Piper swept her short black hair out of her face as she finished hauling in the camping equipment into Erica Moore’s (her best friend since the age of 4) brand new green minivan. Her other friends, Alex, Georgina, Henry, Anna and the twins; Jay and Elliot, were singing songs like ‘I found a peanut’ from inside the van, like they used to on school trips. Well, their final summer vacation together before they all go off to college was going to be way better than seeing some sights nobody actually cared about, it would be so jam packed full of fun that they had to do this camping trip on their first day off in order to fit everything in the remaining weeks.
The song ended as Piper squashed her long legs into the back seat next to Georgina, a seemingly quiet redhead girl who was fiddling with the bottom of her plaid blue and white shirt styled with deep blue jeans and brown boots. Piper noted that this girl could seriously look great in any outfit after looking down at her own outfit; long black dungarees, her mum’s old baby pink wellies and brown tshirt. Next to Erica in the front was Henry, a blond mummy’s boy who was on his phone “playing games” yet nobody believed he wasn’t texting his mother. Jay, Elliot and Anna were in the boot seats trying to choose their next song and Alex was on the other side of Georgina, trying to get her to play Pokemon Top Trumps. Erica turned the ignition and Jay and Elliot started singing ‘The Wheels on the Bus’, causing Piper to sigh, smiling. They were on the road.
Piper must have drifted off because she heard her door slide open, but thought nothing on it and kept her eyes closed in the hope she could go back to her dream about fishing with Daniel Craig, however this didn’t last a mere 2 seconds as all 7 of her friends shouted/screamed ‘WAKE UP PIPES!’ in unison. Although she felt a bit miffed, she smiled and told them to bugger off. “Miss Piper Lockett, we’re here you big ding-dong” exclaimed either Jay or Elliot. She opened her eyes, squinting until her eyes adjusted to the extreme sunlight, when she could see the twins showing off their lanky bodies by leaning on either side of the door. Piper unclipped her belt and hopped out of the van, clicking her back in the process. This would be fun.
After spending an hour trying to work out how to put their humungous tent up (Henry thought they wouldn’t need the instructions so didn’t bring them), another hour choosing which compartments they would stay in and setting up their temporary bedrooms, they flopped down on the grass in exhaustion.
They had decided to camp where nobody else would bother them, with no facilities so they could get the ‘Full experience’ as Alex had called it. No electricity meant no phones, tablets, laptops or (To Alex’s horror) DS’s. Luckily, there was a smallish river some had agreed to wash in, but Anna who grew up in a posh in New York, then moved to England in a mansion (Although she refused to call it that), was not impressed and would have none of it, whereas Henry and Piper were trying to get people in it by slipping comments such as ‘the river would cool us down’ and ‘Gosh it’s so hot.. maybe the river is cooler?’ already due the extortionate heat.
Erica’s stomach made an unhappy noise, resulting in her getting the food from the boot of the van. She opened one of the Tesco ‘bag for life’ bags to find her beloved doritos she bought at 6am that morning because she wouldn’t go on the trip without them. Piper was watching, ready to see that face of joy her best friend always had when she has those damn tortillas, but instead she saw Erica’s face fall to a deeply serious glare. She looked at the remaining seven and held up the blue bag of ‘cool original’ crisps.
“What the bloody hell is this?” She asked, leading to the group stopping what they were doing (Alas, even Alex put down his Pokemon cards) to stare bewildered at the tall, 17 year old and her change of mood. Silence.
“I SAID WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS THIS?!” She yelled. Anna looked like she was about to burst into tears. The last time she shrieked like that was at her sister, Millie for ruining her GCSE coursework. Erica tilted the bag so they could see; it had already been opened and not many left were in the share bag. Silence.
“Who did it? Just tell me so I can rip your head off now.” Nobody owned up. The seven others looked around at each other blankly. Piper knew she was safe however, as she had been asleep in the van, and didn’t even stop when sorting out the tent.
“Jay was this you?” everybody turned to look at Jay, who’s jaw had dropped, leaving his mouth open and looking flabbergasted, and then back to Erica.
“You were in the back. You have eaten my food before; Anna’s Christmas party 2014 you stole the jaffa cakes off my plate. I’m so done with you Jay” she remarked before stomping off. The only thing that could be heard was the birds singing rhymes to each other, echoing through the trees. After a few minutes Piper had got bored of the silence, and plucked up the courage to talk to Jay who had a very sour face on.
“Well? Did you?” She tried to use a friendly tone, but it sounded too pushy and accusing and she instantly felt guilty.
Jay shot her a sharp look. “Really? Actually seriously? You too?”
Elliot, protecting his brother although he was also unsure said calmly ‘Just leave it”
Piper looked down and played with the grass between her legs. “I’ll take that as a no then..” she said with a wary tone.
