Day 4
Hiking.
Not exactly my favorite thing. Yes, I love running... indoors. What I don’t enjoy is heat radiating off my back as I climb a steep cliff. Sweat dripping off my body. Perspiration stains beneath my arm pits that keep rubbing against my skin, chaffing it.
A cold shower is the only thing that’s kept me going all day. The dream of the ice-cold spray washing away the sweat and dirt.
Not having to wear these heavy boots and thick socks.
Lying in my bed and resting my aching back.
I thought today would be fun. A great bonding experience. I couldn’t have been more wrong if I tried.
Everyone’s true personalities started to come out today, and it’s clear how opposite so many of us are.
Natasha, Teegan, and Courtney bitched the entire time. If one of them wasn’t complaining about the heat, or the bugs, or asking if it was almost over yet, the other was holding us up, having to take a break because her feet hurt.
Hence my boots and thick socks. Because they sent us a list of what to bring and I knew everything on there was on there for a reason. Tennis shoes with ankle socks, or in Teegan’s case, no socks, wasn’t a smart idea. I guarantee they’re all going to have blisters.
Bella, Kyra, and I led the way most of the trip, with Jace and Drake behind us. Lennon and Callen were behind them and Milo and Gage were bringing up the rear, making sure the three bitching beauties didn’t veer off the trail and get lost.
You would think we were in the wilderness. Miles from the nearest city. When the truth was we were at a large nature preserve. We were perfectly safe. Nothing was going to attack us. The point of the exercise was to bond as a group and maybe to weed out the weak.
Well, the last part I added because that’s what this was doing. Showing us who is the weakest of the group. The leader. The one who is a little too macho for his own good.
The only person I really didn’t see a change in during the hike was Lennon. He was calm and stoic as ever. Offering help but not pressuring anyone to take his hand unless we wanted to. Which I did once, when I attempted to climb on top of a rock that was slippery and covered in moss.
He was a gentleman, allowing me to lean on him. He didn’t push me up on the rock but rather let me climb and struggle a little, making sure I wasn’t going to fall.
The scene we caused as we laughed when I almost slipped the first time seemed to bother Jace. He fell to the back of the line for the walk back and remained quiet the rest of the hike. It wasn’t until we were back in the parking lot, chugging water and waiting for the van to pick us up that we realized Milo and Natasha were missing.
Let the search mission begin.
Not that the cameramen were any help. They stayed behind. Checking their footage for any sign of where they may have veered off.
So did Courtney and Teegan, complaining about their feet. Callen and Gage offered to wait with them to “take care of them,” which sounded noble but was a line of bullshit if I ever heard one.
Kyra, Bella, and Callen saw everyone else staying seated and just shrugged.
Which left me with Lennon and Jace. Alone. Back on the trail.
I didn’t want to go back and look for them. My feet ached too. But until they were found, back with the rest of the party, my shower was going to have to wait. The sooner we laid eyes on them, the sooner I could stand under the cold spray and relax for the rest of the night.
So, I led the way, Jace and Lennon right behind me. Both with irritated expressions on their faces, mirroring my own.
Five minutes later, I hear Natasha’s shrill laughter and when we round the second bend in the trail, I see her swat Milo’s chest.
“What the actual fuck?” I holler, unable to hold in my anger any longer.
“Hey, there you guys are. Where’d you go?” Milo asks, attempting to act suave as his eyes dart between Jace and Lennon’s. When they don’t answer, he continues, “Didn’t you hear me say, ‘hold up. Natasha has to pee’?”
“Yeah,” she agrees, a sinister smile on her face. “I couldn’t hold it any longer.”
She’s in an awfully chipper mood for someone who spent the last two hours bitching about her feet and everything else that’s wrong with nature.
In fact, she sounds a lot like someone who just got laid, and the twinkle in her eyes tells me my assessment is spot on. Not to mention the leaves stuck to Milo’s jeans or the grass in his hair.
They ditched us. To fool around. And not just us but the cameras somehow. Whatever happened, they’re going to get away with it. It’ll be their little secret.