Chef's boot camp? Well, at least it lasted a few days and the sports challenge rounds out the fourth week nicely, so let's get this one over with. Thanks for reviewing, Gucci Mane LaFlare, lordgemini and OmniIBIBUltraInstinctGodzilla.

We didn't get a break day for the next challenge. At nine am, Chef called us all to line up at the dock. When we finally got there, he started slashing a whip at anyone who wasn't in proper formation. He went at Duncan's folded arms, DJ not looking forward, Heather's head not being up, and Harold…just because.

I was so intimidated I didn't dare look him in the eye until he was right in front of me, shouting "Eye contact, soldier! How do you expect to do anything if you won't look at anyone?!" I managed to hold his bloodshot gaze for two seconds, at least until he'd moved on to someone else.

Chef explained the challenge was his boot camp. We had to call him Master Chief throughout the challenge. When we were ready to drop out, we had to go and ring a bell at the end of the dock, and the last camper still in by the end won for their team.

Our first task was to hold up a canoe over our heads until someone quit. Everyone was going on about whole easy it was and all, until we'd been holding it (with Chef on top of ours and Chris on the Gophers') for hours. We missed lunchtime.

Actually, on the opposite side from me, guess what Duncan was doing. He managed to take his hands off the canoe without Chef noticing, long enough to use a fishing line to hook Harold's underwear and then wind it up, tearing it. I didn't want to start anything and have Duncan go for me too, but I felt guilty for letting him continue. DJ was leaving Harold alone, but Duncan apparently decided he didn't feel like stopping. Harold had been right – once the bullying started, nothing would make it stop.

It wasn't until the evening when someone finally dropped out. Chef kept telling some war story. "What war were you in, anyway?" Gwen yawned.

"Did I ask you to speak?" Chef barked. "Because I don't remember asking you to speak!"

"Whatever,' Gwen muttered, "He so wasn't in a war." Everyone could hear her, though.

Eventually, the first dropout was Lindsay, complaining that she had no more feeling in her arms. She even had to ring the bell with her head. Oh well, at least we could have dinner.

Actually, the dinner was trash. According to Chef, "When you have war, you take what you can get."

Oh well. I had to forage. I did manage to find an apple with only one bite out of it, so I managed half. I was really that hungry. I mean, most people tried the same as me, but Heather and Courtney took going hungry over it.

We had night training, too. First, Chef made us do some kind of dance to some kind of music that sounded like MJ's early chart-topper about horror movies. Then we had two hours from midnight to write a two-hundred-word essay about how much we loved Chef. Seriously. Anyone who fell asleep or didn't finish by two am would have to go and ring the bell.

I managed to stay awake, and wrote a very detailed essay about how he was so confident, so tough, so decisive. In fact, I wrote that I wished I was more like him – not a total lie. I would have liked to be more confident, tough and less wishy-washy. That was about all I could say that was good, though. I managed to do two hundred words.

Well, Chef didn't even read mine. He read Duncan's – or at least the first part. "I love Master Chief Hatchet," he quoted, "Because he is very very very very very very very…this is just one long sentence with five pages of veries in between!"

"It's two hundred words exactly," Duncan pointed out. "You can count them if you want."

DJ and Trent were both taken out because they fell asleep. Everyone got to finally go to sleep, but at five, everyone still in had to get up to go on an obstacle course. We had to get through it in under two minutes before we could finish, and this is where I fell down.

After five attempts where all I seemed to do was get slower, Chef finally told me to "Go down to the dock and ring the bell." In other words, I was done, and couldn't win for my team. At least I wasn't the first to go, though.

Duncan, who had been making comments all day before and still now, finally pushed Chef too far and got sent to the boathouse for the rest of the day and most of the night.

When everyone, both still in and out, were eating gruel for dinner, Courtney kept looking out the window concernedly. "I'm going to check on him," she announced.

