The morning of the camping trip was- unsurprisingly- chaos, although I didn't expect anything less. My parents wouldn't stop reiterating how my siblings and I had to look after each other and not talk to strangers and not accept drugs and not get lost. I zoned out pretty much straight away. Unlike Duncan, I didn't need to be regularly reminded to not be a complete idiot.

Obviously I knew their intentions were good but, at the end of the day, we weren't stupid. Or, at least, I wasn't. And it wasn't like we were going across the world. Although based on how they were acting, it was as though we were travelling to some sort of drug riddled festival ground instead of a family run campsite about an hours drive away.

"We'll be back before you even notice we're gone," I told them, cutting my mum off as she went on a tangent about the safety precautions one should practise when in the vicinity of a campfire.

"I sure hope not," my dad chuckled, and I couldn't stop the eyeroll that escaped me.

My backpack had be sitting, ready and waiting, in the living room since I'd got up that morning. It wasn't that I was inordinately organised or anything, I just liked to know I was prepared. Plus, I didn't want to get to the campsite and then realise I'd left behind something important like my toothbrush. Neither of my brothers seemed to share that sentiment, however, and Duncan was still lounging around in his pyjamas, floating about the house like we weren't leaving for our destination in just over an hour. He had his hand deep in a crisp bag when I broached the subject, even though I knew it was probably in vain. 

"Ready to go soon?" I said flatly, vaguely gesturing at his attire. 

He shrugged. "I'm always ready. I'm like an action man."

"What about Quigley? Is he packed?"

Another shrug. "Pretty sure he's been pacing all morning so knowing him he can't decide what socks to wear."

Duncan was clueless and clearly didn't care that he would probably end up making us late. Getting through to him was just a thing that wasn't likely to happen, and so I was about to cut my losses when my gaze caught on the crisp packet again. 

"Where'd you get those?" I asked with a frown. Why he was eating crisps this early in the morning was a question I knew wasn't worth asking. 

"Your bag."

"Duncan!" I exclaimed, "Those were for the trip!" I huffed, making my way to the living room to check on the status of the rest of the snacks I had packed and my brother trailed behind, not seizing his crunching on the stolen goods. 

"Snacks are snacks," he said, his mouth full, "Next you'll be telling me the pretzels are off limits too."

"Well, they are."

Duncan swallowed. "Oh."

I didn't need to see the empty pretzel bags to know they were compromised as well. 

Obviously, it wasn't that important. But a trip wasn't a trip without snacks. And so the second Duncan finished the crisps, I pushed him upstairs and forced him to get dressed. All before insisting he come with me to replenish everything he had eaten. 

So twenty minutes later, we arrived at the supermarket just a short walk from our house. I had promised our parents that we would be as quick as possible, as to not be late when the Baudelaires turned up, ready to go. So we were on borrowed time- which was the only reason I gave my brother a list and told him to meet me by the cashiers once he had got everything. We would need to split up if we wanted to be back home in time. 

I was on savoury snack duty, just because I didn't trust Duncan not to see crisps and decide we needed them all, and so I headed to that aisle immediately. I grabbed the same things I had picked up only a couple of days before, trying my best not to grumble under my breath over having to buy everything again. Honestly, if my brother applied his enthusiasm with eating snacks and chatting up women to something productive like studying, he'd probably be the next Steve Jobs. But alas, his attention was never on the right things. Which was why I wasn't all that surprised to find he wasn't at our designated meeting point when I arrived there, arms full of crisps and pretzels. 

A glance up and down the surrounding aisles didn't help, nor did scouting out the cashiers to see if he had randomly decided to pay before meeting me. I didn't often call my brothers- or anyone really- but I knew there was no hope of Duncan looking at a text while he was so clearly distracted. So I decided to ring him but the call tone went on and on and on until I eventually gave up. He had obviously forgotten his phone or left it on silent, so with no other way of contacting him and our time running out, I begrudgingly headed to the supermarket help desk- my last resort. 

A couple minutes and a slightly weird conversation later, there was a crackle as the intercom was engaged, followed by a sigh from the lady sitting in front of me, microphone to her lips and a piece of paper I'd written on held between her fingers. 

"Attention shoppers," the lady said in a monotone, "Could The Idiot Duncan please come to the customer service desk immediately. That's The Idiot Duncan, thank you."

The lady disengaged and set the microphone down, gazing at me through her half moon glasses with a look that told me this definitely wasn't the first time she had been asked to say something slightly untoward over the store speakers. 

"Is that really his full name?" She asked. "Legally?"

I nodded, a fake look of pity on my face. "Yep. Unfortunate, isn't it?" 

I had to wait a little bit longer before I saw Duncan's scowling face approaching. I tapped my empty wrist as if there was a watch there, telling him to hurry up. But he kept his pace- and his annoyed expression- until he got to me. Then, he pulled a gigantic water pistol from behind his back.

"Look what I found!" He exclaimed in place of an explanation as to where he had been. "Can we get it?"

*

Later, we arrived at the campsite, bags and supplies in hand. Mr and Mrs Baudelaire had dropped us all off, mostly because Sunny insisted she wanted to come along for the drive, even if she wasn't staying overnight with the rest of us. Now we were waiting by the public pool, where there was an array of loungers, picnic tables and benches where we could put our stuff down and rest until our accommodation was ready. What Klaus and I hadn't realised when we booked it was that check in was from 2pm, and so we had a bit of time to wait until we could see where we would be sleeping for the next two nights. 

Klaus had already spoken to the people at the front desk, to see if there was any way of us getting them quicker, but it seemed they had a set schedule when cleaners would go in, and so there wasn't a way to bring our check in forward. I had checked to see if there was somewhere we could leave our belongings so we could at least start using the camp's facilities without having to leave our things unattended, but there wasn't one, so the only thing we could do was sit tight and try to keep everyone's spirits up. 

About twenty minutes later, a lady came out and gestured for Klaus to come in and look at something. He caught my eye and we went in together. And I, for one, was just hoping it would be good news.

"Okay," the lady said, sitting back down behind her desk and turning her computer screen around so we could see a map of the whole park, tents and facilities included, "these were the three tents you booked which, as you know haven't been prepared yet. However, I've just had a look and we've got three other tents just on the other side of the park," she said, using her pen to point on the screen, "which are all ready to go. They're slightly different to the ones you picked originally, and they're a bit of a further walk from the pool but I assure you they are just as nice. Would you like to swap?"

Klaus glanced at me, but we didn't need to discuss anything. We both knew what the right decision was.

"Yes please," Klaus said, "That would be great."

"Perfect," the lady said with a smile, "I'll take you over there now."

We gathered the rest of our party and then followed the lady through the park. It was lucky that we could just be given new accommodation instead of waiting for our original ones to be ready, especially given it had been our own mistake for not reading the website properly and arriving too early. But I couldn't help but wonder if it was all too good to be true. After all, things tended to go wrong when it came to us. 

I just hoped we would have a good time either way. And that bringing Quigley and Violet to a new location might help them realise their feelings for one another. 

A/N: 

Hey lol, for some reason this took me forever to write. I think I've been really distracted lately, there's lots of stressful things happening right now, both in the world and in my life as well. But I hope this chapter was alright and doesn't come across too bitty, considering I wrote it over a lot of different sessions. 

Thank you for being patient with the chapters in this story ❤