Sophie loved her job. I knew that, because she talked about it constantly. She was a hostess at a restaurant downtown, and she met her other best friend working there, a twenty-one year old college dropout named Rowan. Their only responsibility was to say, "Hello, welcome to Pirate Palace, where all your dreams come true. How many?" And then, when the customer answered, Sophie or Rowan would lead them to their seats. Sometimes they would try to spice things up: "Have you been here before?" "Did you enjoy your last visit?" But usually, like everything she did, Sophie tried to exert as little effort as possible.

I had never met Rowan before, but I felt like I had, because Sophie was a girl obsessed. I think she was trying to make me jealous, sometimes. When I was younger, I was homeschooled, and I didn't have a lot of friends, much less a best one. When Sophie was younger, she had braces and cornrows, so she didn't have a lot of friends, either. We both appreciated each other, but more than that, we needed each other.

Sophie would've been obnoxious regardless, but I think her blonde hair made her seem even more so. She laughed loudly at inappropriate times, and usually at something that wasn't all that funny. She was also a chronic know it all. The kind that teachers wanted to hate but couldn't because they always had all the right answers.

Anyway, the point is that if I ever met Rowan (and sometimes I thought she was imaginary), I would have to bite my tongue to keep from asking her if her parents enjoyed Hawaii back in 2006.

I think Sophie was talking about work when we originally decided to go camping. I can say that with almost complete certainty, because as we have already established, she was talking about work 85% of the time. I had already turned on my auto-pilot, though. I had an amazing auto-pilot. I nodded and smiled a lot, just saying, "really?" and, "oh yeah," over and over again, occasionally doing a little nervous laugh for good measure. She never noticed. Sometimes, when she would call me, I would set the phone on my bed and go do something else for a solid five minutes. When I came back, she would still be talking. It was a risk I was willing to take.

"We should go camping," Jose interrupted, which is what started it all. I swear it was just like that, out of nowhere. Jose was random and a little self absorbed, which lended itself to those kinds of casual proclamations.

"When?" Garrett asked. "I'm going to my dad's this weekend."

"I feel like you go to your dad's every weekend," I said, because it was true. Every time we tried to plan a social event, his parents' custody agreement got in the way. We never did things without Garrett. It was sort of a running gag that we did things without Jose a lot, because we always assumed someone else had invited him. He never knew what was going on in our personal lives, either, and he didn't hear about it until months later, which is just what happens when you're absent from all the important conversations, or if you don't keep up with the group text message. Sophie was excluded occasionally, because she was perpetually scheduled on weekend nights. I didn't go out whenever I had a volleyball game, or when my parents decided I had been having too much fun lately. But Garrett was just a necessity, and nothing felt right without him there.

"I've been going more lately," he admitted. "My dad just suddenly decided he wants to see us now." Garrett and his little sister Zee were left at the mercy of their father's whims. Sometimes he wanted to see them, sometimes he didn't. Sometimes he wanted to pay child support, sometimes he didn't. I felt badly for both of them, but they never complained. In fact, they were two of the most incredibly well-adjusted people I knew.

"Camping," Jose said, to redirect us to his topic of choice. "More specifically, camping and us, two weekends from now." His eyes kept drifting back and forth to the clock on the microwave, where we standing by the vending machines. We had been late to class more than a few times, because we got distracted while talking during our ten minute break.

"I was in the middle of a story," Sophie said, in a voice that suggested she was aggravated, but probably wouldn't do anything about it.

"Sophie, if we waited until you stopped talking to say things, then nothing would ever get said," Jose remarked cheekily. She stuck her tongue out at him, and he added, "Come on. This is camping. And us. Us going camping. AKA the Greatest Idea of Our Time."

"We should. We should totally do it," Garrett nodded excitedly. "That is, if I'm not at my dad's."

"I thought you said you were going this weekend!"

"Yeah, but I might also go next weekend. I don't have my whole life planned out yet."

"If you have plans, cancel them. It's official."

"Just us?"

"And Eva, and Ben, of course."

