. Draping some blankets across both of your laps, you dug into some of the holiday treats you’d made for the party, gently sipping at tea along the way.

He’d been pleasantly surprised by your options, even offering a compliment as you displayed a small array of tea bags. The conversation was civil.

You could tell he was still uncomfortable from what you’d mentioned before, so you opted to choose a slightly different route. Desiring to be vulnerable enough to even the playing field, you began, “My parents only celebrated Christmas because they had me. My father hated holidays, all of them, and my mother was always exceptionally frugal. But they wanted me to experience Christmas, so they celebrated for a long time. I’ve gone back a few times after obliviating them, just to see how they are. I don’t talk to them or go inside, just use a little magic to check on them. They don’t celebrate anymore. I don’t exist, so they never had a reason to celebrate.”

Draco was staring at you, nearly gaping at your words. He probably would have been, were it not for his desire to appear poised and dignified at all times. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Don’t be,” you shook your head. “They hated Christmas. If anything, I did them a favor,” you laughed.

He cracked a smile at your joke, eyes still holding a little guilt, but the joy was enough to move forward with.

Saying the two of you became fast friends would be a bit of a stretch, especially since you’d known one another since First Year, but as the night progressed, awkward silences became less frequent and there were jokes aplenty. The longer Draco was by your side, the more comfortable he seemed to become, offering a great deal of conversation amongst cookie munching and tea sipping.

By one in the morning, you’d drifted off to sleep on the couch beside him, and the blond realized with a flush that it was Christmas Day. Reaching forward hesitantly, he grasped the gold box in his hand, gazing at it in faint wonder. The paper tore gently and it didn’t take long for him to slide open the black box inside.

There was a note, incredibly simple in your neat scrawl, as if you’d taken time to assure your writing was pretty and legible.

Draco,

I saw someone with one of these and thought of you. I remember you saying once that you adore decorative things.

Happy Christmas!

Pushing open the tissue paper revealed a handkerchief. Cream colored and already folded for a suit pocket, he gazed at the swirling green lettering on the corner. D.L.M. It was elegant, beautiful in every embroidered loop and swirl the dark threads provided. Securing the box lid on it protectively, his cheeks flushed with realization as it occurred to him that it must have cost a fortune for you to purchase something custom for him, even getting the color down to the perfect Slytherin green - his favorite.

He had to make things up to you.

Eight in the morning was far too early to wake up on Christmas Day, you realized glumly as you rose from the couch. Bleary eyed and off balance from your unusual surroundings - it was not often you found yourself asleep on the couch -, a small sigh left your lips as you noticed Draco had disappeared. Gift no longer on the table and coat no longer on the hook, it was safe to assume he’d awoken and taken the closest floo back to the manor. He had mentioned his mother always adoring Christmas.

The light tap on the door startled you. It was not often someone came knocking at such an hour. Standing, you waved your wand, muttering a few quick spells to freshen your appearance before carefully opening the door.

It was Draco.

And more.

Before you could really register what was going on, Harry, Hermione, Ron, Ginny, Luna, Neville, George, Angelina, and all the children came bustling through the door, pulling off coats, unraveling scarves, discarding gloves, and offering jovial greetings.

Your eyes shot to Draco’s. He was waving his wand casually, the cookie trays replenishing themselves, kettle cleaning itself and preparing tea anew, blankets and pillows righting themselves on the furniture, and, of course, the presents sliding back under the tree, as well as a few others, a few new ones, that seemed to have arrived with your merry bunch of friends.

“Draco, what in Merlin’s name are you doing?” you asked, unable to hide the surprised smile on your lips.

With a smirk, he replied, “Spreading a little kindness and joy. That is what Christmas is about, after all.”

Your smile was priceless, and although he would deny it later, Draco was smiling, too, when you all sat down to enjoy a cheery holiday morning together.

A/N: Thank you so much for reading! I hope you all enjoyed it. Happy holidays to all of you out there that celebrate. I hope you all are doing well. :)

#draco malfoy #draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy fanfiction #draco malfoy imagine #draco malfoy x y/n

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liw-the-melancholic-apple · 4 years

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How it may have gone - Humble Beginnings

A fic taking place in the marauders era. While the political climate seems to head to a conflict, James, Sirius, Remus and Peter are still just teenagers. Dealing with typical teenage problems.

But this year their little group grows. Who would have known that more prefects would be a good thing?

Masterlist

Six: The Christmas Party II

With only an hour left we sprinted back to our dorm. While Nica and Chloe started folding up their clothes and throwing them into the trunks, Milla and Blair went through their nightstands and I tidied up the bathroom. Over the course of the last four months we had collected all kind of trash in that room and we had spread our shower gels, shampoo bottles, potions and make-up kits all through it. I went into both of the shower cabins to organise the bottles and viles there according to their owners, making one extra pile for all the stuff I couldn’t place.

Next I looked at the five sinks and the big mirror. One hell of a mess. To make a plan for the sinks I started by cleaning up the mirror and the little shelves in front of it. Organising the make-up and brushes per owner I filled the shelves with them, cleaned the sinks themselves and then repositioned the toothbrushes and –pastes.

“Bathroom is done!”, I chirped when I entered the dorm.

“Wardrobes are all empty!”, Blair replied, her hair standing up in every direction.

“Milla and I are done and Nica and Chloe are just now moving on to the nightstands. How late is it?”

“Quarter to eleven. You better hurry up!”, I suggested as I threw myself on my bed and took out my thriller from my backpack. I had just gotten back into the action and could have bitten my nails at the scene that was described – the heroine entering an old and abandoned asylum – when Chloe sat down next to me and made me shriek.

“Don’t do that! Mer-lin. You wanna give me a heart attack?”

“Sorry. We’re done, though. Want to go downstairs?”

We all put on an extra jumper and stuffed our coats with scarves, gloves and hats. Then we headed to the foyer. And waited. And waited. And waited. At twenty past eleven I got aggrevated. “It would be very much like them to just let us wait here. They haven’t pranked us at all since we’ve become friends”, I said tapping my foot on the first step.

“I’m not saying it wouldn’t be them, but they should be smarter than to piss us off hours before two of us are being their dates”, Chloe answered.

Half an hour late the boys sprinted down the stairs and nearly ran into us, profusely apologising to all of us.

“All my fault, I ran into Lily!”, was one of the first things I could hear.

“We got carried away teasing him”, it came from Remus.

“Sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry”, Pettigrew kept going on while Black smirked to himself remarking that we had seriously waited for them.

“Shush! Shut up!”, Chloe ordered them to silence.

“Did you at least get a smile out of Lily?”, she then asked Potter. “She didn’t say I was an arrogant pest. Which is nearly as good, right?”

“Sure, Potter, sure.”

Five o’ clock came rather quickly. I had not expected the day to fly by as it did. The snowball fight had been epic. The teams had been determined by our birthdates: First six months of the year against last six months of the year, which meant that Remus, James, Chloe and I had to take on the other five. It also meant that we had completely missed Black’s birthday on third of November which we all felt terrible for. He assured us that it wasn’t a big deal since we had basically known him for only six days at the time but we all felt that we should have given him something for his birthday.

After lunch we went back outside to play three rounds of quidditch and then we warmed up while being introduced to a couple of very helpful secret passages. One led from our common room up to the seventh floor on which the Gryffindor common room was located and we all were convinced that that passage would be used a lot. Another one was a short cut to the dungeons and then there was a secret room behind a statue of a three headed lion, that the boys usually used when they were pursued by Filch.

They wouldn’t tell us how long it took them to find all of these secrets but they did hint that there was an arsenal of hidden passages that they didn’t show us.

We had so much fun that none of us really wanted to get ready for Slughorn’s party although it had been everything any of us had talked about in the last week.

“Guys it’s five! We’re supposed to be at Slughorn’s by six thirty.”

“Relax. You have forever”, Potter tried to calm Nica down.

“If we would all not care about our hair, like you, maybe”, she answered with a smirk. “But we have five girls and two showers, need to dry our hair, put on our dresses and jewellery and make up our faces. Ninety minutes hardly seems enough.”

