Day 7: Nature

Pidge was sure they were lost.

They had to be. There was no other explanation as to why her boyfriends were refusing to stop and make camp for the night, even as dusk rapidly approached.

She was exhausted and hot and sweaty in the worst kind of way. Her nose itched from the constant onslaught of polling wreaking havoc on her sinuses. Her calved ached and burned from the effort of trying to keep up with their much faster pace. Her backpack of bare essentials weighed heavily on her shoulders, making everything feel worse.

Pidge was miserable and she hated nature worse than ever.

Keith glanced back at her before exchanging a quick and quiet word with Lance, who turned his head to her her in worry. Pidge scowled at them both, already knowing what they were about to propose again.

"You are not carrying me," she snapped in irritation. "It's too hot for me to drape myself over your gross, sweaty back. All I want to do is stop walking and go to bed. Maybe I'll wake up and this nightmare will finally be over." She stopped walking completely and crossed her arms over her chest. She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, but held them back as well as she could. Pidge knew she was acting like a child throwing a temper tantrum, but she was well past caring about that anymore.

They knew she hated the outdoors.

They knew and they still insisted they go on a week-long camping retreat together. "It'll be fun, Pidge!" they'd told her. "You'll love it!"

She felt foolish for letting them convince her. She'd known it was a bad idea and that her dislike of the situation would end up ruining everything, but they had been so excited about it...

Her vision blurred and Pidge knew she was crying. She bowed her head to try and hide it, but it was too late. Her boyfriends were already at her side, words spoken in a low volume, tone even. One of them gently tugged off her backpack while the other scooped her up into his arms, easily carrying her as they set off again.

"It's not much further," Keith promised. "Lance, do you want to run ahead?"

Lance nodded, eyes lingering on Pidge's form for a moment. "Yeah, I'll get the place ready. Food or bath first, do you think?"

"Bath, then food."

Lance was off running before Pidge could string together a proper question. His footsteps made a thunderous sound as he crashed through the underbrush, taking the straightest path to wherever they were going.

"Keith?" Pidge asked quietly. "What's going on?"

Keith sighed. "It was supposed to be a surprise, but... Pidge, we're sorry for putting you through today. We thought it'd be kind of fun, walking all the way here together, enjoying the nature, almost romantic?" He sounded as though he didn't buy into the whole 'romantic' notion of it either. (It must have been Lance's idea.) "Shiro has a cabin out here and he's letting us use it. There's no camping. And it has electricity."

Pidge found herself crying for a whole new reason.

Her boyfriends were such idiots. Sweet, misguided idiots.

She loved them so much.