Chapter 22

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Archie's POV

I lean against the table and stare at the pieces of wood. It's not that I don't like craft—I understand that a lot of people do and it's necessary to do it at camp—but I hate woodwork. People probably think this is stupid, but I really don't want to get a splinter. I have incredibly low pain tolerance. 

Freddie laughs at my table space. "Have you even started?"

"Nope."

"Do you plan to?"

"Nope."

"Okay then." He turns back to his half-built bird house. That's what we're supposed to be building today: birdhouses. Or animal feeders. Or something along those lines. Today we're building them and tomorrow we'll paint them. I don't know why we have to paint them. Won't birds like them better if they look like wood?

Zac is on my other side and he is closer to finished with his birdhouse than Freddie. He works fast. Alice is next to him and has barely started. She has done more than me, so I can't talk, but still.

"Look! I made firewood!" Zachary gestures to his wood from Freddie's other side. He has made it into a pile. It does not look like firewood.

"I definitely see it," Finn says dryly. "Definitely."

"I guess it kind of does..." Freddie affirms unconfidently.

I'm with Finn. I definitely see it. 100%

A bird lands on the table next to Alice and chirps happily. I swear she's like a Disney princess. It's the worst.

They say you can tell a lot about a person from how they treat animals (and by 'they' I mean Jeremy Johnson from Phineas and Ferb) and this just supports my huge crush on Zac. He puts some of the birdseed that's supposed to go in the finished birdhouses on his palm and offers it to the bird. The bird pecks happily at the seeds and Alice giggles. If I had been holding a pencil or a piece of dowel or something else breakable, I would have snapped it.

Then the imaginary pencil unsnaps as Zac turns to me and grins. "Do you want to feed it?"

I shake my head shyly and feel a blush spread across my cheeks. "No, uh, I'm okay."

"Okay." He glances at the birdhouse I was just about to start building. "If you need any help with that, you can ask." I think he's teasing me a bit, but I know he means it.

"T-thanks," I stammer.

I rest my hand on the edge of the table and end up accidentally flipping a handful of nails into the air on a make-shift wood seesaw. I redden further as Zac and Alice laugh good-naturedly. I turn away from Zac before I can make an even bigger fool of myself and catch Freddie looking at me.

"What?"

He shrugs with the air of a person who is definitely not nonchalant. "Nothing. Don't mind me."

I get back to my unstarted birdhouse, shooting Freddie suspicious glances as I do. 

I arrange the wood a few times before getting bored. I have a hammer so hypothetically I would get started with nailing stuff together or putting in dowels or something, but I don't see why I should. 

People around the table and on other tables have started finishing their birdhouses. Oh shit

I arrange the pieces of my birdhouse in the way I think they're supposed to go together. Then I realise I have no idea what I'm doing. I was too busy not paying attention to hear what Gabe said when he was explaining the steps.

Zac has finished his birdhouse and is admiring his handiwork while I do the same. He sees my birdhouse—if you can even call it that—and smiles sympathetically.

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