“I’m sure none of you actually need the make-up”, Black commented absendmindedly.

“That’s how you make all the girls fall for you”, Chloe slapped him against the shoulder.

“What? I mean that.”

“Well, thanks.”

We walked them to their common room and learned that the portrait of the fat lady with a Milla-pink coloured dress was actually the entrance to the famous red and gold den. We rushed down to our common room via the newly discovered secret passage.

“Shower’s free!”, Chloe yelled while rushing past me in her towel.

“Finally!” I grabbed my house-crested towel and headed in. After the snow and the quidditch I needed a shower. It was a quick one, though, since my lengthy hair always needed a lot of time to be dried. Even with the drying charm I had learned from my mum. I used it on the bathroom and mirrors first, so nobody would melt while doing their make-up and then put on my rings, necklace and earrings while an invisible hair dryer blew at my hair, making it stand up like I’ve been electrocuted.

Milla already wore her lilac mini dress that made her look several years older than she was and went into the bathroom to do her makeup; Nica was trying to get her afro into perfect shape, while still in her underwear; Blair wore that awesome midnight-blue dress and put on her new blue heels, her hair already done; Chloe had started with the make-up and needed me to help her zip up her dress.

Once she was zipped in my hair was dry and I brushed it out in the bathroom. Instead of my typical topknot I braided it into one thick strand and rolled that up at the back of my head. As soon as I was done with that I ran back to my desk and put on my lovely charcoal grey dress with the burgundy pattern. Blair who was done first did up the buttons on the back before I slipped into my burgundy pumps that I had bought especially for this party. The little bolero jacket that matched my dress I left hanging for now. Back in the bathroom I went in heavy with the eyeliner and grey eye-shadow – both things that I didn’t do on a day to day – and found a wonderful dark red lipstick.

Nica was the last one to put on her dress – in the end she had decided on a mustardyellow numbers with a white paisley pattern that barely covered her bum – and a little stressed we stumbled down the stairs into the common room. Crick and Magnus were already waiting there for us, talking to Felix who was fidgeting with his tie.

“I’m the luckiest man alive”, Magnus uttered when he kissed Chloe and made her twirl.

“That. Dress. Is. The. Bomb”, Crick stretched every word as he kissed Blair on the cheek. She blushed and thanked him. “You don’t look bad yourself.” The boys all wore dressrobes, all black with yellow ties. I suspected that Felix had asked Crick for advice.

“Toby’s already gone and Sian said not to wait for her. Shall we go?”

“I told Siobhan to meet me on the third floor. I think she’ll tag along with Potter”, Felix bumbled along still fidgeting with his tie as we climbed the stairs.

“Are you nervous, kid?”, I asked smiling up at him as he had had the nerve to outgrow me at only thirteen.

“No…I mean…a little?”

“Don’t you worry. It’s gonna be great. I promise. These parties are amazing.”

“What do I talk to her about?”

“What do you usually say to her?”

“We mainly talk about potions. I tutor her after all.”

“She’s a quidditch keeper and you’re a quidditch fan. You’ll figure something out.” I padded him on the back as we rounded the corner to the statue of Avery the Antisocial where the boys and Siobhan waited.

I watched Felix hug her and compliment her black dress with a smile before I acknowledged my own date.

“Pettigrew! Don’t you clean up nicely!” His dress robes were a dark grey, as if we had planned it and his golden tie matched the buttons. He had obviously done his hair and levelled himself up in the process.

“I thought I was supposed to say that to you”, he grinned.

“Did you buy the dress after finding out which robes I’d wear?”

“Sure, all carefully planned.”

“For real, though, you look great.” He offered me his arm and I took it.

Potter was folding himself over complimenting Nica on her little nothing of a dress, while Black stared at Blair.

“Oh my god. You look like one of those pin-up girls.” He realised her insecure look. “In the best way possible. Hottest girl of the night! Well done, Cricket.”

“Thanks, Black.” Crick didn’t like Black, I knew it but his smile was genuine. I couldn’t help but feel like those two boys understood each other in that moment. They understood that Blair did look great in her dress and that she needed to hear it. They both earned an enormous amount of points in my book for knowing her so well and caring enough to build her up.

“I’m lost for words.” Remus mouth was half opened as Milla turned around in front of him.

“Is that good or bad?”, she asked with a rosy face.

“Good. You look…so good.”

Black who had stopped complimenting Blair notched me in the side. “This is going to be so great”, he whispered, earning a knowing look from Pettigrew.

“Is that what you two always whisper about when you have your little one-on-ones?”, he asked me as we made our way to Slughorn’s office.

“Which that do you mean?”

“That that”, he nodded at Remus who now offered Milla his arm, still obviously in awe.

“Ehm… yeah. We’ve been trying to get them to admit that they like each other.”

“Seems like Sirius is right, then. Even a blind man could see that they do. You should have a splendid night.”

“I expect to have a splendid night whatever they do”, I replied. “And I’m making you responsible for that!” He gave me a heartfelt smile and nodded. “I’ll do my very best.”

In our fairly big group we rolled up to Slughorn’s Office and were allowed in by one of the houseelves. As every year the room looked stunning. It was even bigger than at the dinner and the pretty big four round tables had disappeared. In their place were little bar tables and sofas in one corner and an impressive dance floor in the other. From a central point in the ceiling panels of golden satin and purple velvet draped down into every last corner of the room, giving the impression that it was a giant tent outside rather than just another office in the castle. The floor was covered in tiles of black marble with golden accents. Somewhere out of sight a band was playing Christmas tunes and instead of candles the room was lit by tiny perfectly round glasses with yellow and red flames in them. It was a sight to behold.

Pettigrew had a hard time closing his mouth as it fell open whenever he spotted a new absurdity. Slughorn made a point of inviting old members of the club to his Christmas parties as well as other important people he knew. While we were slowly making our way to the buffet to finally eat some dinner, I was fairly certain that I saw two famous quidditch players and big head from the ministry. The first person who spoke to me, though, was somebody I didn’t expect at all.

“Miss de Witt, long time no see. At first I wasn’t sure if it was you.” A stocky man in his sixties, with a receding hairline and square jaw reached out to shake my hand. It took me a moment to recognise him. It had indeed been forever ago.

“Mr Armstrong?”, I eventually said shaking the man’s hand after I had imagined him without the giant glasses, more maroon hair and a beard.

“The very same, the very same. How are your parents?”

“Doing well, I hear. I have to admit it’s usually Felix who writes them. He’s here, too. Have you already run into him?”

“Not yet, but I’ll make sure to do so.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. This is Peter Pettigrew, a six year from Gryffindor, very gifted prankster. And Peter, this is Healer Lawrence Armstrong, he used to be my father’s superior at St. Mungo’s.”

“ Pleasure to meet you, Sir.”

“And you, Mr Pettigrew, and you. Is it your excellent pranking that got you invited to the party, then?”

“ To be honest, Sir, I wasn’t invited at all. De...Jette offered to take me since all my friends got to go. I’m afraid Professor Slughorn is anything but impressed with me.”

“Oversight on his part”, I assured Mr Armstrong. “Peter, as I said, is very analytical.”

“Just not a potion’s master, I suppose. Horace can be a little small minded”, Mr Armstrong smiled at Pettigrew who in turn smiled at me.

“But do I understand that you managed to impress Horace, Miss de Witt.”

“Partially, I suppose. I am a prefect this year, that always makes it easier to get invited. But Professor Horton seems to have mentioned that I don’t have a lot of problems in Defence against the Dark Arts.”

“I hear she’s brilliant!”, Pettigrew chimed in.

“He will be pushing you for Auror, I reckon.”

“Occasionally. Do you mind my asking how you know him, Sir?”

“Not at all, not at all. I used to go to school with Horace. We always were friendly and remained in contact. When I can make it I always come to find new healers for the hospital. Retired or not. As a matter of fact your mother was at these parties, when she was younger. I got her to consider the career.” I had heard that story only about a million times but still nodded my head and “ooh”ed.

“If I remember correctly you never wanted to take after your parents, right?”

