⌚ 6:18 AM (BECAUSE EL TOOK A FEW MORE MINUTES TO SLEEP IN)

When El finally throws her blanket off herself and gets out of bed, she realizes she's spent eighteen extra minutes in bed and her and Grace's schedule is way off and she might be late for breakfast, then consequently be late for everything else. She nearly gets a heart attack when Grace - who always insists on getting ready first ("I don't want stepping into a puddle full of your leg hair, Elizabeth") - is still fast asleep. Grace is snoring; El wishes she could be sleeping like that right now but she wishes even more to ruin the experience for Grace as well.

El puts her flip-flops on, stretches a bit, clears her throat. "Grace," she hisses. Grace doesn't stop snoring. "Grace," she says louder. Grace doesn't budge. "Grace!" she shrills, having had enough of this. Finally, Grace wakes up and this time, ungracefully so.

She flinches - one could even call it a spasm - then her crusty eyes pop open. Then, because she flinched slash spasmed, Grace nearly falls off top bunk (again) if not only for El holding her flailing body to keep her from falling off.

"Grace," and after three times of saying her name at various volumes, El just sounds done. "Grace Upland, stay still."

"Let me go!" Grace is still flailing. El notices her voice isn't as shrill as it usually is - more like she's in a trance. "Stop! I need - I need to - "

"Grace!" El screams, shifting her hands in the dips of Grace's shoulder and hip to get a better grip on her.

She stops flailing. Grace blinks four times, takes four deep breaths. "Elizabeth," she says slowly, "why are you holding me up to my bunk?"

"How about you get back up to your bunk and then we'll talk," El says. She gives Grace a push and she's relieved to have her weight off her arms. Grace wipes the tears that El didn't even notice at first then gets off the top bunk.

Grace sniffs and checks the time on her phone. "Shit," she mutters. "I'm running late."

"Just you?" El grunts.

"You could've gotten ready before I woke up."

El feels a shiver run down her spine at the harshness in Grace's voice. "You're the one who said - "

Grace sighs as she changes out of her nightgown and into her pink Camp Ashwood tank top and denim shorts. El's eyes nearly pop out of her head then she realizes she's staring so like, ew, she snaps her gaze away. "Look," Grace zips up, "all I'm saying is you should've been rational and just gotten ready before I woke up."

El looks up from the shirt she's sniffing. "And get you all angry? No thanks."

"You're," Grace sprays her deodorant on herself (which makes her smell like strawberries. Do they even make strawberry-scented deodorant?), "scared of me?"

El throws her Overly Large Tee Shirt Reserved Exclusively For Sleeping (trademark pending) on the ground. "No."

Dry shampoo goes in Grace's hair. "You need this." She tosses the can to El. "With that mess on your head, I'm getting scared."

Dry shampoo goes in El's hair. "Thanks for noticing."

"Honey," Grace smears lipgloss on, "it's impossible not to notice."

El switches her flip-flops for her hiking boots and she's done. "Stop pretending, Grace," she spits. "You love me."

Grace is the first out the door, her Prada sneakers squeaking against the hardwood floor and then abruptly padding against the grass. "There's no harm in dreaming, El!"

"Really?" El mutters as she shuts the door behind her. "Your dreams seem harmful as fuck."

⌚ 10:36 AM

"Tug of war, huh?"

El almost punches herself for finding the source of the voice so quickly. Upon having her eyes land on Finn's grinning - as always - face, she turns back to Cabin A. El's managed to steal a rope from the tool shed and gave it to Cabin A to practice with. Now two groups of seven girls are pulling either side of the rope, trying to get to the bandana that El's tied at the center. With yesterday's victory still ringing in Cabin A's ears, for the first time, they're actually practicing so they "can feel the sweet taste of victory again," as Sarah had said. It took all El had not to correct her and that was up to Sarah's bright eyes and to her being ten years old.

"What are you doing here?" El doesn't mean to snap. Well, she does. Kind of.

"The exact same thing you did yesterday." Finn peers into her field of vision.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yeah, you do. You got bored and went to look for me."

El's cold voice cracks. "You...looked for me?" She realizes it cracks and puts it back up immediately. "Gross."

