Every day was an adventure at Camp Wawanakwa. Bridgette's scream in the morning proved that.
At that time, Courtney was finishing getting ready in the communal bathroom. When she realized that the scream was coming from the Killer Bass cabin, she rushed inside to find Bridgette all alone.
"What the hell happened," Courtney cried out in between pants.
Bridgette opened her mouth but quickly closed it and hid something under her covers when the door opened again. Courtney turned around to see Duncan at the doorway with an ax.
"Is it a bug," asked Duncan with an excited twinkle in his eye. "My ax has been dying for some action."
Courtney rolled her eyes and turned back to Bridgette. Bridgette just shook her head and whispered, "I'll tell you later" before walking out of the cabin.
Duncan just stayed in the doorway staring at Courtney. "Well, are there?"
Courtney didn't answer. Instead, she just stared at the bump in Bridgette's covers.
"Just pull up the covers," Duncan said as he walked up to her. "I know you're curious."
"That would mean invading her privacy," Courtney chided back.
Duncan rolled his eyes and pulled back the covers before Courtney could say anything else. It was a piggy bank. A really, really, really ugly one.
Courtney gasped in horror as Duncan laughed.
"So that's what he was making during arts and crafts!"
Courtney stood outside with her teammates trying to focus on Chris's instructions for the day's challenge. However, her mind kept wandering back to Geoff's... craft.
It was tacky. It was cringe. And yet... A wave of sadness (and perhaps jealousy?) overtook her.
She looked in the corner of her eyes at Bridgette, who stood there with a frown on her face. Courtney didn't pay much attention to Bridgette's relationship with Geoff, but from what Bridgette had told her and what Courtney had witnessed, it wasn't progressing.
At least, that's what she initially thought.
Now, the craft changed everything.
Geoff and Bridgette were nowhere close to being a serious couple, and yet, Geoff gifted her a craft. A craft with a (bad) photo of the two of them together. A craft that was meant to last beyond the show.
They've only been on this island for a week, and Geoff was already thinking about his relationship with Bridgette beyond the island.
If I went home yesterday, is there anyone who would've wanted to stay in touch with me?
Courtney snapped out of her thoughts when she heard Duncan groan next to her.
She'd like to think that Duncan would want whatever they have to last beyond this show. After all, he was the sole reason why she was still in the competition.
However, if she were honest with herself, she knew that when this show ended, they both would go back into their daily routine. Duncan would go back to hanging out with people who were probably more interesting than she'd ever been.
And she would go back to an empty home.
One gunshot and dead bird later, Courtney found herself paddling a canoe with a stressed-out Bridgette. Courtney kept trying to ask Bridgette what was going on, but Bridgette refused to answer until she was sure they were away from everyone.
"Oh my gosh, Courtney," Bridgette said. "It was so bad. I come back from brushing my teeth and I notice something bulging under my covers. When I lifted them, there it was."
"No," Courtney said back a little too eagerly trying to hide her jealousy.
"Yes," Bridgette shouted back not noticing. "It gets worse. Etched into the back was an inscription that said 'I hope you think of me whenever you drop loose change into this.'" She gagged.
Courtney didn't say anything back. She knew there was nothing she could say that would save her opinion of Geoff.
"Well," Courtney said slowly. "There are still six other guys you can try for."
They watched as Gwen and Cody rowed passed them. Cody was faceplanted in his canoe while Gwen continued rowing.
"...There are still five other guys you can try for."
Courtney looked around at the rest of the available men. Trent was sneaking looks at Gwen, Duncan winked at her, Harold was choking on... nothing, Owen was making eyes at Izzy, and DJ was counseling a depressed Geoff.
"...On second thought, you're screwed."
Courtney's arms were already sore from paddling the canoe. Being forced to carry her canoe was overkill. Bridgette didn't seem to be faring any better as her arms shook as she ran.
Still, Courtney knew it could've been worse. If she learned anything about this show, it's that their lives were expendable to producers. At least they weren't trying to kill them off with meat-eating rodents.
It also gave her a lot of time to think. To think about whether Duncan saving her yesterday meant anything. To think about exactly what she meant to him.