“I’m not that good with broken bones, I’m afraid. The blood I could do but broken bones and vomit make me shriek. I don’t think I’d be a lot of help to anybody.”

“Fair enough. What about you, Mr Pettigrew, ever considered the noble profession of healing others?”

“Ehm… Truth be told, Mr Armstrong, I think I’m not good enough at Potions to get into the program.”

“So, you have thought about it?”

“I’ve entertained the thought, Sir, yes.”

“Well, with a clever and trusted girl as Miss de Witt in your corner, I’m sure you’d manage to get in. Just you write me if you should want to apply.”

“Are you serious, Sir?”

“Absolutely. Have a good night, kids.”

“And you, Mr Armstrong.”

Once the former healer had left us Pettigrew fell into my arms and thanked me over and over again for having introduced him. He apparently had always wanted to become a healer and was rather crushed when he found out what the required NEWT in Potions was. Beaming with pride and joy he filled his plate with snacks and fingerfood and dragged me over to his friends.

“Guess what de Witt just did!” In every detail he described the conversation we had just had while I wondered where Remus and Milla were off to. Blair caught my look and grinned. She whipped her chin to dance floor.

“T’is the season”, a hoarse voice whispered into my ear when I had just found Milla and Remus shaking their every limb to the rather boring music. It wasn’t over the top romantic yet, but they were clearly too busy with each other to notice that we weren’t around or that I was watching them.

“T’is”, I answered. While I chatted to Black about our dreams for our two best friends a six year girl who I thought was in Gryffindor ran into me, spilling her drink over my brand new dress. She neither stopped nor said sorry and just went on.

“Pardon me!”, I yelled after her but she ignored me. “What’s her deal?”

Potter came towards us with a raised wand and rescued my dress form being ruined. “This is what happens when you speak to Sirius for too long at an event like this. People will think that he’s into you and then the girls get all catty.”

“I talk to Sirius all the time! What’s different now.”

“You usually don’t look like that when you talk to him”, Pettigrew grinned.

“Aren’t you full of compliments today. Thanks doe the cleanup, Potter.”

We spent about an hour just watching Remus and Milla getting more and more comfortable with each other before we decided to join them on the dance floor. I spotted Felix and Siobhan a couple of times both seeming rather unimpressed with one another. Shame. They looked cute together.

While we were mainly hopping around in a big circle every now and again, when the band played a particularly classic song, Potter, Black and Chloe showed off their pure blood upbringing by forcing the rest of us to formally dance with them. The first one who got me was Black who knew exactly what he was doing despite usually neglecting everything he was taught by his parents. Especially when it came to etiquette of any form. When I asked him about it he just shrugged and said that he liked dancing.

At some point Milla and Remus joined us again, a lot less nervous or flustered than at the beginning of the night, which had all of us others grinning knowingly. Although only Black and I had really talked about what those two were blossoming into the rest was fully aware of it as well.

After my round with Black I did two more with Potter, while Pettigrew was taught by Chloe and Blair – who let go of her shyness halfway through the night and revealed that she, too, had been tortured by her parents with dancing lessons. When Pettigrew and I attempted one of the marvellously complicated dances together we even looked half decent. Mag and Chloe snuck off at some point to enjoy each other and remained missing for the entire night. Felix waved me goodbye around midnight leaving Siobhan to giggle with some fourth year Ravenclaw and looking very relieved. His date had gone a lot worse than mine.

I thoroughly enjoyed my night with Pettigrew. Just like Nica and Potter and Crick and Blair did. We were all fully aware that we were here as friends and that it was good fun that we were all together. The awkwardness of having to find something to say or jumping at accidently touching each other was absent all night – if you exclude Remus and Milla who got less and less awkward as time went on. All of us girls got hit with disapproving looks and elbows in the sides when we were talking to Black, who apologised to all of us and explained to me that this was the reason he didn’t want to take Nica.

“So, this happens regularly?”, Blair laughed with red cheeks from the spiked punch.

“Three years ago I came with Mary MacDonald, she’s a friend of Evans’. I asked her because James wanted to ask out Lily and we thought his chances would increase if her friend was glued to me. Mary actually liked the idea but she was treated like a leper for a month. She still scolds me for that…”

“Speaking of Evans…” Potter dashed away and managed to convince Lily to dance with him. It took him a good five minutes and it looked like she was leaving him to stand by himself at least three times but in the end she took his hand. He taught her the same dance Black had taught me. The easiest one. And coincidentally the one that had both partners stand the closest to each other. He wasn’t dumb, our Potter.

As soon as the song ended Potter indicated a bow, said about two sentences and came back to us where he was met with applause.

“How on earth?”, gasped Remus while high-fiving Potter.

“I took Blair’s advice. Not too over the top. Polite. Genuine. And I told her that I thought I deserved one dance after four years of let downs. Besides, I think she wanted to learn how to dance. Seemed into it.”

“Well done, mate!”, Nica screamed. Then she leaned into him and whispered something that had him smirk and blush at the same time.

“Well, of course I’ll show you that again.” They both disappeared into the mass of people on the dancefloor and – just like Mag and Chloe – weren’t seen or heard from again. Nica, it seemed, had accomplished her mission.

Us girls exchanged looks that ranged from impressed to shocked but ultimately forgot about the whole thing as we had too much fun.

Professor Slughorn had to force us out when the dark of night turned into dusty grey of dawn. Apart from us there was a drunk and sleeping vampire left, who Black had decorated with garlic stickers and two snogging couples. We thanked him for the splendid party and walked into the corridor.

“Last smoke together?”, Pettigrew suggested and we all agreed. The courtyard was still really dark as the trees and walls blocked out the slowly rising sun.

“Would it be proper mental to suggest to go up to the astronomy tower and watch the sunrise?”, Blair asked just before we were done smoking.

“No! I love it!” Nica was in. So were I and Crick.

“Little romantic for my taste, but fine” Black nonchalantly snipped away his fag. Pettigrew was game for anything.

“I think I’m gonna go to bed”, Milla said. “I’m knackered.”

“I’ll escort you to your common room then, make sure you don’t get lost.” Remus managed to ignore our grins and didn’t even blush. “Meet you lot up there?”, he asked over his shoulder when he lead Milla back to the foyer.

“Oh. My. God!”, Black chirped when the two were out of earshot.

“Such a sap”, I commented while we slowly walked towards the door and made our way up the stairs.

After a spectacular sunrise in the bitter cold we bid our Potter-less Potter-posse goodnight and went to our dorm. I just wanted to sleep. It had been a really long day. But when I saw the look on Milla’s face I knew that the night wasn’t over yet.

“He didn’t kiss me!” A tear rolled down her cheek, painting a small blackish-grey line on her face. It wouldn’t be the last one.

#marauders fanfiction #marauders era #harry potter #james potter #remus lupin #sirius black #peter pettigrew #original character

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5hfanfiction · 5 years

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Why Did I Get Married? (Camren)

Part Twenty Seven: Communication

“Communication is the fuel that keeps your relationship alive and burning. Without it, your relationship will go cold,” William Paisley.

***

To have a relationship with someone, it requires good communication. There needs to be a mutual understanding of each other’s feelings. For example, if you get mad at someone and you stop speaking to one another, the barrier needs to be overcome and the problems need to be resolved.

Communication solves most problems, therefore communication skills are the foundation for a strong relationship.

*** *Flashback*

“Really, Laur?” Camila opened her eyes slowly when she felt her girlfriend peppering kisses all over her face.

Lauren placed a kiss on Camila’s lips, savouring the taste that her lips would allow. “I will never get tired of kissing you.” She mumbled as she pulled away, sighing in content. “You’re amazing.”

“I can say the same thing about you, amor,” Camila sat upright, her back leaning against the bed’s headboard, Lauren following suit. “Listen, Laur…” Camila began but trailed off.

The photography student at the time took one of her girlfriend’s hand in hers. Back then, Camila was currently pursuing her Bachelor of Music. They were both in their second year of their degrees, which meant that they would soon be taking on the world of work by storm.