Finn just chuckles before he continues, "you, Mari, and I talked for a bit then you got all abgry and defensive...."

"You were attacking me!" El shrieks. As if on cue, Cabin A stop pulling on the rope and look at El. At Finn. Back at El. Then the giggling and whispering ensues. El's head starts to pound. "And who told you to stop?"

Cabin A makes a show of grunting even louder when tugging the rope.

"Whoa now, El," Finn says, "cool it."

"Don't tell me to cool it, Finnegan!"

Finn takes a deep breath and gives El a long stare. His blue eyes are cool as ice. "So this is how Grace feels."

"You should just - " El's voice falters. "What? What do you mean?"

He gives her a small smile. "You're just pouring all this anger on her. Losing your cool. Screaming. Spitting in her face. Hurting my...her feelings. Damn, she's got it hard, huh? El. Don't you think you should - "

"I've got it hard, too," El interrupts him. (Here she goes again, she knows but she also knows she can't help herself.) "You think I like being mean to her? You think I want to care? You think I want to be this way?"

She notices Finn's taken two steps back. "Aren't you being a little....melodramatic?"

"Melodra - " El stops talking when she hears a collective thud from where Cabin A is. Half of them are sprawled on the ground while the other half have the bandana in their hands. "Do another round!"

"But!" Laura whines.

"No buts!" El barks.

Grudgingly, Cabin A picks the rope back up and does another round.

"So are you like this to everybody or...?"

The way he cowers at El's glare tells her she looks absolutely terrifying. She feels terrifying. "Only when pretty boys slide in and ruin my day - two of my days in a row."

At those words, Finn straightens up and magically gets his grin back. "You think I'm pretty?"

El opens her mouth to object again, tries to fight the blood rushing to her cheeks. As if on cue, another thud comes from Cabin A and now, the other team's won. "Great job, girls!" she says instead. "Let's take ten, shall we?"

Take ten; more like throw the rope across the clearing and explode in another round of whispers and giggles. El takes a deep breath, about to tell them off a second time, but she keeps it in when Finn puts his hand on her shoulder. "El, don't - "

"I'm going you ten seconds to leave," El says without facing him, "before I tie a rope around your dick and hang you on that branch." She paints to a tree branch well above ten feet above the ground.

"Shit, Isaac and Will and Jason and Luke were right; you're really violent."

"Ten!"

"Especially to dicks."

"Nine!"

"What's with you and dicks?"

"Eight!"

"What have dicks ever done to you?"

"Seven. Finn."

"Yes, Elizabeth?" he says.

"Leave. Six."

"I don't know, I kind of want to know how dying by dick hanging feels like."

"Five. Are you sure? I can assure you it's going to be very painful." El doesn't know what's changed in her expression in the past second that makes Finn's eyes widen to the degree that they have, give off a little squeal that sounds slightly like an okay bye and run off.

Immediately, El feels a pang in her chest as she watches him retreat down the narrow path between the mass of trees. Caught between chasing after him and punching herself for wanting to chase after to chase after him, El loses her balance and lands on her ass instead, scattering dirt everywhere.

She tries to get up but gets knocked down again at the sudden influx of concerned pre-teen girls surrounding her. El looks up and expects a myriad of anxious faces looming over her. She's barely even surprised that they're beaming at her, squealing under their breaths. The sight reminds El of her mother - when she barged into El's room, wake her up, forced her into Camp Ashwood. Her mother's beam turns into a frown and then tears and then tears and then sobbing, crying, "El, your dad and - and I had a fight...and I have no clue what's happening...so your dad and I might get a divorce..." Sweat builds up on El's forehead.

"El," Bianca's voice breaks through her mother's. "Earth to El?"

"Hm?" El blinks.

"Are you okay?" Maxine says slowly.

El nods, swiping at the tears running down her cheeks.

Laura and Brittany glance uneasily at each other. "Here," Brittany says and she holds her hand out. Laura does the same.

"Thanks." El takes their hands to hoist herself up. As she runs a hand through the loose hairs from her ponytail, she sighs. "Sorry."

