Alright, maybe it wasn't so good. He'd overestimated himself, and what he could handle, because this-- he could barely handle this.

"Jesus fucking Christ," he exclaimed, jumping nearly a foot in the air after stepping on a branch that snapped in two under his feet. His heart was racing and he felt like an idiot. "I hate my life."

"You okay?" Phil asked from a few feet ahead of him, and he sounded concerned, but Dan could hear him laughing as well. At him, for sure, who wouldn't laugh at this loser who was scared of twigs.

"I'm fucking fine, just," he held out his hand, "pass me a beer, I'm not drunk enough for this."

A cold bottle touched his fingertips and he took it gratefully, twisting the top off and taking a long swallow.

It was completely dark in here; they'd lost the light of the fire about ten steps in, and their stupid small flashlights weren't enough to calm him down. Why has he agree to this, this wasn't his thing at all.

"Hurry the fuck up, you two!" Finn shouted, him and the rest of the group considerably further away from him and Phil. Emery was there, as well as Finn's sister, Heidi; a few more leggy females and one other guy who did nothing but tell jokes that made them all groan in protest. Dan didn't bother with learning their names.

"Hey," Phil walked back to him, talking in a quiet voice. His hand wrapped around Dan's wrist comfortingly. "We can go if you want. I'm sure they wouldn't mind."

God, that sounded like the best idea ever. They could go back and keep talking, and ignore everyone else around them. That would be nice. But what would the rest of them think? That he was a lame, wuss of a guy that didn't know how to have fun. And maybe he was, but they didn't know that yet.

He shook his head and took another sip. "No, it's fine, just give me a second, yeah?" Phil seemed to pause, but nodded eventually.

He bounced on his feet for a moment, trying to shake the nerves off, like that would actually fucking work. There was nothing that would hurt him there, there wasn't, and even if there was, there were more than enough other people around him that would probably be targeted first; no one wanted the skinny white kid in Vans.

Phil was still holding his wrist, and he focused on that for a second. "Okay," he said after a while. "Shit, okay, let's go." And they moved to catch up with the others.

"You'll be fine," Phil muttered encouragingly, slowing his pace to stay by his side. Dan downed the rest of the bottle in his hand and passed it to Phil, who tossed it into a bag he was carrying; no littering in the forest.

"Where are we even going?" He asked. They'd been walking for a good ten minutes now, and showed no signs of stopping soon. He wasn't a very physical person as it was, and trekking through the trees with no light was not his idea of a good time.

"Probably to Spencer's Clearing," Phil answered, stepping over a log carefully. "Like, ten years ago, this guy got lost in the forest and ended up finding this old clearing, shouldn't be too far now. Supposedly, he died there, and it's a bit of a ritual, going there the first day of camp."

"This is not the time for ghost stories," Dan said, looking over his shoulder cautiously. It didn't matter if he didn't even fucking believe in ghosts, anything was possible in the dark.

Phil laughed. "That was not a ghost story. That was a...a fun fact story, sort of."

Dan didn't bother answering, too strung out to argue with him now. He could faintly hear the rest of the group trampling ahead without a care in the world, yelling and joking. He wished he didn't care so much.

Phil had been right, it wasn't that far. A minute later, they stepped into a circular patch of land, surrounded by tall trees and looking like it hadn't seen life in years; the grass was overgrown and bruised against his knees as he walked towards the center of it. It would probably be a lot more appealing in the daytime, with sunlight streaming through the trees innocently.

Everyone else had immediately set about partying, passing bottles around and talking, the flashlights tossed to the floor and giving the ground an unearthly look about it.

"It's actually not that different from the bonfire," Phil told him, watching them idly. "Just, less light and more...opportunities." And Dan didn't even want to guess what that meant. Heterosexuals, and their weird mating rituals, he never understood it.

"Okay, everyone, gather around," Emery suddenly said, waving his hands wildly to get all of their attentions, and they proceeded to sit in a group on the ground, uncaring of the tall grass that shielded them from view. Dan stared at them in disbelief.

"Do you know how many fucking bugs could be down there?" He whispered to Phil urgently, who only laughed again and patted his shoulder before joining them. Dan paused for maybe the fifth time that night, and followed suit, a lot more reluctantly. These people were crazy.

Phil leaned over to him and said, in a low voice, "You're such a city boy."

"Fuck off." So what if he was? He hadn't asked to come here. He suddenly realized that Emery was talking, addressing the lot of them in a serious tone, and elected to ignore Phil's sly smirks.

"....assume you all already know about the legend of Spencer's Clearing. Except for our newbie, of course. Dan? Raise your hand please." Dan rolled his eyes, but did so, flustered that so many people were paying him any attention. "Think you can handle a little ghost story?"

"This is so old, Em," Phil spoke up, sounding bored. "You dragged us out here to try and scare the new guy?"

"Shut up, Lester. Just because you nearly pissed yourself doesn't mean you have to ruin it for everyone else."

"It's fine," Dan nudged Phil sharply to get him to be quiet. "Do your worst, jackass."

A flashlight flicked on suddenly, illuminating Emery's face in a harsh glow that made him look oddly distorted. "Ten years ago on this very day," he started, slow and quiet, sounding just as stupid and un-creepy as Dan was hoping. "A man by the name of Spencer Green roamed into this forest, unarmed and unaware of the danger that would soon overtake him."

Phil sighed from beside him, obviously unimpressed, but Dan kept his attention up front, wrapping his arms around his drawn up knees.