“Babe, we don’t need to talk about that again,” Lauren said.

Camila shook her head ‘no’. She sighed and straddled her girlfriend’s waist so that she could look into her beautiful emerald eyes as they had this conversation yet again. “Amor, I know we cleared things up already, but I need you to know, there’s no one else in this world that I would want to be with besides you.” Camila brought a hand to Lauren’s face and stroked her cheek. “You are my everything. I don’t care if someone flirts with me, looks at me, my eyes are only focused on you.”

Insecurity.

It’s a side effect of loving too much but getting little in return.

It doesn’t necessarily mean that Lauren had loved Camila less than she loved her. But insecurity can stem from many types of relationships and it affects someone’s view about themselves. Eventually they might start to think that they don’t deserve love.

“I love you, Camz. I love you so much,” Lauren sighed. “But sometimes it’s just so hard to believe someone like you could want someone like…me.”

Camila wrapped her hands around Lauren’s neck, brown eyes locked with green. “You are stupid to think that I would want someone other than you. I can list so many things about you that’ll make you seem so fucking incredible, Jauregui.”

Camila pulled Lauren in for a kiss. Connecting their lips in a slow but sensual kiss. They shut their eyes instinctively, as fireworks erupted behind their eyelids. A soft groaned escaped Lauren’s lips. The taste of Camila’s lips, how they felt under Lauren’s, was a feeling neither of them would ever get tired of. Not wanting it to go any further as they had classes soon, Camila pulled away and pecked her girlfriend on the nose.

“You’re the person who taught me how to love,” the music student whispered. “The one who actually loved me back. You’re the one who never left my side even though I knew at times, I wasn’t the easiest person to be with. You gave my life purpose. You gave me something to look forward to every single day I opened my eyes.”

Having met Lauren, Camila finally felt as though she knew her place in this universe. She felt that she was alive because they were destined to find each other, to fall in love and to be each other’s happiness.

Lauren smiled and traced her wife’s lips with her index finger. “In a universe with so many stars, the closest one to the earth is the sun. And you are my star Camila Cabello. Which makes you my sun.” She reached into the drawer next to their bed and pulled out a box. “I didn’t plan to do this so soon, or like this, but I feel it in my heart that this is the right moment.”

When she opened the box, Camila saw the most beautiful ring. It was a silver band with a sun engraved into it. Lauren pulled the ring out of the box and held it in her hand.

“I’m not proposing,” the photography student clarified. “But I will one day.” She took Camila’s hand in hers. “I’m making a commitment to you, Camila and only you. You’re why I’m here. I was destined to find you. In a world filled with seven billion people, I was unbelievably lucky to find my soulmate. Thank you for giving me somewhere to be…” Lauren looked into Camila’s eyes and saw that there were so many tears pouring out of them and trickling down her cheeks. “And that somewhere is beside you.”

She slipped the ring on and brought it to her lips, kissing Camila’s finger ever so lightly. “I am totally in love with you. This is the kind of love that burns so intensely that it feels like an explosion of fireworks rippling through my body whenever you’re near, or whenever you touch me. It’s the kind of love that leaves me sleepless but energized at the same time. Speechless but poetic.” Lauren caressed Camila’s cheek. Her girlfriend was an emotional wreck but was still hanging on to what she was saying. “This is the kind of love that shows me where exactly I’m supposed to be.”

Camila smiled through her tears. “The feel-so-much-that-I’m-scared-of-being-hurt kind of love?”

Lauren laughed softly and nodded. “The can’t-eat-can’t-sleep-all-I-do-is-think-about-you kind of love.”

“The love I never knew I was searching for, until I found you, Lauren Michelle,” the music student wrapped her arms around her girlfriend and held her so tightly. “I love you so goddamn much. Please, please don’t ever think I’ll want someone else other than you.”

Lauren hugged Camila back tightly, placing a kiss on top of her head. “I am irrevocably in love with you.”

*End of Flashback*

***

I feel like we’re all just looking for someone who cares enough to try. Someone who realises when they make a mistake and when they hurt your feelings, that they mean it when they say they’re sorry.

Someone who remembers the little things about you. Not just because they have impeccable memory, but rather that they’re paying attention to the things that you have to say.

Someone who’s shy and can barely hold a conversation, but yet they can’t seem to shut up around you. They do anything to have your attention and to keep the conversation going, just for the sake of hearing your voice.

We don’t want to change the ones we love, we’re just simply hoping that we matter enough to them just to go the extra mile.

“Lauren, Camila,” Doctor Briggs greeted the couple as they stepped into her office. “It’s nice to see the both of you again. Can I interest either of you in some tea? Coffee?”

The couple declined Chelsea’s offer of drinks as they took a seat opposite to their therapist.

“How have you been?” Chelsea directed the question to the couple as she grabbed her notepad and slipped on her glasses.

Camila piped up first. “Well, I’ve been okay. I’m actually preparing for the release of my album in September, so my schedule has been a bit hectic, but I’m trying my best to make time for my family.”

Doctor Briggs nodded as she made a note of what Camila said. “Do you have any fears of your relationship regressing into old patterns when you get back out there making your music?”

The singer paused for a moment, looked at her wife before answering. “I feel like it’s only normal for me to be a bit scared but I’m going to try to not neglect my family like what I was doing before. I know Izzy needs me, and Lauren needs me…and I need them. Being thousands of miles away from my family hurts me, and if I can squeeze in some time everyday to FaceTime them, or even when I have a break, to spend time with them, I’m going to do it.”

Lauren smiled and took her wife’s hand in hers, bringing it to her lips.

“I’m glad to hear that Camila. This is major progress as to how you were before. Making time for your family would not just be beneficial for you both as a couple, but Izzy as well. And I know how much your daughter’s happiness means to the both of you,” Chelsea said. “And Lauren? How have you been?”

The photographer shrugged. “I’ve been fine. Just balancing my life between work, friends and my family.” Lauren looked as though she wanted to say something but she held her tongue.

However, their therapist noticed this.

“Is there something else you wanted to add?”

Lauren sighed. “Recently, Camila and I had talked about something with our friends…and I just…I don’t know it’s been at the back of my mind.”

Doctor Briggs nodded in understanding. “The key to having a successful relationship is communication, Lauren. So if something is bothering you, you should try to talk things out with your partner.”

Camila nodded in agreement. “I know I haven’t always been the best person for you to talk to, but whatever it is, amor…you can tell me.”

Lauren sighed heavily and ran a hand through her hair. “Do you remember on my birthday you mentioned us moving to New York ?” Camila nodded. She had brought up the thought, because she felt as though it would’ve been the best thing for her family as they would’ve been closer to each other. “I’ve been thinking about it…and I know that all our family and friends are here in Miami, but I’ve thought about it and I think it makes so much sense to move to there.”

“But…do you want to move?”

“I told you already, Camz, my home is wherever you and Izzy are,” Lauren smiled at her wife. “I know it wasn’t set in stone, but I took the liberty of finding teachers to home-school Izzy and you remember Elena right?”

Camila nodded. “The cute lil girl we met at the park, who Izzy talks about like 24/7?”

Lauren laughed. “Yes, her. Her mother; Anastasia, is actually a teacher and she worked at the Love Academy Preparatory, which means she’s really good. So I spoke to her and asked her if she was willing to tutor Izzy, and she said yes.”

Doctor Briggs sat observing the interaction between the couple. Communication had always been their biggest enemy and today’s session was supposed to help them with that. Talking out their issues, and voicing their opinions would help them to be more in tuned with each other’s feelings.

“I’ve never really interacted with Anastasia, and I feel like I won’t be comfortable with the whole idea of her tutoring Izzy until I get to know her,” Camila said. She wasn’t always fond of people other than their family and friends interacting with their child. She wanted people who were role models for their daughter to be surrounded with.

Lauren nodded. “And I completely understand that, Camz. It was just a suggestion. If you aren’t comfortable with, Anastasia, there’s a lot of other teachers we can hire for Izzy.”