"You sure you're okay?" Laura's eyebrows are drawn together in the cutest way possible. (El can sense Bianca squirming beside her her which takes away a bit of the hopeless-caught-in-between-her-parents-and-Grace El and brings back a bit more of the swaggy-counselor-extraordinaire El.)

"I've been better," El admits, shaking the thought of her mom away (not really). "But I'm fine."

Now, the sudden transformation that goes on on Laura's face amazes El. Her still somehow pristine eyebrows return to their normal positions; the concern in her eyes gets replaced by a teasing glint; her tight frown by a wide smile. She bounces excitedly. "Great!" Laura sings. "Let't talk about Finn."

"Finn?" El replies cautiously at Laura's absolutely joyous expression.

"The way you look at each other is just so!" Tiffany squeaks.

"So...?" El's voice trails off.

"You're like Katniss and Peeta!" Alex says. (El's quite impressed that she's remembered all these girl's names, honestly. When did she actually start caring about them? What's happening? She's turning soft isn't she?)

The mention of the beloved fictional couple starts a train. Each girl has her own fictional coupls she thinks is "totally like Finn and El," including but not limited to: "Ron and Hermione!", "OMG! Kristoff and Anna!", "Elphaba and Fiyero...have any of you actually seen Wicked?", "Aang and Katara!" and not to be outdone, "Troy and Gabriella, no I mean, look at them!"

El picks at an insect bite on her forearm (how did that get there?) to keep her mind from drifting to...him. "You're all delusional."

"You're both so cute though," Tiffany insists. "Constantly playing hard to get and teasing each other and playing around and teasing each other and playing around and you always blush around him I can't. I can't even."

"Hashtag Fel," Sophie says and El cringes. "OTP."

"What's happening?" El mutters to herself.

"Your future, El," Laura says.

"You're one to talk, Mrs. Evans," Bianca sneers. Evan is Zac's last name.

Laura blushes immediately, as usual, jumping to her own defense that "Zac and I kissed one time! No, that doesn't mean anything, Bianca Gutierrez, shut up." And Bianca retaliates with "yeah, right. Kissing. If it doesn't mean anything to you, why not kiss anyone or anything else? Why stop with boys?"

El snorts. It takes her awhile to fathom that Bianca actually said that. Laura wastes no time to scream back - she looks like she's about to pull Bianca's short cropped hair out, but in an endearing way. Does that make sense? Of course it doesn't. Nothing makes any sense when it comes to this camp.

"You and Finn are like my mom and dad, you know." El looks down to see Cassie tugging at her wrist.

"Really?" El puts on a smile despite the mention of parents. "How?"

"You fight a lot," Cassie starts. "And I mean, a lot. But it's okay, because you don't really mean it, You love each other. Like my mom and dad!"

Like my mom and dad! I wish, El thinks bitterly. "Yeah," she fails to swallow the lump that formed in her throat. "That makes it sound a lot better than it is."

"Right, El?" Bianca screeches. "Who's right? Pretty sure I am."

El heaves a heavy sigh. Raises her eyebrows in a way she hopes is convincing enough to be her normal sassy expression. "That's Almighty Counselor El to you, young lady."

⌚ 1:19 PM

"You're not going to give them any moral support?" Will gestures to the patch of grass (and yes, for the umpteenth time, it is positively overgrown grass and nothing else) beside where El's sitting against the trunk of an oak tree.

El nods a sure, sit down to Will. "I'm a pot. You're an African-American kettle."

"Aren't you supposed to be the African-American kettle?"

"I appreciate the political correctness, Will," El says sarcastically. "My skin also says thank you."

"No problem," Will says, sitting beside El.

The next few moments are silent as the two counselors watch their respective cabins play tug-of-war against each other. Cabin A puts up quite a fight - their faces as red and knuckles as white as those of Cabin G. El resists shielding her eyes as ten-year-old Cassie loses her balance, falling over and knocking Michaela off her feet and well, let's just say what happens next is not much different to those viral domino videos on YouTube. Cabin G gets to the bandana, leaving Cabin A to choke on dirt. Lionel blows his whistle. "1-0 to Cabin G! Round two will start in three minutes!"

