Author's Note: Ok, I know the last chapter was a bit confusing because you didn't really understand why Eric was acting the way he was, but this has a pretty major part in the story, so … yeah. According to morning sunrise, why he's being like that makes sense.

Chapter Twenty-One Flashback

I wasn't really sure if it was a week or a month that passed, but pretty sure that it had been a month. After a while, I lost track of the days; they all seemed to go by so slowly. All I knew was that life on the island was not fun. Running had never been one of my strong points, and it still wasn't, even though it was required to come into play several times. The only way that I could really estimate how much time had passed was by the physical changes. Eric's hair seemed to be longer by at least an inch, but I couldn't really tell on mine. It appeared as though I had lost some weight and was now looking rather in shape.

Through the whole time, Eric seemed to be giving me the cold shoulder, and it wasn't just my imagination. There had to be a reason … but I couldn't find it. The only time he softened up was during that one very irritating part of the month that every stupid girl has to go through some time in her life; and in these circumstances, it was not only painful, but embarrassing as well. This was another way that I could tell time was passing. We had at least been there for three weeks, but probably longer.

So, honestly, though I didn't have a clue how long we had been there, I estimated it had been around one month, maybe longer.

I was sitting in the water truck, waiting for Eric to return from … using the restroom … when I heard him yell. Or, at least, I thought it was he. Quickly, I grabbed my bow and a quiver of arrows (yes, we had been productive), slung them over my right shoulder (where my gash was no more than a scar now), and poked my head out of the hatch. I scanned the area surrounding our "home" for a sign of anything … unusual, but could see nothing. Slowly and carefully, I stepped out of the truck, climbed down onto the desk, silently hopped onto the half imbedded truck, and stepped onto the leaf-strewn ground. I ran over to the safety of a tree and peered around. Then I remembered I hadn't closed the hatch. I quickly looked back over to it and sighed in relief. Eric was just climbing back in and a few seconds later, his head popped back out. I gave a sharp whistle to catch his attention, then waved him over.

Just as silently and as quickly as I had done, he came over to my side. "Did you hear that yell?" he questioned in a barely audible whisper.

Nodding, I looked around. It had sounded like a guy; that was for sure. But I had no idea who it had been.

Eric and I made our way through the trees, making no noise that our ears could hear. As we walked, we kept our eyes peeled for anything … unusual. There wasn't anything that appeared strange for what seemed like miles, for that was how far it felt we crept. The only noise that we ever heard was the twittering of birds and the occasional crunch of a leaf we would tread upon.

"Pst!" I suddenly heard. I looked all around but could see no one.

"Lane! Eric!"

I whipped my head around, searching for the person who had called for us. Eric tugged on my arm and pointed up into the trees. I looked up and saw perched in the branches, Brad Kim. He was Sally Grude's boyfriend. I could tell that he wasn't in that great of shape. His normally neat blonde hair wasn't short any more but rather long and frizzy. His blue eyes no longer looked relaxed but bloodshot and panic stricken. His white slacks were in shreds past his knees and he was no longer wearing his blue uniform shirt.

Eric and I quickly ran over to the tree he was perched in and climbed it faster than we'd climbed a tree in ages. I was the first to reach Brad, and though we hadn't gotten along one bit in school, when I reached him, we gave each other a great bit hug. It felt so good to get a hug; I hadn't had one or given one in ages. Once I pulled away, Eric and Brad exchanged their little … "manly hug" thing that guys do. It was the first time I'd seen Eric smile since … a long time.

"Dude, man, I can't believe you're alive!" Eric exclaimed.

"Neither can I," Brad said croakily. It sounded as though he hadn't talked in a while. "What have you two been up to?"

Well, I think I was allowed to laugh here, don't you think? I mean, we're stranded on an island 207 miles away from Costa Rica and the island is infested with genetically engineered dinosaurs that are trying to eat you. Don't you think I should have been allowed to laugh? But Brad only scowled at me. I rolled my eyes and answered him, "Brad; think about it. We're on an island full of dinosaurs. What do you think we've been doing?"

Brad gave me a sort of rusty grin.

"Come on, dude," Eric said. "We'll take you back to our place. Get you some food."

