fake | tratie | EDITING |

| iv. strawberry tours |

edited: 1 . 20 . 22

original word count: 1260

new word count: 1419

. . .

The days went on much smoother after my revelation. I hated Travis because he was a nuisance, not because I felt like he owed me anything. He didn't. He was just helping me out - for what reason, I had yet to figure out. Even if I felt like there was something missing now, I was sure it was just me being paranoid. It didn't matter, because I was relieved of the stress of fake dating him.

Not that it was a bad experience, necessarily. That was what scared me the most - he was easygoing, as obnoxious as it was, which made it way less hectic. It wasn't hard to pretend to get along with him; I wouldn't actually, of course, but it was... nice. Maybe.

At lunch, I was telling Miranda about my thoughts when he stalked up to the table.

"Speak of the devil," I grumbled.

"Always, Katie-kat." He winked.

"Travis, call me that one more time and I will grow roses over your bed and you'll have to sleep in thorns."

Travis put a hand to his heart, feigning sadness. "That wasn't nice."

"Didn't mean it to be."

He harrumphed. "Well, if you're not going to be polite, I may as well leave."

"Nobody's stopping you." I smiled angelically.

The smirk crawling across his face made me want to gag. He said, "I'm glad we're back on enemy terms. I missed that extra spice."

With that, he left to sit with his siblings.

"Gods, I hate him."

"I think that's the point he was just making," Miranda pointed out.

Growling about her unfairness, I returned to my meal and pouted. Even though everyday camp noises filled the pavilion, the sound didn't drown out the little voice in my head nagging at me for being so complicated. What happened simple hatred? Talking to Calypso helped to clear my head, but my logic conflicted with my emotions. I was fairly certain I didn't have feelings for Travis, but seeing him made me confused all over again.

I needed to get a serious grip.

Walking to the strawberry field with my siblings, I indulged myself in conversation about the weather in the dome over camp. We had been meaning to talk to Chiron and Mr. D about changing it up a big since the summertime was coming to a close. We wanted to plant some other things for the all-year campers, because there'd been some complaining about the constant summer produce.

As I gingerly twisted a strawberry off its stem and tossed it into my fourth bucket of the day, I noticed Travis coming over the hill with two kids by his side, neither of them older than ten or eleven. They had to be newer campers, not only because I didn't recognize them, but because Travis pointed to various locations as if he was a tour guide.

He'd been doing that for a couple of years: taking in the new demigods, showing them around, making them feel more at home. What Luke Castellan used to do, before everything went down.

It was a hard thing to come from a normal one into this reality without any friends. I hated to admit how cute it was, because he couldn't be trusted with a twig, much less young campers. But even if he carried the mischief of a Hermes kid, the goodness of his heart couldn't be overlooked. He took a lot off of Chiron by looking after the newcomers, and it couldn't have been easy for him to fill the boots of Luke. I didn't like how nice it was of him. He just had to go around doing good deeds, didn't he? Making himself seem like a better person than he was.