"Hey, do you think we could be tent buddies?" I asked Beverly who was standing by a tree by herself.

"Of course!" Beverly laughed, "I could use the help." she gestured to the mess of poles, stakes and fabric that was supposed to be a tent.

Together, we managed to slide the poles through the slits in the tent, stake it down firmly and roll out our sleeping bags inside it. I put my hand up to her and she high-fived it with a grin.

"Teamwork." I smiled.

I spied the Losers Club across from me, Eddie struggling to hold up the tent while Richie attempted to peg it. Billy and Stan had their tent already set up and were watching the two boys, amused.

The boys and girls were separated between the two sides of the small clearing and I felt a small pang in my chest when I realised I wouldn't be able to hang out with my friends as much as I wanted to, but at least I had made a new one. I looked over at Beverly appreciatively who was unpacking some of her things.

A loud whistle blew and everyone jumped and turned to the centre of the clearing where the teachers were standing with their hands on their hips.

"Alright, students! Now that you've all set up your tents." he paused, and looked over at Richie and Eddie whose tent had now flipped inside out and was blowing in the wind. "Well, now that most of you have set up your tents, we'll be starting with our first activity. Have you all heard of the icebreaker, knots?"

I looked up in disbelief. An icebreaker? We weren't five, and most people had known each other for all of their lives. Why would the teacher make us suffer through an icebreaker?

The teacher scratched his beard. "Okay, well knots is a game where everybody has to bunch together and hold hands with two different people, creating this big knot that you have to untangle. If you let go of somebody's hand, everybody has to start over again and you can only win once everybody has untangled. Understand?"

The teacher was greeted with a bunch of blank faces, and huffed in annoyance. "I'm sure you guys will get it. Alright, everybody bunch together and grab hold of somebody's hand. Make sure it's two different people!"

Everyone hesitantly walked into the centre of the clearing and started grabbing people's hand. I looked to Beverly and she grabbed hold of one of my hands, and I was about to grab Bill's when Richie got to it first. I sent him a glare but he was avoiding my gaze. I looked around for a free hand to grab, but from what I saw there wasn't any.

"Alright, who hasn't held hands with somebody?" the teacher asked and I raised my free hand, along with Patrick. I groaned as he grabbed my hand with a grin, his fingers surprisingly softer than I remembered.

"Okay everyone, start untangling... now!" he pressed a button on his stopwatch, timing us, and we all started moving at once. Me and Beverly lifted up our arms to let somebody through, and then Beverly had to step over a couple of people, nearly breaking our hold.

While Beverly was doing this, I felt a tug on my other arm as Patrick tried to move in the opposite direction.

"Ow, Patrick, stop moving for a second." I said, feeling as if my arms were going to be ripped off, but he didn't stop. I tried my best to hold on to both their hands, but ended up slipping from Patrick's and I fell onto the hard ground.

Annoyed groans directed at me came from everywhere since we had to restart our knot. I put my hands up in defence. I was just glad I still had both arms attached to my body, although I couldn't say the same for my ass.

Half an hour had passed and we still hadn't managed to untangle ourselves from the knot. People had started to give up and the teachers were getting restless.

"Alright, game's over. You can all have some free time while we set up dinner. People that are meant to be helping, come with me." the teacher walked off. I reluctantly followed, along with Henry and his gang.

He stopped at a small, roughly made fire pit and I sat down on a log. Greta was still talking with her friends so I got the teacher's attention.

"Isn't Greta helping as well?" I asked and he shook his head.

"You were the one who started the fight. She did nothing wrong." he stated simply.

"What do you mean she did nothing wrong? She pushed me to the ground!" I replied, touching my bruised lip.

"That's not what I saw." he said as he took things out of some bags.

"That's bullshit!" I said, and he turned to look at me angrily.

"What did I say about being on your best behaviour for the rest of the trip? Do you want to get sent home, miss Lewis?"

I groaned and looked down to the ground, kicking the dirt around as I waited for him to tell us what to do. I felt the log move as someone sat down next to me and I turned to see Patrick with a smirk on his face.

"You're naughtier than I thought. Smoking, getting into fights, swearing at teachers, giving blowies, what don't you do?" he said, staring at me with a mischievous look in his eyes.