"He was barely twenty years old, and he'd been dared by his friends to spend a night in the forest alone. He wasn't scared of the dark, so he thought it would be easy.

"But he got horribly lost, and after about an hour, heard some weird noises coming from above him. From the trees."

As if on cue, a sharp snap! echoed from behind them, and Dan had to choke back an embarrassing yelp at the noise. This was so stupid, it wasn't even scary, for gods sake. Maybe he was just a wimp.

"Don't take it seriously," Phil whispered close to his ear, but there was no way to calm Dan's suddenly racing heart.

"He got really scared, then, and tried calling his friends to give up on the bet, but there was no service. And the sounds were getting closer, and closer. Until he could swear they were right above him, only a foot from where he was standing."

Another noise from closer behind, and Dan jumped noticeably.

"No one knows exactly how Spence died, but his remains were found, so shredded and torn apart, they could only ID him from his teeth. But to this day, people swear they can see him in here, looking scared and lost. And sometimes, people are found here....DEAD!"

On the last word, a pair of hands grip Dan's shoulders and shake him roughly, and he couldn't hold back the high pitched screech that left his throat. He swears he's going to die, if not by horrible creature, then by cardiac arrest.

But everyone else is laughing, including the guy standing behind him, and he blushed fiercely when he realized they'd been messing with him. Except it wasn't funny, not to him or his declining heart rate.

"God, fuck you guys," he snapped and hastily climbed to his feet; so what he didn't know where the fuck they were, the camp couldn't be too far away. He should have just stayed there in the first place.

His jittery nerves were doing nothing to help, making him jump at every stupid noise, but he just shook his head and kept going.

"Wait, Dan." Phil's voice, accompanied by the sound of his footsteps crashing through the forest. Dan ignored him, but a hand gripped his arm an forced him to stop. He turned and glared at Phil, who was breathing heavy. "Shit, wait, okay I know that was a shitty thing to do, I'm sorry. I didn't know you would freak out like that, I would have told them to stop--"

"You're just as much an asshole as I thought you were this morning," Dan said shortly, but Phil didn't let go of his arm.

"Hey, I tried to warn you, but you didn't want to look like a loser in front of them. It's not my fault." He finally loosened his grip. "And camp's that way," he said, pointing the complete opposite direction Dan had been going.

He huffed indignantly and began walking again, leaving the rest of them behind. If this was their idea of fun, then he was more than fucking ready to leave as soon as possible.

***

In light of the events that had taken place that night, it should have come as no surprise that Dan would lose sleep over it.

He wasn't scared, god no, he wasn't. He did not keep imagining shapes in the corners of the dark cabin, standing and watching him cower under his thin blanket, and he most definitely was not covering his ears against the suddenly all too loud and disturbing sounds that came from outside. Fuck, he was a city boy, and this was nowhere near the usual car horns and drunken shouts he heard outside his bedroom window. He'd be more comforted by the sound of a car crash right now than the whisper of trees brushing together in the wind.

He just needed to fall asleep, that's all he needed. Close his eyes, cover his ears, count to ten. Count again and again and again until he couldn't focus on the creepy atmosphere, until-

-a loud thud made his heart rate jump, but he kept his eyes shut tight.

"Ow, shit." It was just Phil. He glanced over at him, and guessed he had stubbed his toe walking across the cabin; no wonder, four guys in one space, it wouldn't be anywhere near clean, even if this was only their second night here.

Phil stopped muttering curses and limped towards the door, directly in front of Dan's bed.

"Where are you going?" Phil startled at Dan's whispered voice.

"Jeez, you almost gave me a fucking heart attack," Phil whisper-yelled at him, clutching his chest dramatically. "To the bathroom, why?"

"Can I come with you?"

"That a bit pervy, don't you think?"

But Dan had already thrown off his blanket and was slipping his shoes on. Phil sighed but didn't say anything against it, and they set out together through the empty and quiet campgrounds. It was still eerie out here, but less so with someone beside him.

"Couldn't sleep?" Phil said, louder now that they weren't in danger of possibly waking up their roommates.

Dan shrugged. "A little."

"I'm sorry, again." Phil scuffed the ground at his feet, looking sheepish and guilty. "If I had known you would freak out like that--"

"I did not 'freak out'."

"You kind of did," Phil said, looking at over at him with a smirk, but Dan glared at him and he stopped. "But I wouldn't have let them do that. It's just, this initiation thing they do, with all the new campers, nothing serious. I wouldn't have let them scare you."

Dan didn't say anything for a long time, not until they finally did reach the bathrooms. "Thanks, then, I guess," he murmured, more to himself but Phil still heard. "No more surprised like that, though."

"I'll warn you if it comes up." Phil smiled. And they stood there, smiling at each other like idiots, until Phil cleared his throat and pointed to the building beside them. "I'll just, um...do what I came here for."

"Yeah, okay that's...okay."

And afterwards, climbing back into his bed as quietly as possible and listening to Phil do the same, he found it much easier to block the unpleasant thoughts from before.

***

a/n: I was gonna wait till Saturday to upload this but it feels so weird having finished chapters in my drafts, I'm so used to just uploading them as soon as I've finished them idk

It's starting out a bit slow I know, it'll be better after this I promise.

But heeeey and welcome to the third chapter, honestly you can't have a summer camp fic without the cliche ghost story scene and someone getting scared ;)

I'll see you next time and I hope you liked this and I want you to know you're absolutely beautiful peace :3