El looks away in disinterest.

"You know, usually you'd be either screaming encouraging words or insults to your Cabin at this point," Will points out.

"How would you know that?" El doesn't know how her voice suddenly turned so cold and on a day as hot as this.

"If you can recall, Miss Thropp," Will says, his voice not even close to faltering, "I've experienced it firsthand and every Wood counselor is saying so."

El's blood begins to boil at Will's cocky tone. Or, at least it sounds cocky. To her. (It really isn't - just lighthearted teasing if anything). "One mustn't assume, Mr Rodgers. Things don't stay the same." The last sentence comes out through her teeth, leaves a bitter taste in her mouth.

"Formal talk, frowning more than usual, being mean...to me?" Will mutters to himself. Then to El he says, "Something's wrong. What's wrong?"

Too quickly, El replies, "Nothing."

Will can only raise his eyebrow as Lionel blows his whistle again. El, despite herself, snaps her head up (way too fast; why is the back of her head so painful?) and sees that this round, her cabin is triumphant. While cheering, Brittany catches El's eye and gives her a thumbs up. El returns it with a halfhearted smile.

"That's better," Will comments.

"I assume you're talking about me and not about how your cabin ate dirt," El growls.

To her dismay, Will chuckles. "Obviously."

"1-1! Round three in three minutes!" Lionel announces. He looks almost as exhausted as El feels.

"But really," the boy beside El persists, "what's wrong? You're talking to me like I'm Grace."

Why not bring that bitch into the conversation just to make El feel worse? Great idea. El plucks out blades of grass to keep herself quiet. She'd rather not screech the words she's thinking in front of ten to fourteen year-olds.

"El - ?"

"I already told you, nothing's wrong."

She thinks that with the tone of finality in her voice, Will would just shut the hell up but - just like all the other fucking times - she's wrong. "Hey," and then Will's doing that thing again with his hands, rubbing circles on her back, "I want to help."

El eases slightly. El realizes this. She draws her eyebrows together. "How do you do that?"

"Do what?" His fingers are pressing now, tickling her.

"That." El squirms. "That thing."

"What thing?" This is when El knows Will is playing dumb because he's teasing her now - he damn well knows those circles he's rubbing into her back are calming her down and he isn't stopping. That is until, well, Will does stop.

El almost misses it; the keyword being almost. But she's too ecstatic about Cabin A winning the final round of tug-of-war. Which is why Will stops in the first place.

"2-1 to Cabin A! You win, girls!" Lionel says. "Congratulations!"

Cabin A does their usual (well not really usual, since they don't usually win) winner thing or in simpler terms, celebrating by squealing "OMG we won!" over and over and over again. El doesn't join them as she usually (again, the word being very loosely used) does, though. It's probably because she's too taken aback by Cabin G's reaction to their own loss. Very unlike Cabin F (or let's be real, Cabin A) would be acting, the boys are smiling and joining in the celebration and being overall good sports. (And that makes El feel awful. She's a horrible sport.)

"You're not happy," Will notices and El wishes he's just stop noticing. "You're supposed to be happy because you won. You're El. Unless," he snaps his fingers at El's face, "you're not El? What did you do to the real El? Who are you?"

"Shut up, Will," El sighs. "I am happy. I'm just...not showing it."

"As if you haven't made that abundantly clear, Madame Stinkeye."

Before El can retort, Lionel cuts in, his eyes bright but the bags and wrinkles surrounding them, very dark. "Congratulations again, El. What did your old buddy Lionel say? Told you you could win."

El chuckles bitterly. "Except I didn't win. Cabin A did. They were stronger than Cabin G - boys, by the way, Lionel. Girls beat boys in a game that requires brute strength...and they did mix in a little bit of strategy. I didn't do anything! I just sat around all - all sulky! It's a miracle Will's still talking to me, to be honest."

Lionel's still grinning but it's evident he checked out of what El was saying halfway through. "Right! Nice talk El! Yes well, uh...oh! I better go. Cabin B and Cabin G have birdwatching." Then he's off, clutching his clipboard like it's a baby as he walks down a path that cuts between the woods.