"Of course," I agreed, tossing my dark brown curls over my shoulder. My hair was different lengths because of heat damage, so I was constantly adjusting its placement. As long as I kept the shorter, fried, split ends tucked into my collar, it looked nice, as long as you were looking at me from a straight view. I had natural, blonde highlights which framed my face, and the front had grown a little past by chest. I hadn't even gotten it trimmed since April of 8th grade, when I decided I wanted it to my hips my college. I still had a long way to go before that happened.

Eva was Garrett's girlfriend, and my other best friend, besides Sophie. Ben, who was walking up to us right after Jose finished his sentence, didn't really have an explanation. He had just sort of always been there.

"JOSE!" Ben called out, from all the way across the lawn.

"BEN!" I hated when they did this, because it drew so much attention to our little microwave circle.

"Couldn't you wait until he gets a little closer?"

"I haven't seen him since first hour," Jose said, as if that were an acceptable defense for his outburst.

"I have your joke for today, Jose," Ben said, close enough to talk in his regular voice. Of course, his regular voice sounded like gravel in a blender, and you could still hear everything he was saying from a mile away.

"Give it to me."

"What is the national sport of Mexico?"

"Hmm... badminton?"

"Cross country." Ben joined Sophie and Jose laughing at his own joke. "I would tell another Mexican joke now, but that would be crossing the line." Every day for as long as I knew them both, Ben came up with a new racist joke to tell Jose. Believe it or not, some of them were actually a lot worse.

"You know I'm Colombian, right?"

"Of course I do. I'm just messing around."

"I figured, but I have to check in every once in awhile, just to make sure." Every time Jose so much as stepped over a crack in the sidewalk, Ben yelled out, "crossing the border!" He did it so often, and with such impressive vigor, that I couldn't help but admire his determination.

I was Jewish, but Ben didn't really have any good jokes for that. I'm sure there were plenty, but just the fact that my grandparents came from Israel alone was enough to get them laughing. There didn't even need to be a punchline.

"Penny's a Jew," he would sometimes expertly observe. "Happy Hanukkah," he would tell me, in the middle of July. Or, "Happy Ramadan," and I would have to remind him that was a Muslim holiday, to which he would say, "same difference."

"I heard something about camping?" Ben asked, never one to shy away from group outings. He always proposed we do ridiculous things, like go on roadtrips or to concerts, or rob banks together, and then became indignant when we said it was too dangerous, expensive, or illegal.

"Word travels fast," Garrett commented.

"Yeah, word travels fast when Sophie is yelling about it from across the parking lot. Anyway, I'm in."

"Don't you want to know when it is?"

"Doesn't matter, I'm still in."

"I like your attitude," Jose said, glaring pointedly at Garrett.

"I've literally been saying we should do this for ages."

"Literally?" I made fun of Ben, because he was the whitest girl I knew. His favorite pastimes were using the word "literally" incorrectly, and expressing his admiration for various caffeinated beverages. He once told me his dream job was to be a coffee shop barista. Not a job he would enjoy, mind you, but his dream job. Ben was also incredibly smart, if I haven't mentioned that- he had a 32 on the ACT, his parents were both doctors, and he had an affinity for calculus. I remember Eva got mad at him when he said that: "You're performing way below your potential," she had told him, which made him want to be a barista all the more.

"Literally, Penny, I'm not exaggerating." Another thing about Ben: he was incapable of sarcasm.

"He might not be," Garrett said. "It sounds like something Ben would come up with, and then Jose would shoot it down, but then suggest it three months later like it was his own idea."

"It doesn't matter who thought of it," Sophie made the mistake of saying.

"Yes it does," Jose and Ben said, at the same time. Jose turned and looked at Ben, then said, "If we all go, and have an awesome time, I want credit for being the catalyst of that awesome time."

"And if it sucks?"

"Camping won't suck. The words 'camping' and 'sucking' don't even belong in the same sentence," he said, and then laughed at himself. "Unless you're at band camp."