She was such an idiot. Yesterday, she spent the whole time trying to figure out whether Duncan liked her back, and while at times he seemed he did, Courtney now wondered if he was just doing it because he considered them friends.
After all, Duncan didn't give her anything to show he thought about their relationship off the island. Geoff did for Bridgette. Maybe she was making a fool of herself by throwing herself at Duncan. He never explicitly said he liked her. She had to initiate the hand holding. She's the one who told him she was glad she met him.
What has he done?
"Which way are we gonna go," DJ asked from up ahead.
Courtney took a quick look at their paths thankful for the distraction. She didn't notice anything different between the two and the left path looked closer. "Left," she said while lifting her hand off of the canoe. "Definitely left."
Big mistake. The canoe hit her on the head.
"I don't know," disagreed Geoff. "I think we should take the one on the right."
She glared at him. She was not in a mood to argue with a guy who didn't know what "portage" meant.
Her anger quickly evaporated when Bridgette reasoned the right side was wider.
Geoff smiled at Bridgette.
"What are you looking at," Bridgette asked while glaring.
The girls then continued walking passed DJ and Geoff. Courtney looked over at Geoff and shook her head.
Poor guy. He has no chance now.
A half a mile later, Geoff let out a loud groan and fell to the ground.
"Ahh! My leg," he complained. "I'm down! I'm down! Oh, it's so unfair! Why did this have to happen now? Oh! Why? Why?!"
Courtney scoffed. She knew there was no way anyone would believe this act. He was overacting. He literally tripped over nothing. He-
"Geoff," Bridgette yelled out while letting go of the canoe and running over to him.
Bridgette's sudden departure caused Courtney to lose her grip on the canoe. She closed her eyes waiting for the impact, but it never came. When she opened her eyes, she saw that Duncan had come to help her put down the canoe.
He smiled at her, but she didn't return it.
"What about your canoe," she asked bluntly.
He scoffed. "I think Harold and Sadie can handle it."
She looked over at Harold and Sadie who were easily holding up their canoe on their own without Duncan's help. She shook her head.
"I should've known," she said in a judgemental tone. "You picked them so that you could do the least amount of work as possible."
He smirked. Her tone didn't phase him in the slightest. "You're just mad that you didn't think to do it first."
She glared at him. "I would never have someone else do my work for me."
"You should try it sometime. Live the good life."
She continued to glare at him but stopped when she heard Geoff groan again. She glanced over at Geoff before rolling her eyes.
"He's totally faking it," stated Courtney.
Duncan watched as Geoff smiled when Bridgette was next to him. "No doubt."
Duncan was about to say something snarky when he noticed that Courtney was staring at Bridgette with... envy?
"What's going on with you, Princess," asked Duncan.
Courtney's head snapped back to him. "Nothing. Except that we're all just standing here watching Geoff when we should be trying to win this challenge."
She turned to walk away but was stopped by DJ.
"We're not leaving any man behind," shouted DJ. "Not on my watch!"
Courtney scoffed. "Except for Sadie and Katie." The rest of the team looked at her. She shrugged. "I'm just stating facts." She looked over at Sadie. "No offense."
Sadie waved her hand dismissively. "Water under the bridge."
Courtney glared at Geoff as he was carried on top of a canoe. She looked closely at his injury. It was a splinter. Geoff was making their challenge harder due to a splinter.
She wanted to pull the damn thing out of his leg to stop this ridiculousness, but she saw DJ watching her closely. She rolled her eyes. Fine, she'll back off.
Geoff better hopes we win.
Once they reached the other team, they went straight to work. Aka they looked at Duncan, who just looked bored.
"What makes you think that I have anything that could help," he asked.
"So," asked Harold. "You don't have anything?"
He rolled his eyes but reluctantly took his lighter out of his pocket. Harold reached over to grab it when Duncan closed his fingers over it. "No way in hell."
Courtney rolled her eyes and snatched the lighter out of his hand when his grip loosened. "Enough with your 'no sharing' attitude. We have a fire to start." She tried to start the flame but couldn't ignite the lighter.