Doctor Briggs smiled internally at the way the couple was communicating. A couple months ago, they were at each other’s throats, and now they were actually sitting down and discussing things that could benefit them as a family. “Effective communication enables you as a couple, to sort out your problems with ease…together.” The therapist said, drawing the couple’s attention back to her. “Being able to communicate effectively, helps to stop pointless arguments which can occur regularly in any relationship.”

Camila and Lauren nodded. They were both aware of the pointless arguments that had been happening throughout the past year between them.

“But before we delve into the session even further, I’ll like to ask about my previous assignment,” Doctor Briggs said. Camila had instantly blushed red. She knew they would have to discuss the topic with Doctor Briggs but she wasn’t exactly comfortable with the topic of sex.

Lauren noticing her wife’s discomfort, she decided to take the reins. “I personally, would like to say that the assignment went well. Even though it was about a year later, I still felt as though we were in tune with each other’s bodies.”

“And how many times after my assignment have the both of you been intimate?”

“Our schedules have gotten busy over these past few weeks, but I’ll like to say that we probably would’ve had sex…five? Six times?” Lauren looked at Camila who nodded in confirmation.

The therapist made a note of the couple’s intimacy. “What about Izzy? How is she doing? A child tends to notice the changes between their parents’ relationships, so has she seemed any different now?”

Camila thought about it for a moment before she answered. “Izzy seems very…chill, for the lack of a better word. She’s always hanging around us, and when she is, she seems so happy. I catch her from time to time looking at Lauren and I, especially these last few days and there’s this gleam of happiness in her eyes, and I as her mother, couldn’t be happier.”

“Camila is right,” Lauren agreed. “We do talk about Camila having to go to work very soon and she does seem sad about having to say goodbye especially after having her around for so long, but Izzy understands.”

Doctor Briggs nodded. “Have you spoken to Izzy about moving?” The couple shook her their heads 'no’. “Do you think she’ll be happy to pack everything up and go? Or would she miss her home?”

“I know that she’ll miss here. Miami is our home. Ever since I moved from Argentina to here, it’s always been Miami. I met Lauren here and Izzy was born here. Miami is who we are,” Camila said, while her wife nodded in agreement. The thought of moving had never crossed their minds before. They would always travel the world, but their hearts would always be in Miami, that’s where they always came back home to.

Home sweet home.

“And I know she’ll miss the people she met along the way here, but our friends, they’re family and they won’t abandon her nor us,” Lauren smiled at the thought of their friends. It was true that no matter where the Jauregui - Cabellos went, the gang would always be there not even a footstep behind. “I think it’s more of the memories that would hurt upon leaving these place.”

Camila smiled sadly. “Yeah. But we’ll make new memories. It’s what we do best.”

“I just can’t bear to be away from you for so long anymore, Camz,” Lauren whispered out. “I’ll do anything just to be near you, even if I have to wait all day for you to come home to me, it’s better than being in a completely different state. And I know that when you start tour that’s going to be another issue, but it’s always been my dream to travel the world and do photography.”

Camila frowned a bit at her wife’s words. She had made it clear that it was always hard to leave her family behind to go out there and fulfill her dreams. It took every ounce of her not to turn around in that airport and run back into Lauren’s awaiting arms. But she didn’t want to disappoint her fans, to disappoint her family and most importantly…herself.

“It’s always been my dream to travel the world…but with you, Amor,” Camila took Lauren’s hand and intertwined their fingers together. “And with Izzy too. I know for a child it’s going to be difficult and it won’t seem like a stable environment, but Izzy is years wiser than her age, and I know it won’t affect her as long as she has us with her.”

“Izzy’s idea of stability stems from having both parents around,” Doctor Briggs said. “And from what I’ve noticed about her, on both occasions we’ve interacted is that she is happier with the both of you. Having a stable home is key, but what’s also important is having two parents who love each other and give that love to their child as well.”

Izzy’s home was her parents.

A home is where there’s love, where memories reside, where friends and family are always welcomed and laughter is never short. That’s a home.

So even if the couple were to move, they weren’t leaving their home behind, they were going to make a new one. Maybe an even better one.

“A home is not a place but rather a feeling,” Doctor Briggs said. “You both seem to be so attached to here, but you’re willing to move to make your relationship work. It’s a huge step…but that’s a huge step in the right direction.” She placed her notepad on the table and looked at the couple. “Our session today was about communication, and from what I gathered during the past hour, is that you both as a couple, do have some things to improve, but your communication has come a long way.”

Camila and Lauren looked at each other, lovingly with smiles on their faces. They never thought that going to therapy was actually going to work. But the thing is, not everyone who goes to therapy get the help that they need. Doctor Chelsea Briggs was only there to guide the couple along the right path, had they chose not to listen to her, not to let each other in, then their relationship would’ve been no more.

You can seek help, but you have to allow yourself to receive the help as well.

Camila brought her wife’s hand to her lips and kissed it. “I love you, Lauren. I love you so fucking much.”

Someday someone is going to look at you, with a gleam in their eyes that you’ve never seen before with anyone that you’ve ever been with. They’re going to look at you and a small smile would find its way on their lips until it grows and their cheeks begin to hurt from smiling so much. They’re going to look at you like you’re everything they’ve been searching for their entire lives.

Wait for it.

Don’t settle.

I hope you know that you deserve it all. The most purest, most honest, the best and most beautiful type of love there is in the world. Not only to be loved by someone, everyone but also to be loved by yourself. To be able to look at yourself in the mirror, with a smile on your face, and the happiness and joy that you feel in your heart, radiating through your eyes, and think “I’m exactly who I am meant to be.”

You deserve the nicest and most caring people to walk into your heart and cherish it for all of eternity.

You deserve it all, you know.

The whole world.

And you know what?

You should never forget that.

People are going to tell you to stop looking for a spark. Stop looking for the butterflies and that tingling sensation you feel whenever they touch you. They’re going to tell you to settle for stability and companionship.

But I want you to picture this…

Can you see yourself twenty, thirty, forty years from now, sitting at the dinner table and only talking about how your day was? About how crazy the weather is, when it’s thirty three degrees Celsius out?mi

Or picture this, you’re out with the love of your life messing around in the supermarket, racing the grocery carts through the aisles, teasing that doesn’t stop, the sarcasm that doesn’t go unnoticed.

There needs to be chemistry, and that’s not something that you can force, it’s just happens naturally.

Sure, being financially stable is swell, but being in love? That’s literally one of the best, and don’t get me wrong, the most painful feeling out there, but it’s sure as hell worth it in the end.

Camila and Lauren?

They didn’t settle for anything remotely far from an incredible love story. Sure, just like any other couple, they had their ups and downs, but the thing about them, is that they didn’t stay down. They picked themselves back up and tried and tried to get back to where they used to be.

The process involved in mending a broken heart is not an easy one nor does it happen quickly, but with the right steps, and with forgiveness, you’ll be on the right path to your healing.

“I love you too,” Lauren brought Camila’s hand to her lips and placed a kiss on it in return. “I’m willing to do whatever it takes to make our relationship work. To love you the way you deserve to be loved. Whatever it takes.”

When you choose a life partner, you’re not just choosing someone to have sex with and someone who loves you and you, them. You’re choosing a lot of things. You’re choosing someone who’s going to influence your kids. You’re choosing your eating buddy for about 15,000 meals or possibly even more. You’re choosing your travel companion; not just around the world, but on simple grocery runs or even dropping your kids off to school. You’re choosing a support system. An unofficial but official therapist, and you’re choosing someone whose day you’ll hear about 15,000 thousand times.

It’s not just a life partner.

“It takes two people to have a relationship,” Doctor Briggs continued as she looked at her clients. “and each person has different communication needs and styles. Couples need to find different ways of communicating that will suit their relationship.” Chelsea looked at Camila. “When you’re angry, what do you prefer Camila? Do you prefer to be left alone until you’ve calmed down, or for Lauren to try until she gets you to open up about what got you mad in the first place?”

