Gold (Fifth Harmony Lauren/Camila Camren fanfiction)

Chapter 1

"Lauren," Jacob says, throwing a ball at the wall beside Lauren's head. She groans, turning over in her bed to face away from the boy. "Lauren," he says once more, throwing the ball at the wall again.

"Why, Jesus God why, do you decide to wake me up at 8:43 every morning, without fail?" She says, turning back to face her friend and pulling her phone from under her pillow, checking the time (even though she already knew it would be 8:43).

Lauren had been in the Miami Mental-Health Youth Clinic for around three months now, and ever since Jacob was assigned to be her roommate, she would be woken up every morning at 8:43, on the dot.

"843 is my lucky number." He says, grinning. He stands up, shoving his stress ball into his pocket. "Come on; breakfast is in 17 minutes." He says with a smile on his face.

"You know," Lauren says, sitting up in her bed slightly and rubbing her eyes, "Considering I've been here longer than you, I'm pretty sure I'd know when breakfast is." She said, smiling.

He rolls his eyes before stretching slightly and cracking his knuckles. "Maybe if you'd stop being such a sarcastic asshole, I'd consider saving you a breakfast burrito while you shower," He says, pausing, "Because you really do stink." Lauren eyes him carefully.

"Don't fuck with me, Whiteside. Breakfast burritos are not things to joke about." He laughs, "I'll take that as a 'yes, thank you so much Jacob for saving me a breakfast burrito while I shower because I smell like a corpse!'"

Lauren laughs, standing up out of bed and stretching before quickly giving him a one-armed hug, "I owe you." Jacob smiles, "Yeah, well, whatever," he says, "Don't get too sappy on me now Jauregui." He finished, playfully punching her arm.

"Wouldn't dream of it, squirt." She says, ruffling his hair. He rolls his eyes once more before leaving their room.

Lauren stretches again, bringing her hand up to her mouth as she yawned. She walks over to her wardrobe and frowns at how barren it looked (which made sense, considering she'd been in the clinic for the last three months).

She hadn't had any opportunities to go shopping, and she sure as hell didn't trust her mother (or her father, for that matter) in buying her new clothing.

She wasn't too sure about her feelings at the moment. She wasn't sure whether she actually liked this place or despised it. She liked the idea of getting better, (even though she knew she could never be "normal") but she wasn't too keen on the idea of going through a challenge like this in a, well, a mental-health center for teens.

She'd thought about it a lot, and that was the problem. She thought too much, and half the time it wasn't even willful thinking. Lauren had lived with OCD ever since she could remember. She handled it well, the doctors didn't think it was severe enough for medication, so she pushed through and dealt with it (or tried to) by herself (and with the support of her family).

However, when she had gotten to high school, her OCD had progressively gotten worse. She'd spend hours on minuscule tasks, trying to complete them perfectly, not stopping until she considered them to be correct and she'd barely get any sleep due to the intrusive thoughts bombarding her mind at 1 am every night (and those weren't even the worst parts).

Once this had begun, her parents had immediately taken Lauren back to the doctors who suggested she start on medication, which actually worked for a while. Lauren's Freshman and Sophomore years weren't as bad as what was to come.

Once she had started Junior year, it was as if she was back to square one. She would try to sleep to block out her thoughts, but it almost never worked. She repeated things much more than she used to, and the thoughts just kept getting worse and worse.