A few days at the Playa as well as a special? Well, okay, let's see it. Thanks for reviewing, lordgemini.

I did my best to divide my time between all of my friends in the next few days. Often I'd play video games with some of the geekier guys in the morning, mainly so I could hang with Harold. Noah sometimes played, too, and he was a lot more relaxed in his element (he often won), so he was considerably less likely to act like a jerk. He seemed to like me a little more than most of the cast and so we got on around that time. Cody often played with us. He was the best at them. Whenever Noah wasn't there, Cody would win almost every time. I didn't get many wins.

After that, I usually spent an hour or so with Katie and Sadie at the pool bar, chatting. I only managed to get to Bridgette at lunch or dinner, because she spent so much time with Geoff, but at least we talked, and we kept up our morning ten-minute yoga sessions together. Any time left over I spent with Gwen and Leshawna, and often that meant Trent was around, too. We got pretty friendly, since our girlfriends were so close.

And if you're wondering, I got plenty of alone time with Leshawna. We still shared a room, so if we felt like being alone, we could always escape up there. Around the place, we didn't hide our relationship, but we were pretty casual, not like Bridgette and Geoff who spent most of their time making out in the hot tub. We could be almost friends if it wasn't for the fact that we sat close together and occasionally kissed, or had our arms around each other. When we were alone, though, we got to go into hyper-couple mode if we wanted. I didn't want to go too far while we were still there, and Leshawna understood. "Early days, right?" she'd said. "We'll have time for that later down the line." But that didn't mean we couldn't make out. I was still shy about my body and wanted to keep my clothes on for the moment. Even when changing, I was shy about it. Leshawna understood that, too, but she wasn't shy at all about changing. "You don't have to look at me," she said, "But I don't mind if you do. It's not like I have anything you don't."

I did sneak a peek, once or twice, although usually I waited for her to at least have a few things on. That purple bra I'd admired looked far better on than off. She had a pink one, too, but I liked the purple one best.

I don't know if the other couples, sans our blondes, were hooking up as much or going further than we were. Gwen said very little about whether she did any more than kissing and holding hands with Trent. I assumed they were taking things slowly. Courtney spent almost zero time with Duncan outside, but if there was a bet going about which couple was going to round bases first, I would have put money on them. Making out in the hot tub for everyone to see was one thing, but I was pretty sure they were together a lot more when I didn't see them. Owen and Izzy spent a lot of time together, and Owen would stare at her with total adoration in his eyes, but I wasn't sure if anything would come of that. As for Lindsay, she did spend a lot of time with Tyler. Any time she didn't spend with him, she spent with Beth. I guess they both understood how it felt to have a fake friend ordering them around. From the confessionals in the rough cut footage, I knew that Heather had picked out Beth particularly because she thought she'd be desperate for friends, while she'd chosen Lindsay based on her lack of brainpower.

The day before we were meant to go home was when things all started up again. We were all chilling. I was sitting by the pool with Leshawna, Gwen and Trent. We were actually laughing over a smiley face drawn on the back of Heather's stubbly head (she'd given up on the wig for the moment). Leshawna told us she'd done it, and hey, she deserved it. A bunch of the guys were playing Frisbee, Izzy and Owen played Chubby Bubbies and Owen told Izzy she was a marshmallow goddess and that he thought he was in love with her. Meanwhile, Chef was hanging out here too, grilling steaks and partying like the rest of us.

But then, suddenly, everything went quiet. Chef took Owen's giant winning cheque off him, and Chris was walking towards us from the dock, holding a suitcase. "Hello, campers!" he greeted us.

"That's ex-campers to you," Duncan corrected.

"Yeah," added Heather, "Your twisted game is over."

The reason Chris was there was actually to offer a deal. There was a case of a million dollars on the table, if Owen chose so, which Chris would hide and all anyone had to do to get it was to be first on the dock, holding the case. Owen could take that chance, or settle for the hundred grand. If it had been anyone else, I doubt it would have happened.

"Game on, baby! Yeah!" Owen cheered. Chef tore his old cheque in half.

At first, no one except him made a move for the prize. As Leshawna pointed out, Chris could have stuffed the suitcase with bricks. And as Noah put it, "I'd love to play another round of Humiliate The Teens, but I've got a buffet to eat."

"Suit yourselves," Chris shrugged. "I'm sure Owen will be happy to have no competition while he makes the easiest million dollars in reality TV history."

But really, do you think that happened? We could hear Owen cheering and laughing as he ran for the forest. Katie started coughing, and Cody began to whistle, but seconds later, it was a pileup. None of us wanted to miss out on this chance for a million dollars.

Beth was actually the nicest about all of it. She suggested we all team up and split the prize money twenty-two ways, but that didn't happen. Who would want to give up that much of the fortune? Everyone split up into smaller groups instead, and Chris promised to give us hints from the loudspeaker.

