Chapter Four

I woke to the feeling of moisture in the air, a typical dewy morning for camping. My damp sleeping bag clung to my legs as I removed myself from my bed. I noticed only one of my three group members had awakened. Nevaeh's blonde mane was in a big frizz, her mouth hanging open. Zeke was face down on the pillow, and I was almost concerned that he couldn't breathe, but then I remembered I couldn't care less.

My movements were quick and subtle. I tried not to wake the others, gently opening the tent door. I avoided the fly so I wouldn't cover myself in condensation, and stood straight up to stretch my back.

I waved in wiggled my arms in different directions as a yawn escaped my mouth. I looked around to see Lucas hovering around his bag which held all our food. He was holding some stuff in his hands but he seemed slightly confused.

"Need some help?" He jumped at the sound of my voice, almost dropping the items he held.

"Well, I'm trying to figure out what we can eat." He spoke in a quiet tone, presumably to avoid waking the others. He scratched the back of his head, putting down the things he carried.

"Well, did you pack the pancake mix?" He nodded. "Great! Here," I picked up the box containing the pre-made mix. "Why don't you start the fire and I cook? I piled some bark and twigs beside the fire, so you could use those as a starter fire."

He nodded and went on his way to start us a fire. I grabbed a bottle of water and a bowl for the mixture. I emptied the small packet into the bowl and added some water to the mix. I used a small whisk to blend everything together. Lucas came up beside me.

"I have a small fire going," Lucas pointed behind him, and I caught sight of a small ball of fire.

"Nice," I praised. "I have the mix. Mind holding the pan for me?"

He nodded and grabbed the miniature pan from the bag, leading the two of us over to the fire he had built.

The coals from yesterday had started to heat up and the fresh wood was burning brightly. Boiling the water yesterday took steady positioning of the pot in between logs, but since I was going to be flipping pancakes I would rather have something to support my base.

Lucas placed the pan above the hot flames and rested the bottom on a non-burning piece of wood.

With the bowl of batter in my hand, I carefully poured a circle onto the pan.

I waited for the small air bubbles to disappear before using the spatula to flip the pancake I had made. I placed it on the plate at my side.

"Could, ah, I maybe try?"

I paused for a moment because I was sure that if I let Lucas give it a shot he would surely mess up our breakfast, and at the same time, I didn't want to be rude and say no.

I handed him the spatula and traded him for the handle of the pan. I watched as he poured a bit of batter on to the pan, waiting a moment before he flipped it.

I had assumed he would mess up in some way because that was only expected of him. I imagined him flipping the pancake over only to have it land on the rim of the pan. But when Lucas turned the pancake over, none of those things happened. It landed perfectly on its other side, with a golden colour and crisp edge.

"Nice," I remarked.

He shrugged nonchalantly and turned away shyly. "I mean, it's j-just a pancake. It wasn't too hard."

I nodded, and suggest he finished the rest. He agreed to do so, continuing to flip mouth-watering golden brown pancakes. He never faulted, and soon enough we had a plate full of pancakes to give us a filling breakfast.

"I'm going to go wake up Nevaeh and Zeke," I told Lucas.

"Alright. I- ah, I'll just... set stuff up, I think." He trotted away over to his bag where he fished out some paper plates and cutlery.

I reached our tent and opened the door to see Nevaeh and Zeke both in the same position that I last saw them. I had no watch or phone so I couldn't tell what time it was, but I knew that it was late enough that I should be allowed to wake them up.

I kicked off my shoes to step inside. I crawled over to the centre and shook both of them.

"Guys, wake up. Lucas and I made breakfast."

Nevaeh shifted so she was facing away from me, and Zeke let out a loud groan, but slowly sat up.

"Go get food," I tried to shove him out the door, despite him being twice my size. He slowly started to move and finally left the tent, and I gave myself some credit even though I most likely had nothing to do with his exit.

Nevaeh was still wrapped up in her sleeping bag. I tried shaking her but she just kept twisting to face away from me.

"It's breakfast," I tried telling her but she didn't budge.

"The cell service here is pretty good," I tried, and she shot up in her bed and started reaching for her phone. She grabbed it from sort of side pocket and starting tapping away.

"Where's the cell service?" She asked frantically with wide eyes. It took her a few seconds of playing with her phone to realize that there was, in fact, no service in the middle of the forest.

She put her phone down and made a face of disappointment. Eventually, I got her to migrate from the tent all the way over to meet with the other two near the fire.

The others were already working away at their pancakes when Nevaeh and I joined. We all cleared our plates and gave them to the fire. After cleaning everything up and changing into our everyday clothes, it was a matter of figuring out what to do.

We all spent some time just sitting around cluelessly, deciding what to do. There was not much for us to do without getting completely lost, and we were trying to stick to what Lucas had mentioned about staying put when lost.

As predicted Nevaeh returned to her phone. Lucas and Zeke had found a deck of cards to play with, and from what I could hear they were bouncing back and forth between games such as 'crazy eights' and 'spit'.

I had nothing better to do, and because of the map, Nevaeh had forgotten to bring I decided to take it upon my self and check overall we had brought. With permission of my group mates, I dug through each other their belongings to make sure we had the necessities needed for a successful and safe camping trip.