"Band camp, oh my goodness," I laughed, fondly remembering the days back in 2010 that Eva, Sophie, and I would spend watching The Secret Life of the American Teenager.

"Remember Secret Life?" Sophie looked at me.

"Yeah, I know, that's exactly what I was thinking. Band camp is such a thing, though."

"Are your parents going to let you go, Penny?" Ben asked, just to be condescending. He alternated from being a try hard, to being a bully. Before he got his first car and his social status skyrocketed, he used to be an easy target, because of his weight. He was still heavy, but no one would dare say anything, because they needed a ride to the party that weekend.

"Probably not."

"What?!" Whenever Jose flipped out about something insignificant, which was often, his voice would go about two octaves higher, and he used a lot of urgent hand motions. "Why didn't you say something sooner?!"

"You know my parents are strict."

"Yes, but you acted okay with it."

"Because I'm not going to worry about your hypothetical camping trip."

"This camping trip is very, very real, Penny, just a real as you and I, maybe even realer. This camping trip is the realest thing I've ever known. This camping trip won't lie to you, and betray you, like people do."

"Personal experience, Jose?" Garrett raised an eyebrow. We exchanged a brief, isn't this guy crazy? look.

"DOES NO ONE WORRY ABOUT THE GOOD OF THE GROUP ANY MORE?!?!"

"That's all I worry about," Sophie said, which I believed. She was far too preoccupied with group relations than she was with schoolwork, or her job. "Now don't you understand why I'm always interfering in people's lives?"

"This camping trip is going to take our group to a whole new level."

"On second thought, is this going to be outdoors? I might not be down for that," Ben added, and then he did that thing with his neck, where he twitched it to the left to fix his Justin Bieber haircut. He must have forgotten his travel sized comb in the car that morning.

"Yeah, and I really don't think my parents are going to let me," I said, with a tiny smile, because I was just pandering to them at that point.

"Sorry, bud. I just don't think it's going to work out. Oh well, we tried!" Sophie didn't understand we were joking, and so she said,

"I'll go with you, even if they won't. Maybe we can invite Rowan?" She looked over at me, to gauge my reaction.

"I'm kidding, it sounds like fun. Good idea, Jose," I said, and Jose beamed. Garrett said,

"Yeah, if my dad tries to make me come over, I'll just tell him to fuck off," and then we all laughed, because that's what we usually did, even though it was more sad than funny. Garrett cursed more than the rest of us combined, but he mostly did if for comedic effect. Anyway, it didn't bother me, since I probably would've sworn a lot more if my parents were estranged. I remember when I met him in the seventh grade, I asked him if minded language. "I don't give a damn," he said, and I can pinpoint that as the exact moment we became friends.

The bell rang, and Jose screamed out, "Group camping trip!!" As we walked our separate ways to class. Sophie and Ben shouted back something unintelligible, and Garrett nodded approvingly, as we walked together to Chemistry.

"Why are we friends with them again?"

"I don't remember," I said, "But there's no getting out of it now."

Chemistry was the singularly most difficult class I had ever taken. It wasn't that I hated work, either; I tried, I really did, but none of it made any sense to me. When we got there, I mentally prepared myself for an hour an half of pure torture. Towards the end of that class period in early September, I starting poking myself in the eye with my mechanical pencil just to stay awake.

"What are you doing?" Garrett hissed to me.

"Trying to stay awake."

"How is that going for you?"

"Not working."

"Yeah, well, it's making you look really stupid too," he said, but he was smiling.

"How about you do your work and stop watching me?"

"Garrett and Penny, this is your last warning," our Chemistry teacher, Mrs. Kipling, told us sternly. She was crazy, but I always thought you had to be a little bit crazy to be that good at something like chemistry.

"Did we get a first one?" The words tumbled out of my mouth so quickly I couldn't stop them. Thankfully, she didn't hear, but Garrett laughed, and so did the boy sitting on my right. Garrett was working on his study guide for Algebra II.

"Why did you answer that question 'yes'?"

"What?"

