It's Only a Matter of Time

Chapter 20

Snowy Hikes

Alexander's POV

(A/N: Oh my God! 1st in 7th grade and 700 reads over all! Thank you for reading my rubbish)

I woke up and it was quiet. No rain, no sleet, no wind. It was bright. The ground was very wet but that didn't matter. I went to John's tent.

"Knock knock! Get up!" I said.

John opened the tent and I smiled. His hair was a mess but he was still cute. John was currently brushing his hair.

"I'm almost ready," He told me.

I nodded and waited as John brushed his hair and got dressed. We went down to breakfast. We were early but it was super nice so it didn't matter. I laid my rain jacket on the ground and sat on it. John did the same. I closed my eyes and soaked up the sun.

A couple minutes later, Ms. B came down and began boiling water to make oatmeal. Everyone else straggled down to eat breakfast. The oatmeal was very good.

"Since the rain is gone, we are going to take a hike," Ms. Shey exclaimed.

Half of us groaned and the other half remained silent. After breakfast we went back up to the tents and changed into hiking things. All I needed were my hiking boots. I tied them and went down the little path.

I met my friends at the bottom. We followed Mr. Hatfield to another path. It went through the forest and led to a field. The path continued up. We came to a rock formation and we all started climbing it. One of the people to get to the top was Jefferson. I hoped he would fall off.

After that, we kept walking. We came to a little cabin that was abandoned. A bunch of us went inside. Clouds had accumulated above us but I was having so much fun and I didn't notice.

Once we were done there, we started to head back. Halfway through, my shoes became untied.

"Wait with me?" I asked John.

"Sure," he said.

As I bent down to tie my shoelace, it started to snow. I looked up in confusion. Snow? But it's May! I stood up and began walking. Up ahead, the path split into two directions.

"Shoot. Which way did we come?" I wondered.

"I think we came from that way," John answered as he pointed down the path that went left.

I shrugged. It looked right. We went that way. Ten minutes down the path, we came to a stop.

"This isn't right..." I murmured.

We were lost. I took off my coat and used it to cover me from the sleet. It had been warm that day so John hadn't brought a coat. He huddled under the coat with me.

We went back the way we came. When we came to the fork, we turned right. Soon the forest looked familiar. We sighed with relief.

Time skip

Eliza's POV

My friends and I decided to take a shortcut to beat the class to camp. We went through the forest to take a more direct path. By now it had stopped snowing/sleeting. I saw a man dressed in grey, standing on a slight hill. I had never seen him before.

"Who's that?!" I whispered to Theodosia.

She looked at the man and shrugged. We continued with our path but I still felt a little paranoid.

"Who is he?" I whispered again.

"Maybe he's a murderer!" Peggy cried.

"Don't be silly," Angie said.

"Then why is he here?" I asked.

"He'sgoinngtokillus!" Martha shrieked.

"I'm going up to him," Angie announced.

"Don't!" I cried.

Angie marched up to him and asked who he was. She tried to seem innocent.

"I'm here to tell you about the native plants," he explained.

"Oh."

He introduced himself and taught us about plants. It was extremely boring. Halfway through, I realized that John and Alexander were gone. I wonder where they went.

John's POV

As we walked through the forest, snow was falling off of the branches. I went over to one of the piles and scooped up a handful of snow. I shaped it into a snowball and chucked it at Alexander.

"Ah! Hahaha," he laughed as he made a snowball.

Soon we were engaged in an epic snowball fight. I realized that people were probably looking for us. I mentioned this to Alexander and we continued walking. When we got back to the tents (we had wasted a ton of time), everyone was in their tents again.

"Bye," I said.

"Bye," Alexander smiled.

Before I even knew what I was doing, I swooped in and kissed Alexander. I could feel his surprise. He melted into the kiss and I broke away. My face was very hot.

"I- I - sorry," I mumbled.

Then I ran away to my tent. What did I just do? WHAT DID I JUST DO?! I just messed up real bad. He went to the dance with Eliza so therefore, he probably likes Eliza. What was I thinking?!

Alexander's POV

What just happened? Did John just kiss me or did I kiss John? I don't know how to feel. On one hand, I like Eliza...but on the other hand.... I groaned and entered my tent.

Thomas was looking through one of my notebooks. I snatched it out of his hands. Thomas frowned.

"What was that for?" he wondered.

"You do that again and I will throw you off of that freaking cliff," I announced as I pointed to the left.

Thomas got up and I followed him. He opened the tent and walked over to the cliff.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Checking to see how high it is," Thomas answered.

I put my head in my hands. Why do I have to have Thomas as a tentmate!? We went back to the tent and I read a book, trying to ignore Thomas.

Soon it was time for dinner. I saw John coming out of his tent. I looked away and sped up. I don't want to talk to him right now. I don't know how I feel. Good thing I couldn't see the heart break in his eyes.