An hour had passed, and nobody had brought the Dorito incident up again and they were playing Monopoly, Piper playing as the dog. Georgina was smothering her 5th coat of sun lotion on when they heard footsteps, and Henry pulled out a knife from the inside of his ‘lucky’ leather jacket (How could he even wear that thing in this heat?), and everybody looked around at him either bewildered or confused. “You never know what might happen!” he mumbled in self-defence. Yet all that came from behind the trees was a battered looking Erica, who said nothing but watching them play monopoly until they gave up and packed it way. Anna and Georgina offered to make dinner with the portable barbeque, and went to set up. The twins decided they wanted to roast marshmallows for desert, and so stomped off in an adventurer-type way to collect suitable wood, while Piper, Alex and Erica collected rocks to make the campfire look nicer as there wasn’t much else to do. Henry was busy taking pictures to show his mum when he got back (Although he did say it was for ‘a project’ he was working on).
Alex asked Erica if she still thinks it was Jay who stole the food, and she gave a dismissive shrug. Alex and Piper looked at each other with wide eyes, as if to send a message telepathically that damn, this girl was not in a good mood.
When the trio got back to ‘HQ’, as Alex called it, their arms were burning from the strain of the piles of tennis ball sized rocks they each held, and as soon as they has released them from their arms a furious Anna stormed over to them.
“The packet of raw onion is gone. Wait, no, not gone. Opened and eaten. The punnet of tomatoes? Opened and eaten. I am so done with this. Did you see Jay? I will personally kill him. Right here.”
Yet another look of amazement and disbelief crossed over their faces.
“You bought a packet of onion? Not just an onion?” Alex asked, confused.
After being told off for not concentrating, Alex asked a much more sensible question; ‘How could he have eaten all of that without Elliot or Anna herself noticing?’ For they were all in the back of the van together. Surely they would have smelt the onion?
“I don’t know but he’s done it. And Elliot would protect him any day.” She cautioned with finality.
Erica, Piper and Alex has made an almost perfect circle with their stones in which the campfire would be placed in, when they heard Georgina curse. Georgina never cursed. Ever. Which is why Henry (back from taking his pictures), Alex, Erica, Anna and Piper ran over to see if she’s okay, to find her holding a bag of half eaten peanuts. Piper looked at the bag and back to Georgina.
“It’s not Jay. Jay is allergic to peanuts. Why did you even bring them?” she asked quietly. Georgina uttered something about not knowing about his allergies. Erica suggested just waiting for the twins to return to ask them about it, which they did.
It didn’t take long for them to come back, but even so Erica, Alex and Anna had come to the conclusion a bear was stealing their food, despite Piper and Henry insisting bears can’t open packets most humans struggle to get into.
Elliot was mid-joke when he saw his friends staring at them both apologetically and with urgency. They dumped the sticks and jogged over to them
“Why the long faces?” asked Elliot, who’s twin was staring at Erica with annoyance and making her feel uncomfortable.
“We have a bear!” exclaimed Anna, who yet again looked like she was going to cry. Piper begged her not to cry (in her head of course), they couldn’t be dealing with a wailing posh girl and friends who thought a bear was after them. She gave a sigh, and denied that there was a bear, and the food going was still a mystery. Anna sniffled and wiped her tears with the sleeve of her chiffon blouse.
“How did you finally come to realise it wasn’t me?” asked Jay curtly.
To everybody’s surprise, Erica spoke up; “Peanuts.” Jay said nothing but subtly nodded his head. Piper was getting tired of silence, it made her think too much, so she went to the minivan to fetch her iPod which still had 96% battery (due to the fact she slept throughout the journey) and portable speakers. She was half in, half out of the vehicle when she heard a rustling noise and a female’s giggle and hit her head on the door turning it to see who it was. She looked back at the others who were all there. It wasn’t one of her friends.
She touched her head to feel the damage; no blood but there was a bump. She rushed back to her friends, not bothering to shut the door
“I HEARD A WOMAN. THERE’S A WOMAN. IN THE TREES, THERE’S A WOMAN!” Her friends looked at her as if she was insane and told her she was imagining it, but Piper ran back into the forest, her friends feeling inclined to follow. Piper ran and ran, refusing to acknowledge the pain in her legs, until she heard a snap of a twig to her left. She darted left and tripped over, but looking up she found a shoe. The same shoe her mum had; a lime green slip-on. She told herself it could be anybody’s but the familiar chuckle ahead said different.
“You have to be kidding me” she whispered to herself. She had no idea where her friends were, but they soon found her and her mum when they heard the angry yell “MMUUUMMM!!!”
Embarrassment glided over her, Erica started laughing, and Mrs Lockett said “Payback for putting a cardboard cut-out of the queen in my shower!”