"It says X=, and then you wrote 'yes' in the blank." Then we used that as an excuse to crack up laughing, because nothing even remotely funny had happened in the past hour, and we felt like it. It was really amazing, the things that Mrs. Kipling didn't notice. A single tear rolled down Garrett's cheek, and I was rocking back and forth, making spastic movements, like I did when I couldn't believe my own hilarity.

About twenty minutes later, I realized I was holding my breath, and let out a dramatic sigh.

"You'll live, Penny," Mrs. Kipling said, and the class chuckled.

"Oh, I wasn'-t," I started, but she had already moved on to talking about stoichiometry, or something equally uninteresting.

"It's too late," the boy on my right said. "She hates you now." His faded blue eyes met mine- they were nothing special in color, but wildly expressively and slightly overeager. He was average height, but seemed a good bit taller than me, and solidly built. Not too skinny, but muscular.

"She hated me anyway," I said, and then Mrs. Kipling looked over at us again.

"David, since you're so chatty today, can you tell us how we measure units of energy?"

"Joules," he said, loudly and confidently. "Or Calories." I was shaking my head for some reason, without even realizing it.

"Correct," Mrs. Kipling said, and she sounded surprised.

"What?" He said to me, when she turned around again.

"What?"

"I got the question right." Suddenly I realized what he meant, and was able to compose a response.

"Oh, I'm not shaking your head at you."

"What are you shaking your head at?"

"This class." He laughed, and so did Garrett, who had overheard the conversation.

"How are you doing, Cal?" I wasn't aware that Garrett knew the boy, but it didn't surprise me, because Garrett was friendly with everyone. Even though he had mostly female friends, that was by choice. I often caught him making casual conversation with members of the football team, like he had known them for years, and they accepted him, even though he was 5'6 with a narrow build and thick, black framed glasses. He was probably the only teenager in existence who owned multiple cardigans, yet still knew the Red Sox were going to have a good season.

Cal shrugged. "I'll be a lot better in fifteen minutes." I looked at the clock: lunch was at 12:50, and it was 12:35.

"Good to hear it, bro. You need to come over soon. You haven't been over in a while."

"This weekend?"

"Naw, not this weekend. I'm going to my dad's this weekend."

"If I hear you say that one more time..." I couldn't help but interjecting.

"Come off it, Penny," Garrett said, which is the expression he used when we were in class and he couldn't drop the F bomb.

"Next weekend?" The boy, either Cal or David, asked.

"Next weekend I'm going camping with this one."

"Oh?" He raised an eyebrow. "What happened to Eva?"

"Oh, Eva's coming too. I didn't mean literally just this one. We're all going." Around my small private school, we could say "we're all going", and almost everyone would know "we" referred to Eva, Garrett, Sophie, Ben, Jose, and myself.

"Cool," the boy said, and the conversation ended. The clocked ticked and a few minutes went by before I heard him quietly muttering, "fuck, fuck, fuck," to himself, under his breath. I laughed quietly, but he was so caught up in the equation we were working on, he didn't even bother to look up at me.

Garrett gave me a look that said, "can you believe this guy?" (Garrett and I were always able to share a surprising amount of information through subtle eye glances).

"Can you believe this guy?" He said out loud, just softly enough for only me to hear.

"I understand the sentiment. Like, I think that's what we're all thinking in our heads right now."

Then I got the answer wrong by one decimal point, because I had lost track of the sig figs. I slammed my hand so hard on the desk that my ring cracked, which upset me, even though I had a million others just like it.

"Can we start over?" I muttered, wringing my sore fingers in the air.

"From the beginning of the chapter?" Cal/David asked.

"No, from the beginning of this class. The only thing I've understood this year was the syllabus."

The bell rang, and Garrett was laughing at me, which summed up my entire highschool career. As soon as we grabbed our backpacks and started walking to lunch I asked,

"Who was that guy?"

"What guy?"

"You know, the fuck boy."

"Oh, him. That's Cal. You heard me call him Cal, right?"

"Yeah, but I heard the teacher call him David."

"I don't know, he answers to both, I guess. I like Cal better."