I smiled at her. "You kind of like him, really, don't you?" I felt like I was safe to say this.

"I do not!" Courtney denied hotly. "Not only do I not like him, I can't stand him! He's rude, he's rebellious, and he's totally annoying!...I'm gonna go check on him."

I don't know what happened between them, but that night was awesome. Gophers and Bass alike hung out in the boys' Bass cabin with snacks that Duncan and Courtney had stolen for all of us. Yes, Courtney actually helped! It shocked me, too. But I loved the snacks, so I wasn't going to complain.

I was even able to sit with Gwen and Leshawna without feeling nervous, because Bridgette was with them. It wasn't weird at all, even though I kept catching myself admiring Leshawna. I'm not sure if she noticed, though. She didn't say anything.

"And what was with all those lame war stories?" Gwen was saying, laughing. She was still in. "He is so demented!"

"Girl, these nails were not meant for combat training, know what I'm saying?" Leshawna added, holding out one of her hands, which had this luscious deep purple nail varnish. She'd been kicked out after sinking into the mud on the course.

"Seriously," Bridgette agreed, "If I wanted to join the army, I would have." She hadn't made it any further, either.

"I came here expecting summer camp," I joined in, "Not boot camp. I didn't even have time to redo my makeup and I know I must look like a mess."

Bridgette laughed. "You don't look like a mess. You're pretty without makeup, but I have to admit, this kind of workout is why I don't wear it much."

"I'm lucky to be naturally pale," Gwen said with a smirk. "It means I actually don't need to wear too much to look like this." She had to be wearing some makeup, because she was still chalk white with blue lips to match the streaks in her hair, but that was lucky for her.

Leshawna smiled at me and said "I feel your pain, girl. I'm not awake until I have my face ready." She paused. "But Bridgette's right, you don't need that much. You already look great, especially the hair."

I looked down, blushing. "Um, thanks." I mumbled, hoping like crazy it just looked like I wasn't used to compliments, not because it was from her.

At that moment, Courtney snatched up the last ice-cream sandwich. Bridgette tried to take it off her, saying "Okay, I think you've had enough."

Courtney just giggled and insisted just one more was fine. A second after she'd finished, she burped, and gave a groan. "Yeah…yeah, that one was a mistake." She ran outside to be sick. Duncan followed her, and I watched from the inside, interested to see what was going on.

"So the Princess has a dark side," Duncan commented.

"Okay, that was so gross," Courtney muttered. "But it was like, once I did something bad, it was so much fun I just wanted more!"

"Well, you could always give me that kiss," Duncan suggested. "That would be pretty bad." Oh yeah…I'd forgotten that he'd offered to "let" her kiss him at dinner the night before.

Courtney just laughed and ruffled his mohawk. "You're still not my type."

"Whatever," Duncan shrugged, "Enjoy a peanut butter-less life."

"Thanks! Enjoy prison."

"I will."

"Anything interesting happen?" I heard a whisper next to me. Harold was standing there, also watching out the window. Looking to see him made me almost miss it.

Courtney turned towards Duncan, took his face in her hands and pulled him into a long kiss. Despite her recently puke-filled mouth, he seemed to enjoy it. Maybe it still tasted like ice-cream and brownies. Then, Courtney walked away.

Harold, standing beside me, gasped, and I turned to him properly. "What's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing, Peyton," Harold insisted. "I just got an idea. It's just…why does he get the girl by doing absolutely nothing, when the loveliest girl on the island hasn't even answered my notes?"

I frowned. "Wait. Back up…let's go sit on the dock so no one will hear this." I dragged him out to the dock, and we sat, dangling our feet. "So what I was saying," I said, "You're sending notes to a girl? Because I'm doing the same, but I haven't told her who I am."

Harold's eyes lit up. "It's really notes made of poetry. Haikus, mostly. I haven't told her either, but I thought she might have tried to find out where they came from."