I found that we had the majority of important things packed, with simple things forgotten such as napkins and candles. It got boring after a while, just going through everyone's belongings. So I sat back for a bit and watched the dead fire.

"Hey, tough girl," I turned my head to Zeke's call. "While you were gone I got Lucas to help me out with cutting some wood. Mind bringing it over to the fire?"

I huffed but complied. I scooped up the wood in my arms and brought it over to the dead fire.

"What's with the, uh, nickname?" Lucas asked him, pulling a card from their deck.

"Everyone knows she weight lifts, she doesn't try to hide it," Zeke commented. "So I think I'll call her tough girl since she thinks she's so tough."

"Pardon me?" I narrowed my eyes at him. "I don't talk about playing football twenty-four-seven, nor do I like to flaunt the fact that I'm captain."

He snickered. "Of course you don't, you're not even on the football team."

I crossed the distance and came up to his side. "That's what you do! I barely even talk about my athletic abilities!" I paid no respect to the boy who was all bronze and no brains.

"I haven't mentioned football once since this stupid camping trip because that's completely irrelevant," He hissed. "I'm not some jerk who brags about everything that's good in my life."

"Well, that's great to hear because neither am I," I retorted. "At least now we know my strength isn't just for show."

"And mine is?" He questioned, raising his eyebrows. I could see Lucas starting to cower in fear beside him as he observed our heated encounter.

"I never said that," I replied innocently, turning back to the fire.

"Race me," He argued. "And we'll see who's better."

A scoffed escaped my mouth. "Oh, please. We're in the middle of the forest, do you see somewhere to race? Plus, who does a sprint determine your athletic ability?"

"Okay, push-ups," He tried. "Except you can't-do girl pushups, they have to be strict."

I placed my hands on my hip. "'Girl push-ups,' what do you even mean?"

He shrugged. "You know, those push-ups on your knees?"

I folded my arms over my chest to exaggerate my glare. "If they're done on your knees, I'm pretty sure they're called knee pushups."

He waved it away

He crossed his arms. "Whoever can do the max pull-ups has to give the other half of their dinner tonight."

"You're on." I challenged.

Despite our bantering back and forth, Lucas followed behind silently. We found two branches that were strong enough to hold our weight. We got ready to jump up to our figurative bar and had Lucas in front of us to count out.

"Go. 1, 2, 3..." We pulled as Lucas called out numbers. I started to pull my body weight at the tempo Lucas called out. I started off with a great start, my energized arms pulling me up at every command, but then my muscles started to tug, and they felt heavier with each pull.

"... 13, 14, 15..." I could feel my arms start to shake. I looked over to see how Zeke was holding up, but he was still going.

"... 18, 19..." I tried going for another, only to have my chin almost touch the bottom of the branch before letting my arms let loose. I dropped back to the ground and shook out my tired arms. Beside me, Zeke dropped too. He clenched his fists and released, grimacing as he did.

"T-Trinity got, um, 19, but Z-Zeke got 23." Lucas stuttered.

"Ha!" Zeke shouted, doing some sort of winner's dance. Whatever it was, he looked as if he was trying to kill a mosquito.

"It's not fair," I complained. "You have the male advantage. Your testosterone increases your muscle mass, and men are built to build muscle. Women have to work harder to gain lots of muscle mass."

Zeke laughed. "Wow, you really have poor sportsmanship. You and I both knew that when we started, but you didn't say anything. You're pettier than I thought."

I frowned as he continued to flaunt his pathetic win. That competition barely even counted. Just because he can do more pull-ups doesn't mean he's fitter than I am. He probably just works out to get girls, he doesn't even use it.

"Do you guys, want to like, uh, I don't know..." I faced Lucas, who scratched the back of his head nervously. "Go for like a small walk or something? I'm, sort-sort of getting bored, around here I mean."

Zeke clapped his hands together, still pumped with energy from his win. "Sure, let's do this! Tough Girl, you coming?"

I sighed and nodded. I had nothing better to do.

After notifying Nevaeh we were going for a walk, the three of us decided to walk forward, in the opposite direction of the tent, that way it would be easy to return, and there was less of a chance of getting lost.

The two pushed me to the front, forcing me to be the one to push past leaves and branches that hit my face. I could hear the two boys chatting behind me as they left me to be the one to take all the hits in the face. I also took momentary pauses to quickly brush off my legs and arms to avoid earning any ticks.

"Wait, what's that?"

I followed Zeke's eyes to a small body of water a few feet away from us. We walked closer to it, to see the fresh water following a stream coming from uphill. We could hear the drift of the water as it moved down the rocks and past our feet. The stream wasn't very big, maybe only a few feet wide. But in length, all I could see what the water coming from a hill up top, leading down and continuing further into the forest.

I kneeled before the water and touched it with my hand. The water was cool and felt like great drinking water. I tried reaching down but the stream was longer than my arm could reach.

Both Zeke and Lucas had also extended their arms in order to touch the water. The two boys played with the cold water, and Zeke lightly hit the water to splash me.

I clenched my jaw and sent him and glare.

He laughed, mocking my expression. He nudged Lucas beside him. "Imagine how mad she'd be if I pushed her in."

"Go ahead," I challenged. "I dare you."

***

At the moment I feel like I'm going for quantity over quality, so once I post the fifth chapter I'm going to go over and edit everything to make sure I'm doing the most :)

with love
via <3