Camilla

twenty

T A Y L O R

I take a deep breath as I park my car outside of Camilla's house. Her Chevy is here, which is a good sign, but I can't help but feel like I'm about to be walking into something resembling a crime scene. This whole situation is putting an unsettling feeling in my stomach, but Camilla is my best friend. I'd do anything for her.

I knock first, but when I didn't get an answer, I decide to just go in.

It's not like I haven't been here before.

"Camilla?" I call, but again, I don't get an answer. I sigh, trying to be quiet as I move down the hallway. It's darker in there than the rest of the house because the hallway doesn't have any windows.

I crack the door open to her room slowly, but she isn't in there. I do, however, see her phone sitting on the end table next to her bed.

I close the door again and then move on to Mae's room.

When I open the door, I see Mae and Camilla on Mae's small bed.

Camilla's stroking Mae's head while she sleeps in the confines of Camilla's arms.

"Jesus, Cami," I whisper, rushing over to her side.

When she looks up at me, I see tears in her eyes and a few that have already fallen onto her cheeks. She wipes them away quickly and forces a smile on her face. "Hey, Taylor. Sorry, I couldn't make it to school today. Mae wasn't feeling too good."

I study her face for a moment. "Bullshit. What happened?"

I don't like using foul language, but I have to be firm if I'm going to get an actual answer from Camilla. She likes to hide the harder parts of her life from everyone, but whatever happened is really screwing her up if she was crying about it.

Camilla does not cry, especially not around Mae, even if she is sleeping.

Camilla looks like she's about it lie, but decides against it when she sees the look on my face. "Mom hit Mae this morning. I was packing her lunch and Mae wanted to sit on the couch to put her shoes on for school, but Mom refused to get up. Mae asked her nicely, and then the next thing I know there's a really loud sound coming from the living room and then I hear Mae crying. Mom had punched her so hard that Mae knocked over the table and shattered the lamp."

Damn. 

"It's not your fault, Cami." My voice is softer now. I put my hand on top of hers, trying to comfort her.

"Yeah, it is," she whispers. Her voice is uneven, like she's holding back tears. "If I had just been paying a little more attention to their conversation while I was making a stupid ass sandwich, Mae wouldn't have been punched across the room. It looks so bad, Taylor."

"Where is it?" I ask, even though I'm not sure I want to know.

Camilla sighs and carefully lifts Mae's shirt to show me the middle of her stomach where a fist-shaped dark bruise is protruding from her skin. It makes me sick to see it. To imagine how much that must have hurt. To know that Camilla's mother wouldn't have even given two shits when she did it. 

"Oh my God," I cover my mouth. "That's horrible. Is Mae okay?"

"Of course not," Camilla scowls, but I know the tone she uses isn't because of my question. It's because of the four hour old memories it brings up. "Mom didn't even fucking apologize. She just sent me a big 'fuck you too' for taking Mae's side and headed off to go sleep with someone for drugs."

I don't even know what to say.

Camilla sighs and slowly slides Mae off of her. "I'm surprised you didn't see the mess when you walked in."

She leads me out the door and into the front room where I entered the house. "My eyes hadn't adjusted yet," I reply, but now that they have, I can barely believe I didn't step on broken glass. 

There's shatter pieces of lamp all over the floor, and the table was still knocked over. "Will you go get the trash can?" Camilla asks me, and I nod before moving to the kitchen to find it. There's a shattered jar of jelly on the ground, but I stepped around it.

"You know you have something broken in the kitchen too, right?" I ask Camilla as I step into the living room again. 
She nods and then gets to work picking up the trash. "I dropped it when I heard Mae scream. I haven't gotten around to cleaning it all up yet. She just got to sleep twenty minutes before you showed up."

I start to walk away "I'll get the kitchen cleaned up."

"You don't have to do that," Camilla sighs, tossing a big chunk of glass in the trash.

"I know I don't have to. Just let me help, okay?"

Camilla smiles at me gratefully, but it looks tired. Sad. Defeated. "Thanks, Tay."

"Of course."

I walk back into the kitchen and open the curtains to let in some light. I have to reach over the sink, and it gets some water on my shirt, but that doesn't really matter anyway.

Then I send Gilligan a text: Cam's fine. Idk when I'll be back though.

A few minutes later he sends back: If she's fine, why are you still there?

I don't answer him after that because I don't know what to say.

It's not my place to tell him that Mae has been knocked to the ground by her drug-addicted mother. It is not my place to tell him that Camilla has been dealing with the aftermath of her mother's drug tornadoes since she was ten years old.

And it is definitely not my place to tell him that every single time Camilla cusses him or Mrs. Ruth or anyone else out, she's asking for help. 

a/n: i hope everyone is liking this story so far. if you are, go ahead and leave a vote! (please)