Chapter 9: Chapter Eight

[A/N] Sorry this took so long, I have been so busy... my schedule's all messed up ahh.... \(-⭘-")/

We had lunch first, which was a sort of lunch buffet, except the options felt more like breakfast and I doubted they would be different for dinner. I didn't care, I was hungry and scarfed whatever down I could.

I sat with my roommates who talked casually amongst each other and didn't really seem to notice me sitting there.

That felt nice. Disappearing felt good.

On our way to the first activity, as the group came together and moved through the camp grounds I felt someone brush beside me and looked up startled to find Victor moving past, just barely glancing at me, winking.

I felt embarrassed for staring at him like I did, but a small giddy feeling entered my chest.

The first activity was abseiling, a long tutorial about how to correctly put on the safety harness and then a short climb down to the bottom of a patronisingly small wooden cliff. Our groups were split up between two different courses to make it easier for the instructors to handle and I realised the larger chunk of kids that were problematic for me were in Patrick's group.

That didn't stop them from messing with me, naturally, whenever we met in the middle there was a little snickering as they looked back at me, sometimes I felt someone shove me hard and I'd have to apologise if I knocked into anyone.

It occurred to me that I hadn't really met a lot of the kids from my year simply because I'd been so wrapped up in being invisible, and part of my subconscious still had this idea if I couldn't see them they couldn't see me. I tried not to look at anyone, tried not to say much or hang around them. The more kids that hated me the worse it would get for me.

I dreamed of it sometimes.

Being lynched by them all. Something light hearted, something barely bothersome, escalating fast as they egged each other on, laughing like they did. I hated that maniacal laughter, it featured in my dreams, worse and worse, louder and more high pitched, still I was dragged out into the field, onto the football pitch or into someone's basement.

Every time in a dream like that I was filled with abject terror, felt the trainer stepping on my face like it was real, cold rubber in a crisp pattern, some abrasion softening the middle of it, and more laughter.

But they didn't realise they were going too far or they didn't care. I knew in that dream, always, I knew I was going to die. I woke up normally with some kind of shaking, a tremor in my hands that did not ease until I sat up with Milk in my arms for a while, sometimes picking him up from his bed to put him in mine for the comfort. Sometimes my legs were shaking so bad I slumped over in his dog bed and crawled up beside him.

A terror that eased but never left me. I was scared of them.

But the other kids in the year weren't like them, they weren't that bad, they didn't even seem to consider making fun of me, yet anyway. If Patrick led by example that would change soon enough.

But still, it was like for a brief moment I stepped out of a bad dream and I was just about to realise that was all it was.

Then our groups merged again to do rock climbing on the massive fake rock face, and even the kids in our group that were fine hanging around me, that were more or less friends with or lackeys to Patrick, started shifting their focus to me.

I wasn't sure around when that happened.

Victor teamed up with me as we went down in pairs. He seemed to be trying to get on with me, maybe out of sympathy, but I could tell he must be nervous about Patrick.

Sometimes I saw him glance at Patrick, express a slight nervous frown and add a little distance between us. It stung, mainly because it was embarrassing that he had to do that, but I understood.

Despite the activities being fairly banal we were all tired by the end of the day and dinner was a more sedate affair.

I was beginning to feel a little comforted by the way that the kids I was rooming with tended to stay in a group together, apparently liking each others company. I followed them around, trying not to look for signs that I was getting on their nerves.

When I actually walked up to the dinner buffet Victor was there again, with a cool attractive expression on his face, handsome, as he observed the options. He saw me and smiled slightly.

He nudged my shoulder lightly. A warm little gesture that made my heart twinge. The lighting in the buffet area was strange, slightly orange in the food prep area and slightly blue in the ceiling, but it looked good on him. His eyes seemed softer under that light. "So what do you fancy?"

You.

"I don't know..." I mumbled.

He hummed, picked up some hashbrowns and put them on my plate. "Good?"

I nodded.

He nodded to himself and looked around and picked up a sausage and put it on my plate. "Good?"

I nodded again, my face was warming up, I was sweating just standing next to him, scared that if I turned around I'd see them looking and the first thing Victor would see was a bunch of leering faces about to pelt him with their left overs.

"Figure beans is a bit..." He mumbled to himself as he perused the options, then decided on a few other things and added them to my plate, filling his as well.

"Thanks." I mumbled so much under my breath that the word barely made it out of my head.

"Not many options... but you'll like this." He continued speaking more to himself.

He seemed to be enjoying himself, oddly enough, I wasn't totally sure if I'd seen that before.

I felt hot in the face and self conscious as I took my tray back to the table I was sitting at.

I did get pelted with some food from Patrick's table but a stern word from one of the camp leaders that noticed it got them to stop.

I looked over at where Victor was sitting, now eating calmly, the different light once again changing the features on his face slightly, giving him a sharper more defined handsome look under the brighter lighting.

My heart beat some bit faster, and I ducked my head back over my plate.

He has a girlfriend.  I reminded myself with an exasperated tone.

I sighed, looked around, meaning to look at him again, but suddenly realised Patrick was looking at me.

We both looked at each other, for what felt like a full minute but must have been something like twenty seconds, almost unblinkingly our eye contact stayed. Mine maintained more out of being frozen, while his... I didn't know why he was staring at me, there was a hard look in his eyes, he looked like his jaw was clenched.

Eventually he looked away as someone spoke to him and I tried to turn back to look down at my plate slowly so that no one would see how anxious I felt.

But the night remained calm, with people laughing and chattering as we moved out in twos from the small cafeteria building down to our respective rooms.

