Canoe trip, Boney Island. The reason Peyton doesn't notice Beth misses the curse warning, by the way, is because she's already focused on her team, so she's not going to see that one of the quieter Gophers is missing. Thanks for reviewing, OmniIBIBUltraInstinctGodzilla and lordgemini.

Before the challenge the next day, I was putting on concealer when Bridgette came in. She climbed up to get something from her bunk, and then started pulling her covers back. She held something up, and I saw her grimace.
"What's up?" I asked, adding eyeliner.

Bridgette smiled without humour. "Just look."

She was holding a little heart-shaped bowl with two pictures pasted together that clearly were taken on the island. One of them was of her, and the other was of a certain guy. And the only one with a camera in our team was…

"Geoff," I said straight out.

"I guess this counts as the latest stupid thing he's done," Bridgette said straight out. "Look what he's put at the back."

I giggled when I saw the inscription: I hope that you think of me whenever you drop loose change into this.

"It's kind of sweet, though, isn't it?" I said. "Corny, but sweet."

"But it makes me rethink whether I want to give him a chance," Bridgette confessed. "I mean, how am I supposed to tell a guy that it's nice that he likes me but that this was the worst possible thing he could have done to show it?"

Katie was in the cabin at the time, but she showed absolutely no interest in the heart-shaped bowl, or our conversation. It was getting really concerning. So when, less than an hour later, Chris announced we had a canoe trip as our challenge, I grabbed Katie as my canoe partner immediately, deciding she might need me.

There was more to the challenge than canoeing, of course. We had to go to a place called Boney Island across the lake, then carry our canoes across the island to a beach, where we'd create a campfire, and then paddle back, with the first team back at camp being the winners. Oh, and if we took anything away from the island, we'd be cursed until the object was returned. Well, Chris said forever, and I said "Are you sure about forever?"

"Well, or until whatever you took is put back on the island," Chris shrugged. "Now, get into your canoes and let's have some fun!"

The rest of our teammates paired up. Since I'd gone with Katie, DJ went with Geoff and Harold ended up getting Duncan after Bridgette asked Courtney to be her partner. Meanwhile on the Gophers, Cody grabbed Gwen while Lindsay pulled Trent off, although both looked at each other. Clearly they wanted to be partners, but Cody and Lindsay got to them first. Beth happily went with Leshawna, so Heather got stuck with Owen – well, Owen got stuck with Heather, more like, but he didn't seem to mind too much. In fact, as they got into the water, he called out "If this canoe's a-rocking, don't come a-knocking!" I think he minded more when he saw Heather taking aim with her paddle. Poor guy – there was no way he was getting that kind of action. At least, not with someone like Heather. Why were the mean girls always the hottest?

"So, what's up?" I asked, once we set off.

"Nothing," Katie mumbled. "I'm just feeling sad right now."

"Any reason?" I kept probing.

Katie gave a sigh. "I miss Sadie," she said in a trembly voice. "I know I said I'd go on for both of us, but…I don't know if I can stand any more time away from her."

I tried to continue sounding sympathetic. "So, what are you going to do?"

Katie sighed again. "I didn't want to do this, but…can I ask you to do something for me?"

I frowned, out of her sight. "What?"

"Next time we lose, can you vote me off – and ask everyone else to do the same? I mean, I'll ask too, but it might help if you ask them with me. We don't have to throw a challenge – I'll keep going if I have to – but I don't think I can really be happy if I can't be with Sadie for much longer. We've never been apart for so long since we met, and it's great to have you as my friend here, but…it's not like having my BFFFL with me. I keep thinking about her and I feel like I just know she's miserable and missing me, too."

I sighed too. "Well, I'll miss you, but if that's what you really want…well, I'll do it." As I spoke, I noticed mist forming around our canoe. As we paddled further, we saw Boney Island. It was small, not too far to race, but it looked forbidding with a skull-shaped rock at the front. I think everyone was just as unnerved as I was.

Still, we had to walk our canoes across the island. I heard later that the Gophers ran into a few native creatures, but we were lucky enough to miss those. Eventually, we came to a fork in the path.

"Which way are we gonna go?"

"Left," Courtney suggested, almost overbalancing with her part of the canoe. "Definitely left."

"I don't know…" Geoff said. "I think we should take the one on the right."

"The right trail is wider." Bridgette agreed. But when Geoff grinned at her, she responded with "What are you looking at?"