I smiled. "So who's that lucky girl who's getting someone who cares enough about her to write romantic poetry especially for her?"

Harold smiled back. "Who else but the Gophers' queen, Leshawna?"

My mouth dropped open. Of all the girls he could have liked, why did it have to be my crush? "But…" I stammered, "I've been writing notes to her too! Not poems, but things about how much I'd like to be more like her and how pretty and confident she is, and how her fearlessness makes her even more beautiful…"

Harold stared back at me. "Well," he said shakily, "I guess we'll have to leave it up to her. Whenever one of us confesses and everything."

I nodded. "And I'd still like to be friends with you. Let's not fall out over a girl, okay? If she chooses you over me, or doesn't choose either of us, no hard feelings."

The last challenge took place when it was light the next morning. Courtney and Duncan were our only two still in, with Gwen, Heather and Owen on the Gophers. They had to hang upside down on a tree, while Chef described how awful they were going to feel. Halfway through, Duncan fell, looking catatonic.

Bridgette instantly ran to him and checked him over. "It's okay!" she called up to Courtney. "He's all right!"

The others reached up to put their hands on the branches, except for Owen, who couldn't reach. Eventually, the exertion got to his sphincter, and some gas escaped.

"Okay, that's it, I'm done." Heather announced, swinging herself up and landing on the ground on her feet. Of course, Owen fell on her seconds later. That left just the two girls.

Suddenly, Courtney started giggling uncontrollably.
"Stop laughing this instant!" Chef ordered.

"I'm sorry!" Courtney continued giggling. "I can't help it!" This is why we lost. Eventually, she fell.

"I expected more out of you, soldier," Chef told her.

Courtney smiled and said "Master Chief, I just have one thing to say to you."

"And what might that be?"

"You really need to take a chill pill." And with that, Courtney went off into more peals of laughter and high-fived Duncan, before he put his arm around her. I'd never once thought I would ever use the words "Duncan" and "cute" in the same sentence, but seeing him and Courtney together, maybe I could.

Nevertheless, we had lost, and I still voted Duncan that night. He'd been bullying Harold for a while, and it was time it stopped.

And I wrote another note to Leshawna: To my favourite girl,

I don't know if I'll get up the courage to ever tell you how much I like you in person. I wonder if you might guess who I am before that? But would you even want to date someone who's too scared to look you in the eye and say "I really, really like you"? Maybe if I make it further, I will. And I guess I should say something else I know I like about you. How about your wit? Like or dislike someone, I love it that you say what you think without being afraid, and make it funny at the same time. Your personality really highlights your natural beauty. Much love, your most shy admirer.

I added that, just because I knew I was shyer than Harold. Maybe it would help her guess who I was.

I think everyone was shocked at the campfire ceremony. At least, everyone except Harold, who just seemed pleased that he wasn't going. Instead, Courtney was the one who didn't get a marshmallow. No one understood it. Not me, not Duncan, not DJ, not Bridgette. We all watched Courtney be dragged to the Dock of Shame by Chris and Chef, while she was yelling "I do not concede, I do not concede!" She even threatened her attorney on the two.

However, just before the boat started moving off, Duncan ran down the dock. "Courtney, wait!" he called. I didn't think he'd ever called her by name before – he'd been calling her "Princess" ever since the first day. "I made this for you!" He tossed something to her, and the boat began to move.

Courtney caught the little object perfectly. "Okay, this is really weird and creepy, but I love it!" she called back. "I'll never forget you!"

I went straight back to the cabins afterwards, and Bridgette followed me quickly.

"I know she was your friend," I said, "And I didn't like her that much, but I didn't vote for her."

"I know," Bridgette said quietly. "It doesn't add up. I didn't vote for her, either. And Duncan didn't. And she wouldn't have, either. And I think Harold would have voted for Duncan. Who knows?"

"I guess we'll never know." I sighed.

But will Harold confess to Peyton? They are friends, after all.