CHAPTER THIRTEEN

A Declaration of Peace, and Maybe Love

Oliver's Point of View

"Maybe I've been too hard on Lilly. I should at least let her explain," I told myself miserably. I haven't been getting sleep. I zipped my tent open and saw that it was already morning. Lilly was drying her hair. She must have taken a bath already.

She heard me zip my tent open, and turned around. "Oh, Oliver, you're awake," she said in a tone that I can't understand.

"You're wearing a bikini," I pointed out. "In the middle of the woods?"

"I told Sean I'd go swimming in the lake with him," Lilly replied.

"The lake is, like, two feet deep," I told her. "You can't swim there."

"Watch me." With that, Lilly walked away.

I took a bath and changed into board shorts. No way was I going to let Sean ruin my friendship and possibly more than that with Lilly. I walked to the lake. Sean and Lilly were playing around, splashing water at each other. Sean saw me, and he stopped playing. Lilly tapped him on the shoulder, and he pointed to me. Lilly looked at me and raised her eyebrows.

"I'm just...gonna leave," Sean said. He left quickly.

I went closer to Lilly. She crossed her arms and turned away from me, but then she slipped.

"Whoa!" she shrieked.

I helped her up, and she clinged onto me, panting. It took me seconds to realize how close our half-naked bodies were. I tried hard not to let my eyes wander off to Lilly's different body parts. She bit her lip, uncomfortable.

I led her out of the lake. She still didn't look at me or speak to me. "I'm sorry," I told her.

"No, it's okay." Lilly turned away. "I know you were awestruck with the whole thing. I shouldn't have gone out to find you with Sean. He's lost and so is his girlfriend."

"Wait," I said. "You went with Sean just to find me? And he has a girlfriend?"

"Yeah," Lilly replied. "I think his girlfriend's name is Bess, or something."

"Oh, man," I muttered. "Now I really feel bad about getting mad at you."

"No, it's okay," Lilly repeated. We made eye contact and grinned like fools.

"Hey, are you guys okay now?" Sean came up to us.

"Yeah, we're fine now," I replied.

"Have you found your girlfriend yet?" Lilly asked him.

"You mean Bess? No, not yet," Sean said. "I've been planning to break up with her one of these days. She's being a real pain."

"Too bad," Lilly and I said in unison.

"But I did find this cave, a few feet behind my campsite," Sean continued.

"No way, really?" Lilly said. "I've wanted to explore a real live cave for as long as I can remember!"

"Now's the perfect time to do that," I told her. "But wait, let me change clothes first."

"Hey, me too." Lilly went into her tent.

I grabbed my things from my tent and went to my own tent. When I came back out, Lilly was jumping around like a madwoman. I chuckled. "Geez, Lil, you seem really excited."

"How could I not?" Lilly said. "We're going to explore a cave!"

"What if there's...something lurking in there?" I asked her teasingly.

Lilly stopped jumping. "Oh, don't be silly, Oliver," she said, but I noticed that she was somehow a little worried.

"Where's Sean?" I asked.

"He back in his campsite. He's super-excited too." Lilly waved for me to come forward. "So, are you sure that we're okay now?"

"Absolutely." I moved closer to give her a hug.

"But are we kind of, you know, 'together' now?" Lilly used air quotes, which she rarely does.

"Definitely." I kissed her.

"I'm impressed," Lilly said when the kiss was over.

"Huh? Why?" I asked.

"Last time, the kiss lasted fifty-eight seconds," Lilly replied.
"And?"

"Now, it lasted a minute and eleven." Lilly smiled.

"I didn't know I could kiss that long," I told her.

Lilly laughed. "Me neither."

I caught sight of the plaster strips covering her bruises. "Are those okay now?"

"These?" Lilly pointed to both bruises. "Yep, pretty much."

Sean appeared. "Hey, you two lovebirds! Are we going into the cave or what?"

"Coming!" Lilly and I said at once.

We ran toward Sean and he led us to the cave. It was huge, but I don't think it's that frightening. I brought a flashlight, just in case.

"Sure is dark in here," Lilly said, sounding worried.

"Come on, Lilly, everything's going to be fine," I reassured her. I turned on the flashlight and looked around. "Whoa, this is so cool!"

"That's not the best part," Sean said. "There are actually bats around here."

"B-bats?" Lilly stammered.

"Calm down, Lilly, he's only kidding," I reassured her again. I turned to Sean. "You are only kidding, right?"

Sean grinned and nodded. "Right."

We went on walking and walking around the cave. People have come in there, too, and there were drawings and writings on the walls to prove it. Finally, Lilly got tired. "Can't walk anymore..." she said slowly, as if she was a person stranded in the desert. "Must have rest..." She sat down.

Sean and I looked at each other and snickered. I helped Lilly up. "You don't mind if I carry you, do you?"

Lilly shook her head. "Nope," she said. "But are you sure you can manage?"

"Positive." I picked her up and she put one arm around my neck.

We reached a dead end. I put Lilly to her feet and she stretched. Suddenly, we heard a voice.

"But I didn't mean to kiss him!" it said.

"Wait a minute, that sounds like Bess," Sean said.

We heard two other voices. One said, "Oh yeah, and I suppose you don't mean stealing him away from me either!" The other said, "Come on, you know I like her better than you! You're nothing but a backstabber, and to someone who doesn't even know you that well!"

And what's wierd, those voices sound exactly like Miley and Jake's.

(A/N: I guess you guys have really had enough with the false alarms that I've been giving. But is this one the real thing? You can find that out in the next chapter. Thanks, bookwormandpoet, for the greeting. Yeah, I'm really only twelve. I just saw People Who Use People, too, and I really saw the chemistry in Lilly and Oliver there! That has got to be my favorite episode. I had to download the episode in because I'm from the Philippines, so I couldn't see it because they only started airing Hannah Montana last September here, and I can't see it on the Disney Channel website either because they only show it in the United States. I practically jumped for joy when I found out that I can download it. Anyway, enjoy this chapter! Technically, I only made Jake not fight off Bess hard enough so that the story gets deeper and there's conflict. But we all have different opinions here.)

PLEASE READ: I got this new story idea, and it's called Seven Minutes in Heaven, and it's about the game. The people playing it would be Miley, Lilly, Ashley, Amber, Becca, Oliver, Jake, Jackson, Josh and Johnny. I've got some pairings already: Miley/Jake, Loliver, Johnny/Amber (just thought of it...). Tell me what you think I should do with Jackson, Josh, Becca and Ashley. I don't know what would please you guys with those pairings. I was planning to do Becca/Jackson and Josh/Ashley, but maybe you wouldn't dig that. Tell me what you think of it through your reviews! I'll start on the first chapter as soon as I put up this chapter.