First was Courtney, who pulled Duncan out of the body pileup we'd become. "Let's go get that million dollars!" she cried, spinning around before kissing Duncan – hard. "Yes!"

"Looks like someone got their mojo back," Duncan commented.

"Shut up and follow me. We've got a suitcase to find!"

"Sir, yes, sir!"

Harold took a few steps towards them, asking "Can I come too?"

"No!" Courtney snapped, scowling at him. "You'll slow us down!"

Harold looked so crestfallen. I felt absolutely terrible. Harold was my friend, and considering he wouldn't exactly have people lining up to be his partner, despite him being pretty skilled…

"Courtney doesn't know what she's talking about," I commented honestly. "Who won our team the first two challenges, huh? I'll team up with you. I mean, if you want me."

Harold looked up at me, and his face broke out into a real, genuine smile. "Of course I'd want you on my team, Peyton," he said. "I know you think it's supposed to be awkward or something, but we've been through it, and we're still friends. So I'm cool with splitting the prize money with you."

There were lots of other teams. Beth asked Lindsay to team up with her, and they allowed Ezekiel to join them, but Beth made him promise to respect them, remembering his sexist comments on the first day. DJ went with Owen, Tyler and Cody. They were the biggest team. Izzy went with Noah, a strange team-up, but they seemed happy enough together (platonically at least). Katie and Sadie ran after Justin. Geoff and Bridgette went together, and the people I would have been with ordinarily – Gwen, Trent and Leshawna – all went together. Heather was left on her own, at first. She tried to join Beth, Lindsay and Ezekiel at first, but Beth told her assertively, "No thanks, Heather. We have enough people already." And Lindsay just shrugged and wished her good luck. Then she tried Leshawna's group, and they thought it was a total joke. It almost came to blows, but Gwen said they were losing time and pulled Leshawna away. I wouldn't have minded seeing her lay the smackdown on Heather again, but Gwen was probably right to stop it this time.

Heather made one more attempt. She tried Geoff and Bridgette, who were too interested in making out to even hear her. As she walked past us, Harold opened his mouth, but she just said "No!"

"We don't want her, do we?" I whispered to Harold. "Were you going to ask her to join us? She's already called me names for being lesbian."

"She's got strong skills," he whispered back. "And I feel kind of sorry for her."

I was not happy with Harold when he actually did follow Heather and try to convince her we'd both be an asset to her, but I'd decided to stick with him and I still really didn't want to argue, so I resigned to getting stuck with her, too. "Fine," she finally said. "But don't talk to me."

"Thank-" Harold began.

"What did I just say?!" We started walking along, Harold silenced.

I wasn't afraid of standing up to Heather anymore. "You don't want to talk to the only person who'd actually be nice enough to team up with you," I said in a bright tone. "Trust me, letting you work with us wasn't my idea."

"Well, what ideas do you have?" Heather shot back. "Sounds to me like all you do is listen to your girlfriend. Why aren't you with her, anyway?"

"Because Harold's my friend and I wouldn't leave him to your mercy," I replied. "I somehow don't think that was her idea. I also don't think it was her idea to have two people crushing on her. And you know what? If you really want to insult me, can't you come up with something that's true?"

Heather's eyes narrowed. "Oh, you want a true insult? How about what a try-hard you are? Everyone knows hip-hop dancers are stuck-up sluts. You with that poor little shy-girl schtick when you've got pink hair and more makeup than all the other girls put together just proves that you're trying way too hard to pretend you're not that."

I just laughed. "You wanna talk about being stuck-up? The mirror called. Talk about being a slut? I think Trent might know someone other than me kissed him just to break up him and Gwen."

"Just because I actually know how to play this game doesn't mean I'd get with anyone," Heather snapped, sticking her nose in the air. "I don't throw myself at tacky trash like you do."

I was getting sick of this argument, so I just borrowed a quote from the movie I'd found at the playa and added an extra reference. "Oh, just shut up, Heather! Also, you might want to listen, because I know where to find the drain cleaner."

"Ladies, please stop," Harold implored. "We need to work together to find the case."

So Heather and I stopped arguing, but the hate stayed, although I got a lot of satisfaction from the confused look Heather gave me. Clearly she didn't understand the reference to drain cleaner. We walked in silence, me wishing that Harold didn't have such a kind heart. I knew for a fact that he didn't like Heather any more than I did, but he'd still been the only person to offer to team up with her after she'd tried to join three teams and none of them would have her.

The chapter was getting long, so I'm cutting it off here. Now, who predicted I'd stick Peyton with Harold and Heather? They are, admittedly, one of the more interesting team-ups, and they actually had the case for a little while, so that's more than I can say for some teams.

Also, yeah, just referenced Heathers again. Heather Chandler is constantly telling poor Heather Duke to shut up among other mean things, and Chandler is also the one that dies of unwittingly drinking drain cleaner. It's also very likely Heather was based on Kimberly Walker's fantastic performance (RIP Kim, you see the me inside of me – and yeah, just referenced the musical).