"I don't make the same mistake twice. What happened between us, at the Barrens, it won't happen again." I said, kicking a stone into the bushes.

"We'll see about that." Patrick licked his lips. We turned away from each other as the teacher got our attention.

"Alright, you guys will be helping me make dinner for tonight. Mashed potatoes and sausages. You three," he pointed at Henry, Belch and Patrick, "you'll go collect some wood for the fire. You two," he pointed at me and Victor, "you'll stay here and help me prepare the food. I trust you two most with handling sharp objects."

The three guys snickered and left, leaving Victor and I to peel a huge sack of potatoes. I looked over at him, his light blonde hair covering his eyes as he concentration on what he was doing. He looked up and saw me staring so I quickly turned back to my potatoes, blushing.

"So, Patrick has taken an interest in you." he said. I glanced up to see him looking at me curiously.

"Has he?" I replied, trying to sound nonchalant.

"He has." he replied, not taking his eyes away from me. "And whatever there is going on between you two, you should end it."

"There's nothing going on between me and Patrick." I blinked.

Victor laughed. "Don't shit with me, you're a terrible liar." I frowned.

"Patrick isn't a good person. You shouldn't get involved with him." he said seriously. I struggled to figure if he was being sincere or not.

"Neither are any of you." I pointed out, referring to the rest of his friends.

"That's true, but Patrick's different. He wasn't raised with shitty parents, he doesn't have an excuse."

I shook my head. "Well nobody can be born bad."

"Well, Patrick was." Vic said simply, and we spent the rest of our potato peeling in silence.

- - -

I carried my plate of food over to where the Losers were sitting, outside Richie and Eddie's roughly made tent.

"Hey L-lara." Bill said as I sat down across from him, and I gave him a smile.

"Lara, holy shit. What the hell were you thinking back on the bus? You almost killed Greta!" Richie exclaimed, his eyes wide.

"She didn't almost kill her. Lara looks more beaten up than her." Stanley stated, looking me up and down. My hand went to my legs which were decorated with long scratches from Greta's fingernails, and my lip, where I could feel some dried blood.

"Are y-you alright?" Bill asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine." I replied, brushing my dark brown hair behind my ear. "I don't know what took over me. She was saying some stupid stuff about me and my mum and I just snapped."

"You sure as hell did! I never thought two girls fighting would be so hot!" Richie exclaimed and Stan slapped the back of his head.

"You should really clean those scratches." Eddie said, "You might get an infection since there's a lot of bad bacteria under fingernails. Here, I think I have some salt water stuff that you can use."

"No no, it's fine." I laughed at Eddie who had started to rummage through his bag. "Gee, you came prepared."

Eddie blushed. "Look, you never know what could happen."

"Yeah, because we're totally going to need... Birth control pills?" Richie read the label of a medicine bottle that had fallen out of Eddie's bag.

"Hey, hands off. This is private stuff." Eddie said, snatching it back.

Richie howled. "Birth control pills? Why do you have birth control pills?"

"My mum must have slipped it into my bag by accident, okay?" Eddie replied, his ears turning pink.

Bill turned to look at me. "So who are you sh-sharing a tent with?"

"This girl named Beverly. She's pretty nice." I replied. The boys turned to look at Bill with grins on their face.

"Is there something I'm missing?" I asked, but they ignored me. I was about to ask again but I felt a light tap on my shoulder.

"Hey Lara, could you come help me for a second? One of our pegs got loose and I can't put it back on my own." I turned to see Beverly standing behind me and all of the boys froze as they looked at her.

"Uh, yeah, of course!" I said and stood up next to her.

The boys still hadn't moved, their eyes moving from Beverly to Bill. "Umm, guys, this is Beverly. Beverly, this is Stanley, Eddie, Richie and Bill." I introduced them, and the boys waved slightly.

"Nice to meet you." Beverly smiled and looked to me. "Well, I'll see you guys around. Bye Bill." She gave a small wave before we walked back to our tent.

I turned back and saw Bill blushing as he looked after us. More specifically, after Beverly. I felt a pang in my chest and I cursed at myself for feeling that way.