"Me, too," I said. "But I liked him. He laughed at me, and nobody laughs at me, except for you, and occasionally Sophie, but she laughs at everyone."

"He has a girlfriend," Garrett informed me. "He's going out with Heather. She drives him to school. They go to PJ's coffee sometimes." He said all these things in succession, like they were directly related. In reality, he was probably just dispensing all his knowledge about the situation. Heather was a girl who I used to be best friends with, in sixth grade. We drew on each others' arms, went to waterparks, had sleepovers, took a tumbling class together. We grew apart in junior high, for whatever reason, but I still liked her a lot.

"Oh, I didn't mean it like that. I just mean I genuinely like him as a person. And I like Heather, too. We used to be best friends, you know."

"Yeah, I know. You talk about it all the time. I'm pretty sure it didn't happen. And don't get started with this friend/obsession/pseudo crush thing again," Garrett said, and I knew exactly what he was talking about. There was a hilarious boy in our religious class last year, who I admired for his witty comebacks and genius pun usage. Although I wasn't physically attracted to him, I wanted nothing more than to be his best friend, and flirted with him mercilessly to (unsuccessfully) get that point across. He ultimately dated Eva, because that's just how those sort of things usually end. They broke up, Eva fell for Garrett, and the rest was history, but needless to say, both Garrett and I still harbored a grudge.

"That's different," I said.

"How is that different?

"Because Harvey was the worst."

"Cal could be the worst."

"Except he's obviously not, or you wouldn't be friends with him."

"What's going on?" Eva walked up to us, and I slid in beside her, letting her take my place next to Garrett. She towered over him at 5'8, making for an adorably mismatched couple.

"You missed a lot. We're going camping, and Penny has a crush on Cal." Eva raised her eyebrows.

"Cal? You mean David?"

"Jose would be disappointed you didn't react to the camping first," Garrett said, as I talked over him, loudly denying his allegations.

"I do not!"

"Okay, it's not a crush, it's a weird friend, obsessive, pseudo crush. You know how Penny gets."

"I do know," Eva nodded, like it all made so much sense. "Sorry, Penny." She saw the disgusted expression on my face, and then backtracked. "I'm just kidding. I think that was a one time thing. Penny would've literally slept with Harvey, just so he would hang out with her on the weekends."

"Can you blame me? I mean, just imagine how great his netflix commentary would be. We could sit on opposite ends of the couch while he points out all the plot holes in Gossip Girl."

"Are you serious?" Eva asked, almost looking alarmed. She apparently didn't understand how hilarious all the plot holes in Gossip Girl were.

"No, I'm kidding. I think I did have a crush on him. I was in denial. But I'm over now. Over and over and over." Eva knew about my pseudo obsessive friend crush on Harvey, because I couldn't help but tell her everything. She didn't know about while they were dating, obviously- I waited about six months to tell her, and I thought that was a safe amount of time, and we could finally laugh about it. She was never really that into him anyway, not how she was into Garrett, at least.

"I just like him as a person."

"Harvey?"

"No, I'm back on Cal."

"David?"

"No, Cal."

"I'm so confused."

"Cal or David," Garrett clarified. "Either one. He goes by both. Geez, it's not that complicated." Sometimes Garrett would be making a legitimate point, and he would ruin it by passionately adding, "Geez!" at the end.

"Whatever. It doesn't matter. Cal or David, I don't like him. I don't even know him."

"Well, he likes you."

"Why do you say that?"

"I've never seen him talk that much before."

"He said, like, two words."

"I know," Garrett grinned.

"Camping?" Eva asked.

"Camping. Next weekend."

"Cool," she said, not because she was desperate for social interaction like Ben, but because of her laidback, easy-going nature, and her inability to plan things in advance.

"I thought you said he had a girlfriend."

"Are we back on this?"

"Yes."

"Are you disappointed?"

"A little. I don't know why though."

"Because you like him?"

"No, that's not it..." I said, and he swatted my forearm with a photocopy of the periodic table.

"You are such a fucking liar"