Happy anniversary to this story! I'm so thrilled that it gets to be celebrated with this chapter cause I was so excited to write it.

XIII: Don't Forget to Lather Between Fights With Wilderness 10-in-1

Jason's favourite and least favourite part of the day: supervised and scheduled showers.

He's alone but he's not. All the boys shower at the same time in the same room, but with stalls that are open. They have walls but no doors cause they "can't be trusted in private." They're also being supervised but from the outside so they could keep some form of dignity. Coach was sitting outside reading an old issue of some artillery journal and, literally, eating the advertisements. (Apparently, the ads for protein bars tasted like the snack themselves.)

Leo told Jason that during his first days here, there was a kid who snuck in box cutters to seek revenge on a bully. That day became a literal bloodbath and Leo didn't shower for a week after that accident. Then some kids would try to smoke, hoping that it would blend in with the shower steam. Sometimes, kids would still get away with it.

All the shower stalls are the same: two walls separating them from the people next to them, a dingy shower head that barely has water pressure, crusty tiled floors and walls, and an industrial-sized bottle of Wilderness 10-in-1. Jason didn't ask what was in the Wilderness 10-in-1, but he knew he probably didn't want to know the answer. It was a murky white colour in a bottle with some smudged marker. According to Leo, who gave this information unprompted, it's unscented shampoo, conditioner, and body wash. The other seven are up to the user, which is alarming. He wouldn't be surprised if it was the same concoction the school used to wash the dishes, clean the floors, and ward off wild animals.

He squeezes some Wilderness 10-in-1 in his palm and rubs it into his hair. Considering that he didn't develop any rashes or go bald from using it so far, Jason figures that it's fine. He doesn't exactly feel dirty or clean afterwards so it's good enough.

But so far, the showers have been a no man's land session. Everyone minds their business as they lather in the Wilderness 10-in-1 and take in the steam.

Jason catches the sound of Coach whistling, leafing through the magazine, but then it stops. Coach starts clopping but instead of coming closer to yell at someone for suspicious shower activity, it's growing softer as if he's going away. No more daydreaming. He needs to start paying attention to his surroundings again. Coach has never left his post before so something must have happened somewhere.

Jason peeks out to see where he went. He can't see through the shower steam. Showers still go as if nothing happened but Jason's stomach turns.

Jason turns to check the other side and he's pushed back. He slams against his shower stall's wall, landing hard on the tiled floor. He grunts as the boy in the stall next to him cusses him out. Wilderness 10-in-1 that remains in his hair slides down his forehead. Jason wipes it away before it lands in his eyes. One only makes that mistake once and it leaves their vision blurring for hours after, even with extreme rinsing.

Jason looks up, water from his shower head rinsing him off, and sees Dylan standing above him. Water and Wilderness 10-in-1 drip from his hair as he snarls down at him with narrow eyes.

"If you wanted some 10-in-1, you could've just asked," Jason says.

It was an attempt at a joke that he'll probably never try again since Dylan lunges towards him. Jason slides forwards on the tiled floor, the slippery surfaces work to his advantage. He quickly stands and his gut instinct goes for his pocket but he doesn't have any. He doesn't have any clothes.

Dylan stumbles into Jason's stall. Jason looks at the stall next to him and the kid who cursed him out wraps himself in a towel and exits. Jason pounces ahead, grabbing Dylan and pushing him through the wall, knocking it over and them with it. They hit the ground and some other boys peek out of their stalls not caring since they get back to their showers. Jason rolls off Dylan about to get up again but Dylan isn't there.

It's as if he vanished into thin air.

Jason's immediately on his feet, standing on the wall they knocked over. He rolls his shoulders back and looks around. There's no sight of Dylan but he knows he'll be back. He grabs the shower head and mutes out the neighbouring shower sounds, even turning his own off but keeping the one in his hand running. His breathing steadies with his heart as his eyes trace the shower's steam for Dylan. The steam grows and more water droplets form on Jason's face. It passes his ankles as if swirling by and he makes the mistake of looking down.

Jason's eyes flicker up and he spins around with an elbow jutted out. Bone cracks when he contacts Dylan's face, blood gushing. Some hit Jason but it rinses away with the shower head. Jason grabs Dylan by the hair and pulls him back, looping the shower head's cord around Dylan's neck tightly but not life-threatening. Jason heaves, putting his elbow against Dylan's shoulder despite Dylan attempting to thrash at him. He pushes him against the shower wall, next to the shower's faucet.

"Stand. Down," Jason orders, pressing Dylan against the wall. His voice is so deep and low it scratches against his throat.

Dylan lets out a sound that's the mix of a grunt and a laugh. He points the running showerhead right in Jason's face. Caught off guard, Jason falls back but he ducks when Dylan swings the shower head by the cord that's still around his neck. At another swing, Jason catches it and pulls just to set Dylan off guard.

Both their heads turn when they sees Leo standing in front of them wrapped in a towel and wearing a snorkel while holding a bottle of Wilderness 10-in-1. Jason remembers seeing Leo first walk in with one and says he's learned his lesson from nearly being blinded by Wilderness 10-in-1. Both pause, looking at Leo. Leo's eyes, underneath the fogged goggles, flicker towards Dylan. Jason turns around since he knew Dylan would use this distraction but Leo squirts out the bottle of Wilderness 10-in-1 in their direction, waving his arms.

Jason's eyes immediately burn as he grabs the shower head and points it directly at his face. Nothing is restrained against the cord so Dylan must have escaped and fled to wash out his eyes. Jason flails his arms around, grabbing someone about to finish off the fight.

