you make me sick (for being so perfect)

Forty.

"Oh my god, Lo."

"Put that away!" Lauren runs over to Camila and her mom and rips the photo album out of her mother's hands. "Don't show her my baby pictures."

"But Lauren," Camila pouts and takes the photo album back. "Look how cute you were. You can't deny me that."

Lauren frowns. "But I don't want you to look at my baby pictures."

"Let her look, Lauren," Clara laughs and flicks over the page, pointing to a picture in the top left. "This was her first day of school. She made me go on the school bus with her because she was frightened of the other kids."

"Oh my god," Camila repeats, staring down at the picture with wide eyes, "Lo, you were adorable. I just want to squish your little cheeks. In fact, I'm going to go and build a time machine so I can go back and harass baby you with my cuddles."

Lauren sighs in defeat, because she knows that her mom isn't putting the photo album away any time soon. So, she sits down on the couch next to Camila and shrugs. "I wouldn't let you cuddle me, though. I didn't like touch even more back then."

"But- look at you!" Camila exclaims. "You were so cute! And you're such a cuddly dork now. You're always asking for snuggles."

Lauren shrugs again and cuddles up to Camila, because now she kind of wants snuggles and Camila had told her that she can hug her whenever she wants. "Yes, but I didn't like it then. I would never let people touch me, except- um, I would cuddle with my mom on a Saturday morning when we watched The Lion King."

Clara laughs. "You say that like you don't ask to watch it every Saturday you're not at Camila's."

Lauren blushes, but Camila doesn't look all that surprised at Clara's words. "Trust me, the days she's at my house and I suggest watching a movie, it's always straight to 'can we watch The Lion King?' I don't get how you're not sick of it by now, Lo."

"It's one of my special interests," Lauren shrugs. "I love it, and there's more than one movie so I can choose which one I want to watch."

Camila doesn't reply, because she lets out a loud aw that makes Lauren jump. "Okay, this picture is my favourite by far. Look at you, you were so tiny! I bet you were having so much fun at the playpark. Look, you seem so happy to be on the slide."

Lauren looks down at the picture with a frown. "I'm not- um... I never went down the slides. I just sat on it. Because I could."

Clara looks between them with a smile. "The slides scared her. Lauren's afraid of heights."

"Mom," Lauren sends her mother her best glare. "Stop it. You're embarrassing me."

Clara laughs. "I'm your mother. I'm supposed to embarrass you in front of your girlfriend."

"Well... stop it," Lauren repeats, tapping on her leg but cracking a smile when Camila wraps her arms around her waist and rests her head on her shoulder. "And- um, Camz, stop encouraging her."

Camila shakes her head. "Nope. I'll encourage her as much as I like. I want to see all of your cute baby pictures and hear about all of the embarrassing stories from your childhood. But I didn't know you're afraid of heights. You didn't seem to be when you were dragging me on all of the rollercoasters at Disney."

"I mean things like- uh, tall buildings. One time I went up the Eiffel Tower when we went on vacation and- um," Lauren turns bright red, and her last words come out all muttered, "I cried."

"Cried is an understatement." Clara says, and Lauren feels her mother squeeze her hand; she doesn't pull away like she usually would. "She had a little panic attack, but you were fine after, weren't you?"