“I…um…” Camila stuttered. She knew that her anger had always gotten the best of her, and even though she had the biggest heart and loved Lauren with every fibre of her being, sometimes she wasn’t the best person to be around when she was angry. “I prefer to be left alone. I love you, amor, and I know you know that,” she looked at her wife. “But when I’m angry, I can’t be loving and I can’t be rational. I lash out and I feel like the best thing for you is to leave me alone.”

Lauren nodded in understanding.

“And Lauren?” Doctor Briggs directed the question to the photographer. “And when you’re angry, what do you feel like is the best thing to do?”

“I like to talk things out,” Lauren said. “I don’t like arguing and fighting, and I just feel like the quicker we solve our issues, the better it is for us as a couple.”

Doctor Briggs nodded. “This right here is an example as to what I meant when couples can have different means of communication. Camila would rather be left alone rather than talking things out on you, Lauren because some of the things she might say, may end up hurting your feelings. You both need to understand that as humans, you have different needs, and you feel differently towards things.”

What do you do when someone stops loving?

You let them leave. No matter how much it kills you, how much you want to chase after them, you let them leave.

Because what’s the point of wanting someone who doesn’t want you?

What’s the point of wanting to be with someone who doesn’t want to sit and try to work things out with you?

“So even if it takes an hour, or two, after you’ve calmed down,” Chelsea addressed Camila, “You need to communicate clearly with your partner, to avoid misunderstandings that may cause hurt, anger, resentment or confusion.”

Doctor Briggs went on to list many things to help improve the couple’s communication.

They needed to set aside time to talk without interruption, to their partner about their feelings and misunderstandings.

They needed to think about what they had to say. Not just blurt things out randomly. But it was better to be able to be vocal about what was bothering them and why, and what they wanted to change.

They needed to be clear. so that their partner understands and receives the message accurately. Talk about what is happening and how it’s affecting them.

“A key factor to communication is using the 'I’ statements, such as; 'I want’ or 'I feel’,” the therapist told the couple. “I realised that during today’s session, you both have been using that, therefore it voices your opinions and feelings towards a particular topic.”

When communicating, you need to be aware of your tone of voice. Sometimes your partner may feel as though you’re attacking them if you’re being loud. This may cause them to shut down and not say anything, or they may retaliate and the issue may never get solved.

'Happy wife, happy life’ isn’t an accurate saying. Both of the parties in a relationship feelings should matter. Negotiate and remember that you don’t have to be right all the time. If the issue that you may be having isn’t all that important, or it’s trivial, sometimes the best thing to do is let it go, rather than risk your relationship.

“And most importantly,” Chelsea said in finality. “Avoid using the silent treatment. The only way to work out your differences is by speaking.”

Learn to understand each other rather than defeat each other.

“I want the both of you to face one another,” Doctor Briggs instructed the couple who did as they were told. “We are going to do a little exercise. I want you to look each other in the eyes and say three things you don’t like about each other and three things that you love about each other.”

They seemed a bit skeptical about this but they’ve made huge strides in their relationship, this shouldn’t affect them too badly.

Besides, Camila knew just how annoying she was.

“Camila? Why don’t you start?”

The brunette nodded slowly. “I um..three things I don’t like about you. Hm, hm, hm,” Camila pretended to think. “I don’t like how you leave your car parked in the driveway, and when it’s time for me to get out, it’s hard. You know I can’t drive, Lauren!” The brunette pouted. It had always been a task for the woman to drive and the fact that her wife made it even more difficult for her, annoyed her.

Lauren tried to hide her smirk, but she nodded in understanding nonetheless. “I won’t do it again. I promise.”

“I don’t like how you snore.”

“I don’t snore!” Lauren protested.

Camila rolled her eyes. “Well not every day, but when you come home after spending all day at work you snore. And I don’t like it.”

Her wife sighed heavily. “Okay, I get it.”

“And..I..” Camila seemed a bit hesitant about saying this but she needed to get it off her chest. “I don’t like it when you give in to Izzy. She’s barely five and she has never heard the word 'no’ from you. I get that you love her and I do too, but sometimes Izzy needs to understand that she cannot have everything that she wants.”

Camila tried to look away but Lauren held her face in place to look at her. “I understand where you’re coming from, Camz. It’s just, I want to keep her happy and I feel like giving her whatever she wants will make her happy.”

“I know that, but we’re not trying to spoil her and make her think that this is how life is,” Camila said. “She’s going to have everything that she needs, but she can’t get everything that she wants.”

Doctor Briggs then instructed Lauren to go ahead with what she dislikes about her wife.

“I don’t like how you’re so…” Lauren made random hand gestures. “Messy. You leave things in the worst possible places and I always find myself tripping over your shoes. Or when I go to the bathroom, you have your makeup scattered on the counters. It’s annoying.”

Camila sighed heavily and rolled her eyes. “Now see, if we had a maid, you wouldn’t have been complaining because she would’ve been cleaning up after me!”

What a child.

“Then for you to accuse me of fucking the maid?” Lauren scoffed.

“Well I’d hire an ugly, old maid!” Camila retorted.

Lauren shook her head and laughed. “You’re something else, Camz.” Her wife smiled playfully at her. “I don’t like how you are when you’re on tour. You just I don’t know…disappear on me and text back hours later,” she mumbled. “I know you’re busy and I understand that, but I can’t help but feel ignored and abandoned when you do that. I just think that it’ll calm my thoughts if you just told me that you were going to be busy.”

Once Camila saw the sadness in her wife’s eyes, she regretted just randomly leaving without telling her. There was always a fear that Camila was going to leave her, and Lauren’s insecurities always got the better of her.

“I understand, baby,” Camila caressed her wife’s cheek. “I promise, I’ll let you know when I get busy and not just leave you in the dark.”

Doctor Briggs interrupted the couple to ask a question. “Lauren, would you trust your partner if she doesn’t remain in contact with you? And vice versa, Camila?”

The couple didn’t take any lengthy period to answer the question. They trust each other, but the issue is that, they’ll end up missing each other. Talking 24/7 when you’re busy is difficult, but as long as there’s trust and communication going on in the relationship, there won’t be any issues.

“Lastly, I dislike how hard you are on yourself when it comes to you being Izzy’s mother,” Lauren looked Camila in the eyes. “You’re not a horrible mother. Maybe you just needed some help and to spend sometime with Izzy and to develop a bond, but you’re not a bad mother. Izzy loves you so much, I hope you know that.”

Doctor Briggs made the occasional note about the couple, and if they had been truthful, the couple didn’t necessarily dislike anything that bad about each other.

“Now, Camila, why don’t you tell Lauren three things you love her?”

Camila smiled fondly at her wife. There were so many things that she loved about the woman before her, and only choosing three things about her, was going to prove to be a task.

“I love how much you love me,” the brunette told her wife. “I love how even when I feel like it’s impossible to love me, you’re right there loving me nonetheless.”

There isn’t anything on this planet that Lauren wouldn’t have done for Camila.

“I love how you’re driven. I love how passionate you get about something that inspires you. I love how you’re vocal about the many injustices that people face on a day to day basis and you portray it in your work.”

Camila would choose Lauren over anyone.

“Lastly, I love how much you make me love life,” Camila said. “I love how when I’m with you, watching paint dry can be so fucking entertaining.” This caused Lauren to laugh because they had done this one day when they repainted Izzy’s bedroom. They sat on the floor, passing a bottle of wine back and forth, watching the paint dry.

“And Lauren?” Doctor Briggs instructed for the photographer to tell her wife what she loves about her.

Lauren smiled. “I love how you’re passionate about your music. I know these past few months or even years, I made you believe that I wasn’t your biggest fan, but my god, Camila, your music is amazing. Whenever anyone listens to it, they can feel just about every ounce of emotion that you pour into it.”

To Lauren, Camila was worth finding. Worth knowing. She was worth loving.

“I love how you interact with Izzy. I love how you’re so concerned about her feelings that you won’t do anything she doesn’t want to do.”

It brought Lauren back to their last Halloween when Camila wanted to visit a haunted house with her family, but when she saw the fear on her daughter’s face she decided against it.

And that was just one out of many times Camila decided against hurting her daughter’s feelings. She had something planned that she wanted to do for Izzy, to bring her into 'her world’ but it was a secret for now.