After a few minutes, Duncan grabbed the lighter back. "Hey, hey. You're going to ruin my favorite lighter." He then easily ignited a flame. "I guess CITs are useless for fires."
Courtney just glared back.
"Bridgette," she heard DJ call out. "You've got first aid training, right? Maybe you could check out Geoff's wounds. He might have gangrene."
"Or jungle rot," added Geoff.
"Or athlete's foot," added DJ.
Courtney sighed. She'd like to think that Bridgette was smart enough to see through this act but frowned when she saw Bridgette going towards him.
By the time the Killer Bass came back to the camp, Courtney had a headache. If Geoff's fake injury wasn't enough of a disaster, Harold decided to be an idiot and throw all of their paddles into the fire. Both of them were lucky that DJ was able to get over his fear of water.
Still, she couldn't celebrate with her teammates. Geoff's gift to Bridgette was still on her mind.
She hated feeling jealous. She wanted to be happy for Bridgette, but she couldn't turn off the voice in her head questioning Duncan's feelings for her. She rubbed her temples.
"Don't tell me your concussion got worse from the canoe hitting you," she heard Duncan say behind her.
She started walking a little faster. She did not want to see him right now.
Unfortunately for her, Duncan caught her. "Don't be mad at Geoff. He was just trying to get some time with Bridgette."
"I'm not mad at Geoff," she snapped harsher than she intended.
He raised his hands as if admitting defeat, and the two continued to walk together in silence. It felt awkward.
"What is your issue," he asked finally breaking the silence. "You've been acting weird this whole challenge."
She stopped suddenly and looked up at Duncan in the eyes. "You. You're my problem."
She pushed him away and ran towards the cabin trying to ignore her guilt.
Courtney was in sixth grade and had just performed her first middle school orchestra concert.
She had practiced overtime for this moment, which earned her the first chair. Her fellow classmates were less interested in taking orchestra seriously and had just signed up for it as an extra elective or because their friends were in it. While she wasn't interested in her classmates' gossip or their stupid pranks, she was friendly with them, and they seemed to like her back.
At the end of the concert, Courtney walked out with her parents when she heard one of her fellow violinists call out her name.
"Hey," said Vanessa. "A bunch of us are going down to get ice cream. You wanna come?"
Just as Courtney was about to say yes, she felt her father's hand grip her shoulder tightly. She looked up to give him a quizzical look.
"You have speech class tomorrow," her father reminded her. "So you have to wake up earlier to practice your violin."
She wanted to argue back that she should be able to skip one practice, especially when it was the day after the recital, but her father's face told her she wasn't going to win that argument.
She let out a deep breath. "Sorry," she said apologetically to Vanessa. "Maybe next time. I have to practice."
Vanessa nodded before running back to a group of their classmates.
When Courtney turned around, she heard a classmate say, "I told her she'd be practicing. Girl doesn't know how to relax."
She pinched her arm hard and blinked back her tears. She hated that she'd never get to experience a normal teenage life.
Courtney's hand shook as she tried to reapply her lipstick. An hour had passed since her conversation with Duncan, and the guilt was eating her alive.
She knew that she was being unfair. It wasn't Geoff, Bridgette, or Duncan's fault. She was always jealous of others. She never got to experience the things her classmates had: parties... boyfriends... staying out late at night...
It was a lot to ask, but she had hoped that joining this show would help her to catch up on what she missed out on. It's only been a week, but Bridgette had gotten what Courtney wished for.
That doesn't mean my time won't come.
She looked out the window near her bunk. The sun was starting to head down. If she wanted to apologize to Duncan, she'd have to do it soon.
She jumped off of her bunk when she heard the sound of glass break. When she looked, she saw that Bridgette had dropped Geoff's craft.
Bridgette gave Courtney a nervous smile. "Have any glue?"
Sadie's head peaked out from under the covers. "I think Katie left some of her art supplies behind. I'll go check."
Courtney stared at the broken craft in Bridgette's hand and couldn't help but laugh. After all, the gift was really bad. "I wouldn't waste my time trying to fix that."
"Maybe I would," replied Bridgette with a hand on her hip.
"...Why do I feel like this I means we?"
"I found three glue bottles," Sadie shouted excitedly from the top bunk.