Poor Geoff. Hopefully that was giving him the message that the gift was not appreciated, but not the idea that she would never be interested, no matter what he did.

Either way, we went right. But halfway there, Geoff suddenly let out a cry and dropped to the ground. "My leg!" he groaned. "I'm down! I'm down! Oh, it's so unfair! Why did this have to happen now? Why, why?!"

And Bridgette was the first to run to him.

"You've gotta go on without me," Geoff said in barely above a whisper.

Courtney actually tried to take him up on that offer, but DJ caught her arm. "We're not leaving any man behind," he told her sternly. "Not on my watch."

Geoff just had a splinter, but it seemed like it was really, really painful and we couldn't get it out until we got back to camp. So DJ actually had to carry the canoe on his own, while Geoff rode on top of it. By the time we got to the beach, the Gophers had just arrived and were trying to get their fire started.

Well, we had a little advantage. Once we'd gathered at least some firewood, Duncan pulled out his lighter. There was no rule against using one. So our fire was starting before the Gophers even had a flame. However, we still needed more wood, and Harold had the bright idea to throw our paddles onto the fire. Before anyone could rescue them, they were already disintegrating.

"How are we supposed to get home now?" Bridgette demanded.

I would wager that Harold was the only reason we lost. We all agreed to have one partner from each team push their canoe and swim back. It wasn't actually too far. But it wasn't easy, kicking like crazy while hanging onto the canoe, and Katie just spent the whole time sitting there, not even trying to paddle with her hands. The only good thing was that DJ actually had the courage to swim across the lake, pushing Geoff and his canoe. But four people pushing canoes with people in them weren't as good as the Gopher's eight paddles.

This is why I went around telling everyone that Katie had told me to ask everyone to vote her off. The girls were easy to convince, especially as Katie told them herself that she wanted to go home, and besides, even though Harold had screwed up today, he'd won us our first two challenges. Who knew when he might be useful again? I wasn't sure if Courtney was totally convinced by our case, but she said she'd think about it.

I made the case to Harold that the stunt he pulled with the paddles put him in a major danger zone. "That's why you need to vote for Katie," I explained. "It's the only vote we can convince people of, because she actually wants to go home. If you vote, we've got five, because she's voting for herself."

DJ also listened to me and agreed to vote for Katie easily. "Poor girl. I mean, if she wants to go home, we shouldn't force her to stay."

"Will you talk to Geoff and Duncan for me as well?" I asked anxiously. "I would, but I don't know them as well as you do, and you know what I'm like." Shy and stupid about talking to people who try to scare you on purpose, even if you know beforehand because they told you they would.

Either way, Katie didn't get a marshmallow. She gave a wan smile, and then gave me a hug. "Walk me down?"

I looked at Chris to see if I was allowed. He gave a sigh, but said "Okay. Strong friendships do raise the ratings sometimes."

The Boat of Losers arrived just as we reached the dock. Just as we stepped onto it, a high-pitched squeal started coming from the boat. Katie looked up, and she suddenly started squeeing even louder. She ran to the boat and almost knocked her friend over with a hug.

At the joy of seeing Sadie again, Katie seemed to have forgotten me entirely. The Boat of Losers started moving off before they realized I was still there. Even so, I waved to them. "Bye, guys!" I called out. I think I saw them return my wave, but I can't be sure.

Bridgette accidentally broke her heart-shaped bowl that night. "Have any glue?" she asked us.

"I wouldn't waste my time trying to fix that," Courtney scoffed.

"I thought you didn't like it," I said, confused.

Bridgette smiled and picked up the pieces. "Maybe I do," she said softly.

I suddenly smiled. "Was Geoff a good patient while you removed the splinter or something?"

Bridgette giggled. "He was smiling like a little puppy the whole time. I couldn't stay mad. I mean, I wasn't really mad at him, just embarrassed, but…you know what he said afterwards? That I would make a really amazing doctor, or nurse. I mean, that actually was a straight compliment that worked. He didn't even say it was just because I would look good in a nurse uniform or anything. That would've turned me off immediately – just that I gave him good First Aid."

"Well, if you don't mind me saying," I said, "Don't take this the wrong way, but you would look good in a lab coat." We all started giggling.

This is the reason I put a lot of emphasis on the Katie/Peyton friendship early on. They're both very girly. And I think I can safely say that the BFFFL who stayed longer had more relevance this time around. I've always wanted to try writing Katie alone, so that was a good opportunity.