We lead Brad down the tree and crept through the forest. I was very relieved that he was just as silent as we were.

It was a miracle, really, that we had found Brad. If I had been alone with Eric one more day I swear I would have gone nuts. It's one thing to have no one around so you don't have anyone to talk to; it's another when you've got a cute guy around and no one to talk to. It gets very depressing after the first few days and lasting what seems like a month with hardly a kind word is nothing short of torture.

Brad seemed to be very impressed with our water-truck that we liked to call home and he ate nearly a whole can of beans. He told us he had been living off all sorts of things. Some of the things sounded extremely disgusting. Things like picking carcasses clean before the buzzards got there or rummaging through what other dinosaurs had left behind didn't suit me. Which was why I was glad when Eric said that we should go to bed and stop wasting the battery in our lantern.

Though it was my turn, I offered the bed to Brad. He turned it down, however. He said he was used to sleeping on something hard and wouldn't take the bed away from a lady. I blushed and hit Eric on the arm when he laughed.

I was running through the forest, a dense fog pressing in on all sides. The foliage was so thick I could hardly squeeze my way through it. I wasn't sure what I was running from, but I knew that I had to keep going. The fog seemed to get thicker and thicker as I ran until I could hardly see my hand if I waved it two inches away from my nose. Panting heavily, I stopped in my tracks and cried out, "Help! Someone! Anyone! Help!"

But a booming ahead of me silenced my cries and I stood, rooted to the spot. Something was coming through the mist. And it was a large something. A huge, dark form walking slowly towards me.

I woke up with a start. It had been the same dream as before, only it had gone on just a bit longer. I had been having this dream what seemed like every night for about a month. But I had always woken up as I began crying for help. Why was the same dream haunting me?

I looked around the water truck and saw that it was day. The hatch was open and sunlight was pouring into the musty room. I sat up and looked around. Neither Eric, nor Brad was in side. They wouldn't leave me here alone, would they? I could have been attacked while I was sleeping! What jerks! I thought fiercely. How could they be so inconsiderate?

I stood up, stuffed the blankets on a shelf furiously, and pulled myself out of the hatch. I looked around and saw Brad and Eric sitting on top of the truck, gazing up at the trees. "What the heck are you two doing?" I whispered harshly.

"There's the sleepy head," Brad teased, grinning down at me. "Have a nice sleep? Nice dreams?"

I glared at him and went back down into the water truck. What the heck did they think they were doing? Sitting out in the open like that. Any dinosaur could come a long a pluck them right up, not that I cared at the moment. It would almost be a relief to get away from Eric and I had never really like Brad. I heard Eric begin to talk and so I stopped to listen.

"She's been having these dreams lately," Eric explained to Brad. "I just let her sleep."

"What are the dreams about?" Brad asked.

"I don't know," Eric said.

"Why not?" Brad questioned.

"What do you mean, why not?" Eric asked.

"Well … you like her, don't you?" Brad asked.

Wow; that was unexpected. There was a pause and then Eric said, "I think I'm going to go down and look at our stock of food. We might need more now that you're here."

I hurried away from the hatch, not wanting Eric to think that I had been eavesdropping. Eric came down into the water-truck, paused, then went to look at our boxes of food. I looked over at him. Though I thought he had looked buff before, he looked more so now. I guess climbing trees really can keep you in better shape. I looked down at my own legs and saw that they no longer looked overweight but pleasantly thin and strong.

Eric straightened up and, after a few seconds, walked over to me. "We're going to need more food," he said, making sure not to look me in the eye.

"Oh," I said. "I'll get my bow, then, shall I?" I started to walk past him, but he stopped me.

"I think it might – it might be better if I went alone." He said.

"What!" I exclaimed.

Eric hushed me, then went on to explain, "Well, you know what happened last time. We nearly died! I don't want that to happen again."

"Well you're doing a heck of a job pretending that you want me dead!" I practically screamed. With this, I pushed past him, climbed out the hatch, hopped onto the desk, then the truck, and went off to find a tree to climb.

