Walk A Mile (Camren)

Epilogue

It was a learning process, being away from each other.

The first few weeks were the worst. It was before school started and when they still had most of their time to themselves. Lauren could hardly stand having to text Camila back and forth, because that was all they could do now. And Camila hated the never-ending ringing and beeping of trying to get in contact with her from 729 miles away. Mutually, they despised hearing the distorted timbre of their voices through an unsatisfying phone call. All of the what did you say's and the huh's and the I can't hear you's were getting on Camila's nerves. She missed the way she could watch her lips move as she spoke and how clearly she could always hear her in person, but she couldn't dwell on the negative all the time. Lauren was still hers and they were still together. That was enough for her.

For the first month, every night, they went to bed on Skype or FaceTime. They set up dates to see each other and rarely missed them. Sometimes, they'd have multiple throughout the day. Lauren would call because she missed her or she was just thinking about her. Camila would call because she just wanted to see her face. If they couldn't manage a call, they'd send sweet, meaningful texts to each other. Camila was the culprit of a swoon-worthy message most of the time, but Lauren also pulled through with them sometimes. The good morning messages were always extremely personalized and differed from the day before. Lauren found herself looking forward to what her girlfriend would say each day. Somehow, they managed to be equally as obsessed with each other from afar as they were when they were in person. Things were good. Everything went well and Lauren was delighted to see that Camila's promises held true.

However, the practice started to lag around September. The good morning messages occurred later in the day, due to Camila starting school and being too rushed in the morning to send them the moment she woke up. The random calls throughout the day diminished because she was at school while Lauren was still at home, waiting for her to get out. The nightly ritual of the skype sessions remained intact, even if they hadn't talked for a good portion of the day. Soon enough, those were getting pushed back as well when homework was starting to get assigned. Camila apologized profusely for it whenever she had to make Lauren wait, then they'd carry on as if nothing had happened.

It got even more infrequent when Lauren transitioned to her new campus and started her classes. Their schedules clashed.

Now, it wasn't just Camila's schoolwork infringing on their time, it was Lauren's as well. Lauren was a lot more involved at school than Camila was. She played sports and joined clubs. While Camila only had to endure the recurring seven hours of instructional time and contacted Lauren as soon as she was out, Lauren left class and proceeded to go on to do even more things - things that kept her from replying to Camila. They both felt it slipping away, but they ignored it. They were desperate to maintain what they had and avoided fighting at all costs - and that meant not bringing it up.

Although they'd both silently agreed to ignore what was happening, Lauren took it very personally. She broke their unspoken code one night on FaceTime. Beating around the bush was her way of introducing the subject and Camila was instantly on the fence. Once more, she suggested breaking up to salvage what they were steadily losing, but Camila convinced her otherwise. It did get hard, and there were days that they barely talked at all. Lauren eventually learned to take it with a grain of salt, because Camila's life didn't and couldn't revolve around her. And neither could her own. She had to trust that Camila loved her just as much when they were busy as when they were actively interacting with one another.

It seemed that right when Lauren saw it from Camila's perspective, Camila was the one getting discouraged. They switched their points of view on the matter. Much like she predicted, Lauren herself was the one that started to stray. Her studies, beginning training for her sports, and getting adjusted to life on campus overall demanded most of her time. She managed to squeeze in a few texts to her girlfriend here and there over the course of the day, but the conversation was vague and neutral. They slowly lost their ability to talk for hours on end. The two individuals that had learned to communicate almost everything seemed to be reversing their progress. Drifting was the most painful for Camila, because she noticed it as soon as it started to happen. Whenever she'd want to address it, she wouldn't. Instead, she'd just send her another message, hinting that she'd like to talk to her later. And Lauren would usually call her later, but they had to suffer long bouts of awkward silences. For the first time since their initial meeting, they barely had anything to say to each other. Sometimes, she didn't even get a call - but an apology text in the morning.