°•.˜"*°•𝓞𝓷𝓮 𝓸𝓯 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓰𝓲𝓯𝓽𝓮𝓭 •°*"˜.•° (C. Madrigal X Reader)

Chapter twenty four: Destressing

After about a week of planning the party along with keeping up with school work, Marcos' birthday finally arrived.

"It's my brithdayyy!" Marcos said, dancing on the breakfast table.

My mother ran outside and scooped him off of the table immedietly.

"Marcos! Don't do that!" she scolded him "Sorry, Julieta..."

Julieta chuckled and assured my mother that it was alright.

"I have three daughters, they were like this whenever they got excited when they were younger" Julieta said.

Just then, Mirabel busted through the doors to the breakfast patio, dancing and carrying a plate of pancakes with one hand and a plate with arepas stacked on top of each other in the other hand.

"Happy brithday, Marcos!" Mirabel said, jumping onto a chair and then the table and started dancing on the table.

"Ay, Mirabel! Get down, you'll get hurt!" Julieta said "Okay, maybe they're still like this at times."

Mi mama laughed and continued setting the table. I was given the duty of setting up the party while Camilo distracted Marcos but Camilo was nowhere to be seen.

'Ugh, where is he?' I asked myself internally.

"Marcos, you start eating your pancakes, you can eat first since you're the birthday boy!" I said "I'm going to go check on Camilo, okay?"

"Ooh, checking on your boyfriend, y/n?" Marcos said, making his pancake pieces kiss.

"Camilo is Y/n's boyfriend?" Antonio asked "How mean! He didn't tell me!"

"Camilo is not my boyfriend, we're just friends!" I assured them.

"Mhm..." Mirabel said, raising an eyebrow.

I scoffed at her and went back inside Casita to search for the tricky shapeshifter. Adriana passed by me, carrying a painted banner.

"Adriana, that goes up here! Marcos is out there right now!" I said.

"Oh, then I'll get Adelita to put it up, I can't reach that" Adriana replied, shrugging before creating a shadow portal and stepping into it.

Miguel passed me and ruffled my hair.

"Hey, y/n" Miguel said casually.

"Miguel! My hair..." I said, trying to retame my hair.

"Hey, where's Camilo? Isn't he the one who planned this party?" he asked "Did lover boy ditch you, y/n?"

"Haha, very funny" I said, rolling my eyes "I was just looking for him, any idea where he is?"

"I saw him go into his room" Miguel said, pointing upstairs "He was shapeshifting into a different person with every step though...Kind of reminds me of how you used to get..."

I felt my eyes widen and I started running upstairs. Casita helped me by pushing my in front of Camilo's door with the tiles. I knocked on the door cautiously.

"Camilo?" I asked.

"Y/n?" I heard him ask back.

"Yeah, it's me" I replied "Can I come in?"

The doornob jiggled a little bit and then the door opened. I saw Camilo in front of the biggest mirror in the room as Isabella.

"Why are you Isabella?" I asked.

"Oh uh...I needed a pick me up I guess..." he said, staring at his reflection, running his hands down his torso.

I gave him a confused look. When he noticed it in the mirror he explained a bit more.

"Uh, well...I heard some guys at school talking about me while I was giving invitations out in town and..." he explained "It helps to not be me sometimes..."

I used to do this too. Whenever I felt bad about myself I just turned into someone else and took on their identity but I realize now that it was unhealthy. I was chipping off pieces of myself whenever I did it, trying desperately to be someone else. It was one of the major problems I had when it came to the whole identity issues thing...

"Cami..." I began, gaining his attention "This is unhealthy."

"Huh? What do you mean?" he said "I'm just...destressing. Planning this party has been a lot..."

"I know, it has been for me too" I said "But doing...This isn't good for you."

He didn't reply, he simple shifted back into himself. I gave him a sad smile then made my way over to his bed. I sat down and patted on the area beside me, gesturing for him to sit. He sat down next to me and held out his hand, silently asking me to hold it. I took his hand in mine and he layed his head on my shoulder.

"I used to do this too, I would pretend to be someone I'm not whenever I felt like being myself wasn't enough" I said, playing with his fingers "I would look at myself in the mirror as someone else, it made me feel calm and good for a short moment but it would just make me feel more useless and would make me more confused about who I was..."

Camilo nodded, showing me that he understood.

"Is that why you do it? Because you don't feel like enough as yourself?" I asked, running my hand through his hair with my other hand.

He hesitated at first but eventually nodded.

"Camilo, you are more than enough" I said "You are more than just someone that we use whenever we use someone else, you are you! I know it's cliche, but you are perfect as you are."

Camilo's sweet laugh filled my ears and a soft smile made it's way onto his face.

"It's not cliche it...helps, actually" he said, clutching my hand tighter.

"You've gotta find a healthier way to 'destress' dude" I said with a chuckle.

"You know, doing this thing with you right now is pretty destressing" Camilo said, shifting to lay down on my lap.

He stared up at me with those dumb chestnut eyes that made me melt.

"Yeah, it is for me too" I said, resting my hand on his chest.

We stayed like that, talking about mindless things until Pepa called us down to greet guests. I smiled as I realized that the quiet moments with Camilo were going to become some of my favourite memories.