It wasn't the best move, going out alone without a weapon. But I made it to the top of a tree unscathed and plopped down to have a good hard cry. I couldn't hold it in any more. Eric had been so mean to me for the past weeks. I didn't give a darn what his reasons were because he had been extremely hurtful. Some of the things he had said … one time, when nerves were running high, he had even accused me of being the cause of Hannah's death. I could still remember it …

----------- Flashback-----------

"You think I'm being unfair!" Eric yelled. "Just look at what you did to Hannah. Was that fair!"

"ME!" I screamed. "I didn't do anything to Hannah! If anything, I tried to save her, which put myself in danger as well!"

"What was it then, huh?" he exclaimed. "A bloody brachiosaurus!"

"I don't know what it was, ok! Why are you being so mean?"

"We wouldn't BE in this mess if it wasn't for you!"

"Oh, so now it's MY fault we're stranded on this island! Last I heard, Mr. Polycarp was assuring us we would be fine because we would have an 'expert' along with us. I can only presume he meant you. You've been obsessed with dinosaurs since the first time I saw you."

"What has THAT got to do with anything?"

"Oh, yeah, Eric. This has NOTHING to do with your stupid obsession with those ruddy creatures down there. Because the last time I checked, they were the ones who killed Hannah, NOT ME!"

----------- End flashback -----------

I sniffed and rested my head on my knees. That was only one out of the many arguments we had had. They were times when Eric had really spoken to me in what could be classified as real sentences. He was being a big poop head for no reason.

"Hey," someone hissed in my ear.

I screamed, stood up, and whipped around. Brad was crouching right behind where I had been sitting with a smirk on his face. "Something wrong, pumpkin?"

"No, Bradley; everything's just fine and dandy." And with that, I turned and began to climb down.

"You'd think you would be a bit more considerate towards someone who had housed you and taken care of you for the past two months," he called after me.

I whirled around and stomped over to him. I was pleased to see that he recoiled a bit, probably in fear. "Oh he took me in, did he? Took care of me, did he? He's been such a jerk for the past month I'm starting to think I would have liked it better if he'd never found me! All he's done is not talk to me or yell at me, accusing me of things such as my best friend's death! Oh, yeah, it's only been about a month. I'm a girl; I should know."

I turned and began climbing down the tree.

"Man, you stink!" Brad called down after me.

"Well you don't smell so good yourself," I called up to him. When I reached the bottom of the tree, I turned and stomped away in the direction of the hot springs. It was the only safe place that I could think of to get away from the two creeps. I still couldn't see why Eric was being so stupidly mean. Brad had always been like that, so he wasn't bothering me that much. I knew Eric hadn't been that bad today … maybe it was because Brad was there. I didn't know. But man I was getting so annoyed at him. I felt as though I might go insane if he kept this up.

I began to smell the hot springs. Wow; it smelt worse than I remembered. At least here I could be alone.

I finally came to the springs. It looked like a large black boulder. I walked around it until I found the entrance and pushed my way through the vines and into the small space. It looked just as it had before. Like a hot tub with a patio and a waterfall on the rock wall opposite it.

I yanked my shoes and socks off, slipped my clothes off and threw them into the water. "Honestly," I said to myself. "Those two will be the end of my sanity. If Eric doesn't start talking to me, I'm going to go insane, I know I will. And there's that stupid jerk who had to show up yesterday. Gosh, if anything, Brad is just going to –"

But I never got to finish because at that moment, someone said, "You know where Brad is!" I whirled around and saw someone stepping out of the shadows.

The Elfin Child HAHA! Oh my word, I laughed SO hard when you said, "ERIC'S BEING A BUTT!" That wasso funny! HAHA – ouch, my side hurts.

Morning sunrise Nope, sorry, didn't say in the chapter … but I told you anyways. You're so good at weaseling things out of me!

Dumb pixie Um … how, exactly, was that a cliffhanger? And how can you expect me to update EVERY day?

Beautyqueen321 You are the dancing queen, young and sweet, only17, feel the beat from the – haha, sorry. There'll be more romance, but later.

Take a wild guess You have a problem with logging in, don't you, shortandproud? You're odd. Thanks for the happy b-day!

Amandabires haha – no.

Antiope Honey, you're good.