"Can you - can you believe him?" El immediately fumes once he's out of earshot.

"Uh, yeah? Why would he lie about Cabin B and Cabin G having birdwatching...?" Fortunately, Will realizes that El is having none of his jokes. "I mean...no. How dare he!"

El rolls her eyes. "You're making fun of me."

He loses his smirk, replaces it with a fond smile. "El, I totally understand how much you hate that Lionel and Isaac and a bunch of other people in camp are sexist. I get that. I love that you're really passionate about it. But you gotta chill sometimes, okay?"

He sounds like he's talking to a dog.

El hates it.

"Okay," she manages stiffly. "Thanks. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to get my cabin ready for dinner." She stalks off, pausing briefly to give Cabin A a come hither or else gesture before continuing down the path Lionel just passed through.

"El!" Will calls. "Tell me if you need any more of those back-rubs. I won't charge you anything."

El rolls her eyes again. She almost laughs. Her head is hurting too much. She doesn't laugh.

⌚ 9:35 PM

El doesn't even bother changing out of her clothes tonight because of a number of reasons. One, she was dirty to begin with so what would be the point? Two, Grace, Louise, Mari and Sky are sitting at the foot of her bed - she is not in the mood for any social interaction whatsoever. Three, this could be because of the massive headache and just recently, the pains in her abdomen that she's developed during dinner. What the hell is in Camp Ashwood's food?

Louise stops mid-sentence to watch El kick off her shoes, peel off her socks and collapse onto her bunk. Instead of continuing, she asks El, "You okay?"

El only grunts in a hopefully okay-sounding tone before shoving her person under the blanket and shutting her eyes.

"What is her problem?" That's Grace's voice.

"She's probably just tired." Mari.

"We're all tired." Grace. Probably rolling her eyes.

"But we all haven't been through Grace Upland's constant torment, am I right?" Louise. Chuckling but suddenly quieting. Grace might be glaring at her.

"No, but have you heard from the Wood counselors? El's pretty cray-cray." Sky. Whispering.

"El's passionate. There's a huge difference." Louise.

El feels that familiar flutter of affection towards the counselor. Or maybe that's the pain in her core Jesus fuck that hurts.

"It's cute that you're defending her." Grace. Sarcastic (when isn't she?). "At least someone is."

"She defends herself all the damn time!" Louise.

"And you're still defending her? How about me, then, Lou?"

"How about you? You mean the one attacking her? What do you have against El, Grace?"

"I have nothing against Elizabeth." Grace. Cold.

"Well! That escalated quickly!" Sky's frantic voice cuts through.

"Yeah!" El hears shuffling - she guesses that's the girls getting up and leaving. "We'll see you, uh, tomorrow, G-grace."

The door shuts. El risks a peek at Grace. The blonde sighs, glances at El (who proceeds to immediately shut her eyes then open them slightly again once she feels Grace's gaze has left her) and pulls off her shirt, getting into the bathroom. After a few minutes, she gets out, sending out a renewed strawberry scent to the cabin. She glances at El again. El shifts a bit to let her hair fall in front of her eyes so she'd be able to open them without Grace suspecting anything. The latter shrugs tiredly, shaking her wet hair out of the towel it was in, slipping out of the towel she was in - oh, okay. El tightly shut her eyes as soon as Grace let go of the towel. Nothing. She saw nothing, thank god.

El only opens her eyes a crack again when Grace has slipped into her standard pink barely-nightgown. When Grace switches off the lights (she doesn't tell El to, for the first time), El's eyes pop open. She clutches her stomach, trying to lessen the wave of pain that passes through.

(What in the actual world is happening to her? Send help.)

______________

a/n: again i must apologize for the absolute shittiness of the chapter i mean it got rlly angsty at the end bc lord jesus im going through so much shit
good thing tho bc those emotions r gonna help in the coming chapters (hint hint yes u should be worried)
dedication to ally bc she read this all and commented and voted at one time like whoa dude hella also super cute banner by amyvevo :))
lets all pray that im gonna get another chapter out by jan 5?? (#pray4julia2k15)
also late merry christmas early happy new year yeah yeah :-)