"I'm friendly!" Leo yells. "I'm friendly."

"Oh," Jason says, putting Leo down. "Sorry."

"He disappeared." Leo passes Jason a towel. "My goggles fogged up and he was just gone."

"Thanks," Jason sighs, "and sorry for all that."

Leo shrugs. "No problem for both. Seems like you had a fun time."

"Yeah," Jason says sarcastically. He hears Coach's clopping returning and he yells at them through a megaphone to hurry up since shower times are almost done. "Did he hear any of that?"

"Beats me."

-o-

Leo and Jason meet up again in the cafeteria where they sit at their table by the trash cans. It was the designated seat for outcasts amongst outcasts, often having trash thrown at them when people claim to have "missed" the cans. Everyone talks about the shower drama since even the girls had a fight in theirs. Jason and Leo wait to hear from Piper but she's nowhere to be seen at the moment. However, given that the lunch of the day was Wilderness School's lukewarm and watery chicken soup, cheese sandwiches with dense bread and plastic cheese slices, and cardboard fries.

"He just came after me," Jason explains to Leo.

"I was in the shower for ten minutes," Leo says, shaking his head. "It may have only been ten minutes but it was the worst ten minutes of my life. I don't want to talk about it again."

"Agreed, but I would like to say that in those ten minutes, there would've been a lot more destruction if it hadn't been for you."

Leo nods, proudly eating one of the cardboard fries since it was the best thing on the menu today … which wasn't saying much. They look up and see Piper approaching them with her lunch tray. When she sits between Jason and Leo, they notice that her hair is still damp from the shower and soaking her shoulders and back, but also a split lip and bruise on her face.

"And I thought we had it bad," Leo mutters.

"Piper…?" Jason says, unsure where to start. They were hearing remarks about the girls' shower fight and, although there wasn't any property damage, it seemed rough since some girls went to the nurse's office afterwards.

"It's fine, it's fine," Piper reassures, looking down at their food.

"Piper."

"We were all in the showers, minding our business as one does. Then a group of them came after me, and pinned me to the shower floor. Some were holding my arms and legs, another had a hand over my mouth and neck so I wouldn't scream. I couldn't even bite her at first. They grabbed my hair in their fists and started hacking at it more with dull scissors. Not the sharpest tools in the shed, those girls, I think the scissors were sharper. Anyways, once one of their grips on my wrist loosened since the shower was still running, I got my hand back, grabbed the scissors, and shanked whoever was in sight."

Leo laughs a bit. "Nice."

Jason blinks. "You - you what?"

"Relax, the scissors were dull. I don't even know if that makes it better or not but it became a literal bloodbath in there."

Jason realizes that's why Coach disappeared. He must have heard that something happened at the girls' end and was called over there, especially if some had to go to the medical sector.

A clique of girls approach Piper with their empty food trays, sneering over them.

"Just remember, Piper," Savannah starts, "it's just hair. It'll grow back."

Piper mocks her grin with closed lips. "Remember, Savannah, it's just a flesh wound. It'll scar."

The girls roll their eyes as they leave, throwing out their trash in the cans and putting their trays on a counter. Piper snorts a laugh. If Piper lost the fight, they would've dumped the trash on her and her friends. Jason can't help but think about Piper being thrown out on the roof by those girls and left there overnight. But, like with the shower, she's come out and has fought back. She can handle it even if she doesn't want to.

"Piper-" Jason starts.

Piper turns to face him. "I heard you nearly strangled Dylan in the shower."

"It was so cool," Leo says as Jason grabs one of the sandpaper-like napkins and wipes at Piper's split lip which starts bleeding again. "Where'd you learn that?"

"Felt natural," Jason says, grinning a little. "Maybe we can have matching scars."

Piper smiles. "Better than sports medicine."

"What's that?" Jason wrinkles his brows.

Piper and Leo glance at each other.

"You don't want to know," they say in sync.

-o-

Turns out, Coach did find out about the shower fiasco because someone ratted them out. Now, they all have an earlier curfew. Jason hasn't seen Dylan since the fight, but he doesn't care. He knows Dylan would want to finish that fight and Jason's more than ready. He doesn't know what he did to piss him off. Jason doesn't even know him except for his name and that he could put up a good fight. Was he someone from his past life? He would've said so, wouldn't he?

Jason changed into his PJs and lies on his bed. He glimpses at the brochure photos they had to take that he taped on his wall.

Jason looks at Piper and she doesn't have a bruise or split lip. Her hair is still chopped unevenly but that's because she made it that way. After word went around about what happened to Piper, he heard that she came to the Wilderness School with long, thick, beautiful hair. Some girls stuck gum in her hair, not just inserting the piece but stretching it out over many locks. Instead of trying to rinse it out and salvage what was left, she just took scissors from the art room and went to town on her hair. That was the hairdo Jason first saw her with and got to know. Seeing her with her new look and the marks made his hands ball into fists. But after hearing how Piper handled it, how she handles everything introspectively and on her toes, making sure she makes it out her way … gods, it makes his heart pound in his chest.

Piper had a point that night on the roof about how he could leave. Nothing can stop him. He could easily walk out that door and run through the woods. But he hasn't because of Leo and Piper. Surely, Leo and Piper could handle themselves. He's shown them so and they've managed to be here before he showed up. Meeting them and being their friend in his weird circumstance has been the most he's belonged anywhere that the feeling itself is foreign. It's unsettlingly comfortable.

He has nobody else.

This chapter also has a Campfire counterpart. You'll get to read what happened to Piper from her perspective (Chapter 46).

As I've (probably) mentioned before, I'll list all the Campfire counterparts at the end.