Bridgette smiled at Sadie before giving Courtney a look.
Courtney rolled her eyes. "Fine," she relented as she took a bottle from Sadie.
Geoff's craft couldn't be that complicated, right?
Four hours and three glue bottles later, Courtney was ready to smash the damn craft into pieces. Well, more pieces.
Geoff's craft turned out to be more complicated than the girls had originally thought. No matter how hard they tried, the glass pieces wouldn't fit together, there somehow was always a missing frame piece, and the macaroni would just. not. stay. put.
Courtney dramatically waved an empty bottle of glue in Bridgette's face.
"I don't think it's that bad," Sadie said nervously.
An hour ago, Sadie had given up on the glue and tried to use clear tape. The results were devastating.
Surprisingly, Bridgette just smiled at the result. She stood up and put the craft on her nightstand.
Great. Now, we all have to see it every day.
"Thanks, guys," Bridgette said sincerely. "Seriously, I owe you one."
"I'm holding you to that," replied Courtney.
After fixing Bridgette's present, Sadie and Bridgette had both fallen into a slumber. Courtney, on the other hand, couldn't sleep.
She still felt bad about the way she spoke to Duncan, but there was nothing she could do about it right now. It was 1 am, and she seriously doubted Duncan would appreciate being woken up just to relieve her of guilt.
Maybe some fresh air would help.
Courtney settled on the steps just as she had when Harold's snoring became too much. She hardly did it nowadays. Somehow, over time the Killer Bass had gotten used to Harold's snoring. Even Duncan, the biggest complainer of Harold's snoring, barely mentioned it anymore.
She looked up at the stars awed at the fact that she could even see them. This would never happen back at home. No, the city life and the pollution had long covered such beauty. It's just one of the things she'd miss once she left the island.
She heard a door open and quickly turned around. Her shoulders tensed when she realized it was Duncan.
He must've noticed her discomfort because he moved to go inside again when she shouted, "No wait!"
Shocked at her outburst, he quickly released the door and ran up to Courtney covering her mouth with his hand. "Are you trying to wake up the whole island?" He then slowly released his hand.
"Sorry," she said sheepishly. "It's just... I thought about what I said to you today, and you really didn't deserve that so I'm sorry."
His confused face relaxed into a smirk. "Do my ears deceive me or is Princess actually apologizing to a criminal?"
She let out a deep breath. He wasn't angry at her. "Don't be an ass about it," she replied. "This is the last time you'll ever hear an apology from me."
"We'll see about that," he teased. He then became serious. "So why were you acting so weird today?"
Courtney chewed her bottom lip trying to find the right words to say. "Do you ever think about what happens when we're off the island?"
He shrugged. "We go back home."
"Well yeah," she said slowly. "But what happens when we're home? Do we go on day to day as if this show never happened? Do we keep in touch with everyone and slowly drift apart? Or do we potentially become part of each other's lives forever?"
He shook his head. "I swear... Do you have to always plan for the future? Can't you just live in the moment?"
"That really didn't answer my question."
Duncan sighed before looking at her. "You need to stop worrying about the future. There are a million different things that could happen, and honestly, I don't want to think about them. Right now, I just want to enjoy the present. The future, we can just figure out when the time comes."
Courtney gave him a skeptical look.
"All I'm saying," continued Duncan. "Is to just enjoy the time you have now with the people on this island. Don't waste these moments stressing yourself out with the unknown."
She slowly nodded her head. She wasn't sure if she agreed with his philosophy, but she did know that she was tired as hell of trying to figure out her future.
"Come, look at the stars with me," said Duncan patting the space next to him. He pointed up at one of the stars. "See that one? That's actually the first planet where they discovered aliens. The astronauts wanted to report their findings to the public, but the government decided they didn't want to alarm the public. Instead, every three years, an astronaut is sent there to learn more about the planet and the aliens' culture. Maybe one day, they'd be published in our history books."
Courtney gave him a weird look before laughing. "You're so full of shit. That star is part of the big dipper-"
"Please, no commentary from the audience."
She shook her head but let him continue with his ridiculous stories. It was the first time that day she felt truly relaxed.
