Chapter Text
Camilo's room was a theater. It came complete with lights, mirrors, sets, and a personality much like the gift itself. Most of the time it was very agreeable, and readily changed to whatever he willed it to show. The second he was flustered, though, it did as it pleased.
Félix had no idea what it'd been doing before he was let in. He only knew that, when he entered, there was a spotlight on two chairs on an otherwise blank stage. Perfect for the father-son chat it decided its owner needed.
Camilo chose to ignore his room's betrayal and stayed in the bed off in the shadows. He didn't so much as peek out from the covers as his father took one of the seats.
"Your mamá is worried," Félix began, voice as judement-free as he could make it. "You know how she gets when she sees you can't control your shifting."
"It was hiccups," Camilo lied from inside his cocoon.
"Must have been the worst case ever to make you give up a day with your friends." He saw how his son stiffened, and weighed his approach. "What was the plan today?"
A backdrop of the alleyway where the boys had spent the morning slid into place as Camilo shifted. "Just talked."
"About what?"
"Girls and stuff."
Félix smirked, sympathetically, at the heavy lifting "stuff" had to do in that sentence. "What is it? Black eye? Your Tia's arepas can handle anything a teenager can dish out."
"We didn't fight," Camilo insisted. He pulled the covers off his face a bit to prove he didn't have any bruising. It gave away the puffiness of his eyes, though. "Just can't see them again."
"Did they say that?"
"Well… I mean no, but…"
"What happened?"
"Apá…"
"I told you you could tell me anything," Félix said, and added "meant it" more insistently.
"It's too weird…" Camilo said in more of a whine than he would have liked. The stage lights flickered along with him.
"Everyone is weird at your age."
"You'll get mad."
"Why? Did someone get hurt?"
"No."
"Did something break?"
"No."
Félix took a suspicious look around the room for any sign of deception. Finding none in that, nor his son's voice, he concluded, "Then I don't think I'll need to get mad. You just tell me what did happen."
With considerable reluctance, Camilo sat up. He didn't move to the chair that now had an inviting spotlight on it, though.
"Okay… so I was hanging out with the guys and we were joking and talking about the girls in town, right? Like… who had the best boobs and stuff."
"Mhm."
"And uh…" Camilo scratched his ear and muttered, "I might have said it was me, as like a joke, right?"
"And you proved it?" Félix asked, already knowing the answer.
"They dared me," he said, as if it were obvious he couldn't refuse something like that.
Having been 15 once, Félix conceded the point. "Okay, then what?"
"So we're all laughing and then Fernando is like 'what do they feel like?' And I was like 'go for it', and it's all really funny, right?"
"Right."
"But then Luis took a turn and like…" his voice dropped down as he curled into himself. "Felt good. Felt really good."
Félix barely got out an "ah" before the dam broke and the lights began to flash around them.
"And they noticed! So I tried to play it off but I was freaking out and my body wouldn't stop changing. And everyone's laughing at me and saying I have a crush which I don't and Luis is staring at me really weird and he definitely hates me now and…!" He groaned, and flopped down to once again bury his face in his pillow. "I ruined everything!"
Félix had to admit, to himself at least, that he certainly had never gotten himself into anything that weird with his friends. But, then, he'd never had the resources his son had to accomplish that. The good thing was that, at least, the issue at its core was standard.
He leaned forward in his chair. "So tell me about Luis."
Camilo peeked an eye out. "Why?"
"What is this? I can't know my son's friends?"
He brought himself back up to a sit. "Well… he works at the butcher with his dad. And he's really good at football, and he's super funny, and smart, and-"
Félix looked at how the lights brightened around them, and with a smirk asked, "What about his eyes?"
"They're green and amazing," he said, slightly wistful. "They're really bright, like parrot feathers or something. And when he's excited I think they get brighter, and-"
"Mhm. You have a crush, mijo."
"Do not!"
"What color are Fernando's eyes?"
"Uh...."
"Exactly."
Camilo took the time to think this over. "I ruined everything, didn't I?"
"No, no. The others will forget in a week when someone else does something. Just try not to be that someone," he said, thanks to far too much experience being a teen himself. "But you go talk to Luis."
"You sure?"
"Sure."
Camilo thought this over for a while, then asked in a small voice, "What if he doesn't like me back?"
"It will hurt," he said, honestly. "But you accept the no, and you can go back to being friends. You'll find someone else another day."
"Do you think I have any chance he'll like me back?"
"You're my son and ask me something like that?" He laughed. "Of course you do!"
"Even after making an idiot of myself?"
"How's about this?" He stood from his chair and motioned towards the door. "You go talk to this boy, and I tell you some of the idiot stunts I pulled up win your mamá."
Camilo grinned, and likewise moved to get out of bed. "It's a deal."