“And lastly, mi vida, I love how you never cease to make a smile grace my lips,” Camila looked away from her wife for a moment smiling to herself. Lauren gently turned her head back so she can gaze into Camila’s beautiful brown eyes. “I love how my only truest form of happiness can come from you.”

Do not fall in love with someone who doesn’t cherish the smallest parts of you. Because that’s what makes you…you. And if they can’t love that, do they even love you at all?

I know that sometimes things get hard and it seems as though the person never truly loved you to begin with, but true love never leaves. It might get lost temporarily but it never leaves. Lost in confusion, pride and misunderstandings but being lost doesn’t mean it’s the end.

Sometimes love needs to take a step back to breathe before it finds its way back home again.

Doctor Briggs clasped her hands together happily. As the couple pulled away from a hug, the emotions being on an all time high after what had been said. “Before the session ends, I have an assignment for the both of you. Date night. Each of you have to plan a romantic date for your partner. I don’t care how it’s done, where or when; it has to be between now and our next session three weeks from now.”

The couple nodded. Camila internally fist pumped because she had been planning something special for them to do as a family.

“You can go all out or do something sweet and simple,” Doctor Briggs placed her clipboard on the table and stood. “It’s all up to you.”

*** Wattpad: Commander_Camren

#UPDATE #series #g!p #camren #angst drama #family #humour #romance fluff #submission #Why Did I Get Married

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fraudulence-paradox · 4 years

Text

08/22/17

I dropped acid for the first time over the weekend (4 days ago). It was interesting. I’ve heard that people when they have an intense experience with it, especially their first time, begin dividing their life into “before acid” and “after acid”. I’m not sure it was quite that impressive, but it certainly was intense. I’ll try to keep to a timeline, but for obvious reasons, that’s pretty difficult. I was at J---’s parents’ cabin for the weekend with some friends. J--- and I had decided a while ago that we wanted to drop acid that weekend, to kick things off. We were sitting in the screened room out back, and I was very nervous. We lit a spanish prayer candle to “La Virgen de Guadalupe” for good energy. My hands were shaking as I pulled the two colorful pieces of paper, perforated and connected down the middle, out of the reflective first-class Canadian parcel bag the dark net delivered to us. I tore them down the middle, handed J--- his tab, and after some thought put mine under my tongue. They were something like 125 mics, and on the advice of our more experienced friend there, we held them under our tongues for 30 minutes. Around the 25 minute mark, (and the 10 minute mark for our friend N--, who had ingested close to 3.5g of shrooms), we made our way into the deep woods behind J---’s house. At some point on our journey out there, J--- and I moved the tabs from our tongue to our upper gums, again at J---e’s advice. I’m not sure if that actually does anything, from what I read, it’s pretty much all ingested as soon as it touches your tongue, but it was part of the ritual, which made it seem all the more spiritual. We entered the woods, and looked at mushrooms and other flora in the woods floor. I was beginning to feel something like a mild weed high, and after a bit more time, colors seemed a lot brighter. That was more or less all I was expecting from what I thought was a pretty low dose, but I couldn’t have been more wrong. All of that may have even been placebo compared to what lied in store for us. At a certain point, when the mushrooms began hitting N--, he broke off our impromptu hike, and sat on the top of a cliff face, observing the woods below. I went up to join him, as the hill we were on, following a trail of mushrooms on the forest floor, was beginning to get rather steep. N-- and I perched on the cliff top as the rest of the group disappeared into the ever thick brush. It was at this point that I began experiencing, for the first time in quite a while, pure, ecstatic joy. I looked up at the trees, and watched the wind shake the leaves, seemingly aware of every moving part of every tree in the forest. I want to stress that even at this point, I still wasn’t tripping, it was merely the come up. For a long time, N-- and I sat on that rock, just listening to the beautiful silence of that West Virginia woods. Eventually we decided we should head back to the cabin, in case the others got back. When we arrived, I was beginning to quite acutely feel strange. At this point, there was no way what I was feeling was placebo, it was real. Sort of a tingling sensation all over my body, with a strange anxiety, or more appropriately skiddishness, like I had just drank a lot of coffee. Staying still or sitting in a chair wasn’t really an option. A big part of the whole trip revolved around me assigning myself goals, and accomplishing them. The goal for that portion of the day, was get a guitar. J--- had packed his guitar and banjo, but as we had arrived in WV in his parents’ pickup truck, and it was rainy on the way up, he had surrounded the soft guitar case in a cocoon of plastic wrap. I’m not sure why this memory sticks out to me so much, but I remember spending an eternity struggling with the wrapping, then realizing it was easier just to unwind it, rather than ripping it. I kept forgetting that, and having to rediscover it, and it felt like some sort of metaphor in my mind. I’m not sure what it was supposed to mean, but it felt significant. Like the universe was telling me something important. Before I go on, I want to stress that as of right now, sober [fraudulence-paradox], base [fraudulence-paradox] (as tripped out me would go on to call me), does not believe in any sort of spirituality, or cosmic meaning or purpose. So dear reader, please take whatever you read next with a grain of salt, because the trip was quite brain bending. For the peak of it, I literally forgot what it meant to be “normal”. I’m still a little confused about it, but at the time, I was absolutely vehemently convinced that not only would I never return to “normal”, but that I was experiencing reality as it really was. But we’ll get into that momentarily.

Now with guitar in hand, I returned to the screened in room, where N-- was sitting. I couldn’t get comfortable in a chair, so I eventually sat in the corner, all sprawled out, feeling electricity course through my extremities. I tried to play some chords on the guitar, but for some reason, all of the chords and progressions that I’d normally idly strum sounded foreign, and alien to me. It was confusing (I would later learn the guitar was out of tune, but even when tuned, it sounded frighteningly alien). I had to put the guitar down, and when I did, I took a momentary glimpse at the ceiling. The ceiling was made of cedar paneling, very natural looking. But as I looked at the roof, if I didn’t take my eyes off of it for a few seconds, the paneling appeared to ebb and flow, the patterns on the wood grain looked less like burned in curves and circles from years of wear, and more like ripples coursing across the surface of a pond that had a stone thrown in it minutes ago. The longer I looked at it, the more patterns and movement I began to notice. At a certain point, it looked as if the ceiling was made of completely clean wooden panels with no grain at all, but instead had paisley, fractal patterns projected on it. My only experience with psychedelics prior to this was with mushrooms, and I took pretty low dose. The only real visuals I got from them were rooms appeared to large, and fonts of things I was writing looked different from letter to letter. And if I really focused on any one thing, I’d notice it was all in my head, I could see what reality actually looked like. The scary, but maybe most mind opening part about acid, is you can’t do that. On a medium dose like I was on, I could look at the ceiling, or the pattern on some object as long as I wanted, but the fractals would only get more elaborate. At this point, maybe 90 minutes had passed, and the rest of the group walked in. They all sat in the screened in room, and began packing bowls or vaping or whatever they were doing. I can’t remember, I was absolutely taken by the ceiling fractals I was seeing. J--- was lingering in the kitchen in the house, so I eventually pulled him out and had him look with me, to confirm how cool it was, and he also saw it. He saw something at least, I can’t know what was going on in his mind, but from that point on, it seemed like some portion of our trips had synced up. We were both seeing something cool on the ceiling, and our thought patterns were totally different than sober us. While we were all sitting in that room, I asked L---n if there was actually some sort of paisley print on the ceiling, I asked if what I was seeing was real. He responded in the best possible way he could have. Earlier that day he told me his brother had coached him up on how to trip sit, and it was showing. Because when I asked him if what I was seeing was indeed real, he didn’t say “nah, you’re tripping”, and he didn’t try to fuck with me by confirming that “yea dude, there are really fractals crawling around on the ceiling”, what he did was respond by saying, “well, what is real, [fraudulence-paradox]? Where do you think reality ends, and the trip begins?”. For whatever reason, that kicked the trip into high gear. Basically as soon as he said that, I began peaking. Something happened in my mind, and I completely lost touch with what was real. My mind was free from having any preconceptions before thoughts. It was like I was five years old, but capable of grasping these intense abstract concepts. It was like I could just sit and think without prejudice or bound. N--- and I (mostly I) decided we wanted to go back out since we were tripping pretty hard, and to be honest, I was just getting antsy from sitting too long. I wanted to go explore everything. I wandered outside, and N-- lit some incense. We stopped at this large rock in J---’s backyard and hung out for a while. I took a watering can from under the deck we were all sitting on, because I wanted to start a drum circle and began to bang on it quietly while the incense burned. My mind was racing, grappling with the strangest thoughts and ideas. I don’t remember any specifics to be completely honest, but I think I was talking a lot about spirituality, and the universe, because J--- told me I was being a walking stereotype. It was probably true, but to be honest, it just felt nice to talk about all the stereotypical stoner crap. It felt like I could actually one hundred percent grasp entirely abstract ineffable concepts in my mind, free from language. But when I tried to verbalize them, it came out as stuff like, “look man, we all exist in.. reality, right? But where does this thing that’s experiencing reality exist? Is consciousness part of reality? Or is there something special and different about the thing that views reality?” But even less eloquent than that, because, c’mon, I was tripping balls. J--- seemed to think everything I was doing and saying was ironic, but to be totally honest, I don’t think I was capable of irony at that point. Everything I did on acid, had to be completely sincere. Everything I was experiencing was too beautiful and felt too true not to be completely, one hundred percent sincere. Even using a watering can as a drum because I liked the sound it made. I completely understand why hippies did everything hippies did now. Every form of expression, especially the esoteric, and non-permanent, like sound and dance, felt like they expressed these crazy, ineffable thoughts I kept having.

