It Had to be You

Chapter 15

Max trampled through the forest, planning to just take a loop around and end up back at the tents so he could avoid the cursed dodgeball disaster. Pretty quickly though he realized that he was horrendously lost. Tired, he paused walking for a second and sat down on a medium sized rock in a clearer section of the forest. Before he could relax, however, he heard footsteps coming up behind him.

He jumped back on his feet and flew around, fists up and ready to punch a grizzly bear, or whatever creature really, in the nose. Instead he came face to face with a surprised looking Preston, who put his hands in the air.

"Oh Jesus!" Preston yelped. "It's just me!"

Max lowered his hands and stared for a second at the other boy.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" He said after a moment of awkward silence.

Preston laughed awkwardly before answering "Same thing as you I guess. I don't want to perish slowly at the hands of Nerf." Preston shuddered at the thought.

"Yeah, he does seem to have it out for you." Max admitted, thinking back to the previous year. "Someone ought to stop him. He's, and listen this is coming from me so take this with the fucking heap of salt that deserves, out of line a lot of the fucking time. I may be a shit but at least I'm not a stabby one."

Preston laughed, this time considerably less awkward. "Yeah your machinations are a little bit more psychological than that. Although, you've mellowed quite a bit. I mean those first few weeks were bad." He draws out each letter in bad like he's going over each of Max's schemes in his head as he says the word.

Max thinks last year he would have taken offense to that. It doesn't bother him so much anymore though. "I guess I have."

"I think I'm going to put on a play next week. I asked David about it pretty much as soon as I arrived." Preston continued after Max didn't say anything more. "But I don't think it's going to work out."

Max looked up at Preston who was looking out into the forest. "Why not?"

"I mean, listen I love the spotlight as much as the next guy, but it's kind of hard to put on a whole play by yourself. And after some of the disasters," Preston winced, remembering the increasing ridiculous failures of his performances last year, "David says he's not going to make it mandatory. Which means no one will actually join."

Max snorted. "Yeah probably not dude. You're a little... stress inducing."

Preston forced a laugh at that. "Yeah."

This time Max broke the silence. "Do you want to raid the dining hall for yogurt? I figured out a good way to sneak in a few days ago."

Preston suddenly looked confused and he said "Yeah, camps back that way." He gestured off to the side. Then he paused, looking confused. "A few days ago? Didn't everyone get here like yesterday?"

Max paled for a second before kicking his ass in gear. That was a stupid mistake but not an irreversible one.

"Yeah, um, my parents tend to drop me off early? They mix up the dates or whatever. And fucking David could never force them to make the drive twice, the shit is too nice for that. So I got here early."

That was actually mostly true. Or it was for last year anyway. David had been all apologetic and so he had stayed alone at camp for a day or two. But Max had been so angry at being stuck at camp back then that he was pretty much a ball of spite for that entire time.

"Oh, what's it like, all David all the time?" Preston asked.

"It's like you're overdosing on pixie sticks," Max deadpans, turning in the direction Preston had been pointing."So yogurt?"

"I would love to steal yogurt but can we do something real quick before we go?"

Max turned back towards Preston. "Yeah?"

Out of nowhere Preston pulls out a hairbrush and points it accusatory towards Max. "I am fixing your fucking hair Max!"

Max jumped and started to run toward camp. "NOPE! See you sucker!"

Preston laughed and ran after him.