I settled in for the night, paranoid for a while, before quickly falling asleep.

In the morning I awoke to the sound of hooting from nearby owls, the low light knocking at the window, the sun barely stretching its arms.

My bunkmates were chatting amongst each other, a light hearted argument about a game they were all playing, when George saw that I was awake he called my name.

"Elliot. What's your view? Destiny Seven or Samurai of Valhalla?"

"I uh, I don't know..." I rubbed my head sheepishly, dodging as the other two, Colin and Hudson, tossed some kind of sweets at each other from across the two top bunks.

"Don't know or haven't played them?"

"Both." I replied quietly.

He hummed. "What games do you play?"

I shrugged. "I don't really... I don't have a laptop. And we're not allowed to use our phones in our rooms after dinner."

He raised a brow and stared at me strangely. "Okay, cool."

"Damn strict parents..." Colin spoke, looking over from his bunk above George.

I nodded and shrugged.

"Well you can always come over to mine and play it." Hudson leaned over his bunk to tell me, but I could only barely make out the top of his head.

I nodded. "Thanks." My voice was barely a whisper.

The day started out good, and surprisingly it didn't seem to get worse either, as much as I anticipated it to.

We moved on to archery in the mid morning. It had rained the previous night so the air was a bit cold but the sun was trying to dry things up for us and the archery range had fencing that kept some of the cold breeze out.

Then there were teambuilding exercises. The female camp leader, Emma, did a great deal of talking between every exercise, so in reality while we spent something like two hours in the woods arranging ourselves in height order and date of birth and other weird tasks we didn't actually do very much.

I did have a favourite exercise though. They, Emma having been joined by her male counterpart, directed us to a small stream, the rain providing it with a little higher of a water level than I'd notice before when she was giving the tour earlier, over which there was a large wooden log.

We gathered in front of it. It wasn't a tree trunk, maybe that would have been problematic health and safety wise, it was a log that had been fully sanded and cut to size and lugged across the stream like a bridge.

"Everyone has to hold hands and slowly make your way across the log. We're going in groups of four. Everyone is going to get two chances to do this, you can't go with the same people twice! Okay? Girls I'm looking at you, no sticking to the same people!"

There was a mumble of agreement before we all got going. It was simple enough actually, although the log was a bit slippery from the rain it was large enough that walking sideways made it fairly easy.

I completed the first way across with George and two others, and then got put into another trio by Emma when I reached the other side.

"Okay, you now go with him... and you can go with them too... come back around now guys, be careful!" She pointed at Patrick, gesturing for him to go to me.

My stomach sank, I saw myself being pushed hard into the shallow stream and everyone laughing at me and my stomach knitted itself together tight.

But the second person she directed to join us was Victor, and relief and anxiety wrestled for top place at that. He might be nice to me but would he still be if Patrick started messing with him too? He was only lucky because the class liked him, liked that he was nice and smart and just plain handsome. With the whole classical music thing he had going on he was sort of just cool. But that could change, if enough people decided they didn't like him that could change.

I think my heart would break if I knew I was the reason for that, seeing him reduce into what I was, sad and quiet and paranoid, exhausted and small.

Every morning I saw my life flash before my eyes, my dismal future, it seemed so hard to picture just how bleak it would probably be. The mere thought of Victor, someone whose attractive grin seemed so radiant, with his classic confident wink, waking up the same way, made me scared.

But Victor smiled at me as we were moving across the log.

I was in the centre, with Victor on my right and Patrick on my left, moving in his direction. He was taking big steps, his hand barely holding mine, a deep glare on his face, some of his friends laughing at the other side.

The stream was fairly shallow but wide, so the log stretched across maybe four or five metres, and it wasn't really a quick walk as easy as it was, and with Patrick trying to practically race down it, it was pretty hard to keep my balance perfect.

"Ahhh..." I breathed out the startled cry, trying to be as quiet as possible as I nearly went off balance trying to keep up.

I looked back at Victor who grinned suddenly and tugged my hand.

My brows furrowed, he held my hand tightly, a little thump sounding in my chest as my ears felt hot. He suddenly stopped moving, acting like he was being thrown off balance. Patrick, whose grip on my hand wasn't tight in the first place, lost a hold of me and got about two steps before reaching out to grab my hand again as he fell forwards with a loud strangled yelp.

I nearly fell over as well, as did Victor, as the log turned slightly and we had to hurriedly keep moving along it as we witnessed Patrick splash into the water, some of it rising up and landing in his open mouth, he gasped and coughed, getting up slowly, his mouth wide open like his eyes.

I tried really hard not to laugh as he quickly got off, but a chuckle tumbled out of my lips as everyone crowded around, some of his own friends laughing even as they tried to help him out.

But my smile faded when I saw the look on his face, and it was directed at me, a burning, blazing, angry look, dark eyes glimmering as he dragged himself from the shallow water, accepting the help of a friend even as the blistering bitter glare remained fixed on me. An apoplectic tinge of red to his face, lips pressed together so that they were slightly pale.

The sheer fury. I didn't understand it. But I felt cold from top to bottom, felt fear in my chest squeeze me like a snake on a mission, even the sweat on my neck and on my hands felt freezing suddenly.

I swallowed, suddenly realising I was still holding Victor's hand, flushed darkly up at him as he realised too just as I was pulling my hand away.

"Sorry..." I mumbled shyly.

He chuckled, his eyes lingering on me. "No worries."

[A/N] Big fat kisses to the WCP and my supportive patrons... \ \ \٩( ′ᵕ')و ̑̑/ / /