Eventually, we left the “drum circle” and ventured deeper into the woods, leaving J--- behind. (He didn’t want to move around, he just wanted to lie down and probably look at the ceiling fractals some more--a noble goal.) We walked through the woods, and eventually made a sort of camp at the base of one cliff, and on the top of another. N-- was setting up his hammock, and I was just staring at trees. As I stared more and more at the trees, I began becoming acutely aware of every single boarder on every single three-dimensional surface of the tree. I cannot stress this enough, LSD didn’t make me see anything that wasn’t already there (well, okay, maybe the ceiling-fractals), it only made me notice the patterns and boarders of everything that was already in front of me. That was the part that was making me question reality so badly. I legitimately wasn’t seeing anything that was outside of reality, I was seeing more of it, somehow. It made me think about how there is this thing: reality. We exist in it, we experience it to some degree, but we can never really know what all of reality is. We are born into reality, but it was already there, and when we die, reality will still be there. Somehow this whole thought cycle (and all the subsequent tangents that came from it) made me very okay with death. I’m not very afraid of it anymore. At least, not as much as I was. I think it made me come to terms with it. We exist for such a short time, and while we’re here, even if we can only see a small part of it, with only five senses, that can be easily fooled, we get to observe reality. I think that’s really special. I don’t think people really think about how much of a gift consciousness is. Whether its some sort of spirit, that exists outside of reality, or its just the way the meat in our skulls shoots electricity, it’s undeniable that there is some sort of human experience, and I think to a great extent we all share at least that. As far as we know, humans, and maybe some other large fauna, are the only things that get to experience reality. I’m not sure why this was so poignant to me, but it was. That was the biggest thing I took away from the trip. We get to exist, and while we’re here, we get to see reality. And if we’re really lucky, and if we so choose, we can even effect reality. We can build, or destroy, or create. We are the masters of reality for a very, very short period of time, in a very, very small space. We can do whatever we want, and even though it’s all fleeting, we can experience it. Other consciousnesses can experience it. These were the thoughts going through my mind, in a wild frenzy. … (eventually write about going back for incense, getting john, experiencing death and birth thousands of times, leaving the woods for the last time, coming down) … ([fraudulence-paradox] note: clearly I didn’t. Maybe I’ll come back and edit this post someday)

After we had built the fire, and J---’s friends from [college] had arrived, we passed around a bong. I thought that the LSD had more or less exited my system. I was feeling back to baseline consciousness pretty much. I could remember why I valued certain things, like not going to jail, disappointing my family, or not dying, which was a kind of disturbing thing I had forgotten earlier, but had remembered that “base [fraudulence-paradox] ” valued, so I probably shouldn’t mess them up for him. So I was feeling pretty sober. And what else is there to do around a campfire, but get a little high? I had wildly underestimated how much acid was still kicking around in my brain, and after the third or so hit, I was right back to peaking. Honestly, I was mentally exhausted at this point, so instead of going with it, I fought it. That was probably the reason things began taking a turn for the worst. At no point do I think I had a “bad trip”, but more like Timothy Leary would describe, there were difficult portions, all of which happened after that bowl was smoked. I started to notice the same sort of heavy pattern recognition was happening in the stones around the fire as was happening in the woods earlier that day with the bark on the trees. I was watching the fire burn, and could pinpoint individual portions of the wood that were burning off, and splitting into charcoal. It was kind of like a very distracting superpower. It was kind of cool, until I noticed with my “super-perception” that living in one of the logs we had thrown into the fire was a whole colony of some sort of woodlouse. It was incredibly disturbing to watch as they all flooded out of the tiny holes in the log, only to be vaporized by the flames above. I witnessed thousands upon thousands of deaths, and even though they were insects, that really affected me. I eventually found some excuse to go back inside, and go to bed, despite it only being 11.

As I lied in bed, I went through the most difficult part of the whole trip. I remember pretty distinctly, that it felt like my conscious, thinking mind, was entirely separate from the animal brain that controlled my actions (which is kind of normal when I’m high, but was amplified by the acid to the point where my conscious mind (left brain?) was having whole discussions with the animal id (right brain?). I’ve heard theories that the brains hemispheres are actually separate entities; the one with the language center controlling the body and any outward communication, and the other hemisphere controlling the logic, and sort of taking a back seat, unable to control the impulses). A sad-sounding song came on, on Pandora, and the “animal mind”, which for simplicity’s sake, I’ll call the id, began thinking about M----, and feeling sad. The “conscious mind”, which I’ll just call the ego, normally would disagree and think the id’s thoughts were all impulses. But what made this portion of the trip so difficult, was the ego conceding that it too was upset. It was thinking something along the lines of, “M---- made [fraudulence-paradox]’s id happy. And we liked her ‘ego’ too”. Over and over. All I could think about was “M---- made us happy”. The ego eventually convinced the id that if it ended, it wasn’t meant to be. We would eventually find someone who made [fraudulence-paradox] happy again. But all I could think about was how nice it used to be to have someone I could share the thoughts of my ego with; someone I could open up to, and not just show the impulsive id, but show the more sensitive ego. I think everyone needs that. It makes people happy, but moreover, I think that kind of trust in another human being, in another human being’s conscious mind, is something beautiful, and of supreme importance. Love is one of, if not the most important things to experience in life. Then, the ego had an even more disturbing thought. All my life, I’ve thought marriage was just how it ends. It was just an eventuality that couldn’t be avoided if I wanted to. The ego, or I, whatever, realized that marriage is not a guarantee. There is a real chance that I could just never find someone. Maybe I could settle someday, but there is no guarantee that I’ll just find someone who I love, and who loves me.

Somehow, I settled myself down. I feel like it required the ego saying a lot of things to the id that it knew weren’t true, but that would calm [fraudulence-paradox] down. I don’t know. Eventually that weird split personality thing went away. I was back to normal when I woke up.

Maybe that whole weird split personality thing was just my mind’s way of dealing with grief. I don’t think I ever fully came to terms with how upset the breakup made me. I dumped her, but it really felt like she dumped me. Something in the semantics of “I dumped her” made me think it wasn’t okay to feel sad. I’m not sure. I’m still sad, but it’s more of a dull pain. My ego was right. If we broke up it really wasn’t meant to be. But I know it’s still hurting him just as much as my id.

#LSD #acid #trip #report #trip report #journal #college #lysergic acid diethylimide #college journal #tripping #psychedellics #psychedellic

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