Calamity

Prologue

Camila marched over towards Lauren's locker, waiting patiently for the raven-haired girl to finish putting her books away. "Jauregui,"

Lauren sighed loudly, slamming her locker shut as she glared at Camila. "Cabello,"

She looked down at the essay in Lauren's hand, the 'A' circled in red pen at the top of the paper stuck out like a sore thumb.

Camila held up her copy, a prideful grin on her face. "Better luck next time,"

The raven-haired girl scowled, anger rising in her the longer she stared at the 'A+' on Camila's.

She stuck up her middle finger at Camila before turning hot on her heel and headed for the library. Not far from behind her, Lauren could hear the squeaking of Camila's tennis shoes against the hallway floor.

"Oh, come on! Don't be such a brat, you owe me a soda from the vending machine now."

Lauren dug into her pocket, tossing a dollar bill into the air, rolling her eyes when she can practically see Camila stumbling to get it without even turning around. "There's your dollar, go get it yourself,"

"You know, if you asked, I would've been more than happy to proofread your paper." Camila said smugly. "It's just... I thought Lauren Jauregui never makes mistakes?"

"I don't," Lauren swung open the door to the library. "It's Miss Lovato's fault. She told me it was perfectly fine to use citations from another book and then marked off points for it."

"That's a new low for you; blaming the teacher,"

"Fuck off, Camila,"

Camila sat down at the small wooden table tucked away in the corner that Lauren began unpacking her lunch on, an amused look on her face.

"Are you that mad?"

Lauren poked her straw into the juice box. "No, just annoyed that you gloat so goddamn much,"

"I'm not really..." Camila paused, leaning in closer to Lauren. "Feeling like a winner right now, but I'm sure you can change that."

The older girl scoffed, pushing Camila away from her. "I told you already, Cabello. It's not happening again. Go deal with your blue balls in the bathroom."

"If I recall properly, neither of us agreed to your stupid oath that night, but whatever floats your boat."

"I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have said it if I didn't mean it." Lauren continued drinking her juice box, swatting Camila's stray hand away from her goldfish.

"Well," Camila sneaked her hand around Lauren's shoulder and stole a few pieces. "Since I won this round, are you finally going to tell me?"

"Why do you want to know so bad?"

"Why are you hiding it?"

Lauren hummed in contemplation, sipping her juice box peacefully until she finished it. She set it down on the table before turning to face Camila completely.

"Dartmouth," was all she said.

"No fucking way," Camila's jaw went slack. "Are you messing with me?"

"You just begged for me to tell you and now you don't believe me," her eyebrows knit together in confusion. "Do you want me to show you the confirmation email of the deposit I put down for my seat?"

"Sorry, you're right. I assumed that... Your dad—"

"Wanted me to go to Princeton, I know. He's still mad at me, but he'll get over it. I think."

Camila gave her a half-smile. "Who would've thought Lauren Jauregui had balls so big?"

"Bigger than yours, actually,"

"Yeah, you fucking wish," Camila scoffed. "Well... I guess this is it." She got up from her chair. "Catch you on the flip side?"

"Fourteen years," Lauren said. "We've been going head to head in school for fourteen years and all you can say is 'catch you on the flip side'. God, you're insufferable."

Well, she definitely has a point there.

Ever since Camila's mom got a job working as a maid for the Jauregui family—the two girls spent most of their life hating each other. Always going back and forth about absolutely nothing.

When schoolwork became more than just simple multiplication tables and ABC order of their vocabulary list, they began their stupid little competition of who did it better.

And despite the major differences in their lives, they always found themselves back at square one with each other. Doing nothing but arguing, of course.

And sometimes kissing. Sometimes—really, it's only when they're both plastered at a party and have nobody to turn to.

It first started off as Camila teasing her about being a prude at Jennifer's quinceanera which somehow escalated to Lauren spending the entire night proving her wrong. After that day, it became an unspoken ritual for them.

They'd meet up somewhere in private, most of the time it was in Camila's beat-up Honda, have a quickie, and then part ways. Still, that didn't change the fact that they could barely stand each other most of the time.

Camila is too arrogant, brash, and loud for Lauren's liking. Lauren is uptight, rude, and bossy in bed. But Camila kind of likes that, so she doesn't consider her to be downright terrible. Though, sometimes she really is the worst.

They bicker over who's smarter, who's faster in gym class, who gives better orgasms, who has more friends—there isn't a single thing in this world that they don't argue about. And after fourteen excruciatingly long years, it was all finally coming to an end.

With graduation right around the corner, Camila was supposed to be the first one up on stage to give her salutatorian speech followed by Lauren properly opening the ceremony as Miami High's valedictorian.

Then, come fall, Camila would be settled in her dorm room at Columbia while Lauren explored the streets of New Hampshire—freed from the shackles of her overbearing father.

As much as it pained Camila to admit it out loud, Lauren had won their fourteen-year-long competition, and it was time for the younger girl to finally acknowledge it.

Camila stuck out her hand, a playful glint in her eyes. "Congratulations, Lauren Jauregui. You're better than me. There, happy?"

"Finally," Lauren's lips curled up into a full smile as she shook her hand. "I've been dying for you to say it out loud,"

Without missing a beat, Camila leaned forward once again, lips brushing against the shell of Lauren's ear as she said, "Wanna feel like a winner?"

-

The next chapter will be a bit of a time skip, but let me know if you guys are interested in me continuing this.