Kendall hates camping. Kendall doesn't like sleeping on the ground. Kendall is a house girl; but for Kendall to even be considered a prefect one day, Kendall has no choice but to sleep on the ground, shit in the woods, and participate in the annual 2025 Lasting Impressions Leadership Camp.
I am Kendall, by the way.
As insufferable as it seems, I have no choice. Every grade 11 has to go for this camp, because in the second and probably the first half of the third term, we'll be getting assessed. Now I wouldn't want to be the only one in my family that hasn't held a leadership position; my mother (allegedly) was head girl at an all girls school, my dad was the rugby captain, and now my sister is the deputy head girl. If I can at least become a prefect I'd be happy; they're my motivation and inspiration, and not to forget rubbing it in Sofia's face if I make it.
After trekking for what felt like a lifetime, we finally set our bags down, relishing in the beauty of the outdoors. The tall trees forming and creating some sort of shield around the campsite, fallen leaves around the uneven ground, and the lake that should be somewhere around here if we actually looked. If you're an outdoors person, it would be perfect for you. But for me, not so much.
The view is nice though.
"You know, this isn't so bad…fuck!" I tried swatting away a bee that seemed to only have interest in me. "Jesus!"
"For someone that complains about being in the house all the time, you sure are scared of bugs and animals." Yasmina shook her head as I fought the air.
"Me? Scared? Never." I put my hands on my hips. "In fact, I'm just doing this to protect you."
"Kendall, you ran as fast as you could as soon as we left the bus. Stop lying to impress Yas," Isa remarked, earning a high five from Joanna.
"Yeah Kendall, Yasmina's already whipped, relax."
"Joanna!" Yasmina threw a stone at Joanna, who promptly dodged. "Should've caught it, Jo, basketball season is next term."
"You like basketball?"
Yasmina nodded. "At least in basketball there's about a 93% chance I won't get a hit to the fucking head."
"It was a mistake, Thompson, get over it," Sofia suddenly stated, laying her bag down next to mine. "It was supposed to hit this nutjob over here."
"Thanks for reminding me of how shitty your aim is," I scoffed.
"Is this what we call bonding? We're here to bond," Liliana muttered, hands in her pockets.
"We're here to lead," Audrey corrected.
"We're here to compete," I snarled at her.
"And I'm looking for a toilet. Any ideas, anyone?" Jo waved her hand multiple times.
"Well we're in the woods Jo, look around you." Yasmina shrugged. "Nature is your toilet."
"Oh for fuck's sake," she mumbled, kicking a rock and walking away from us. "That's why I didn't want Lynn to get in there first; taking too damn long to pee."
"I'm on my period for fuck's sake!" She whined, running after her.
I turned to the others. "Now that's done, what's next? Standing sucks."
"Sit on the ground," Bailey suggested.
"Better yet, trip and sprain your ankle, it'll help you in the future," Audrey added.
"How helpful." I rolled my eyes. "Where's Miss—"
"Alright ladies! Time to talk," Miss Verne appeared out of nowhere with Meredith and Kirsty wielding wood in their hands. "Let's outline what we're going to be doing for the next few days."
"I bet this is going to be good." Yasmina nudged me.
***
Safe to say it was not good.
We spent the rest of our days having multiple team and trust building exercises: after many failed trust falls and following the leader games, I have come to the realization that I am not completely ready to be a leader. If anything, Sofia has more qualities than I do: she's self-assured, vocal, and open to criticism as well as asking for help where needed. Surprisingly, for the past few days she hasn't been focusing much on me, nor has Audrey. I was happy about that because to some extent, I didn't care about Audrey, Liliana or Sofia; my focus was on bettering myself.
Needless to say, Yasmina surprised me the most during this camp.
Yas has never been one to back down or to completely stay dormant in stressful situations. She basically led alongside Sofia, which annoyed Audrey a lot. If she's actually serious about it, Yas could become a prefect. We've had cases like this before: a new kid comes in, becomes a prefect, gets another thing to add to their university application. If that's what she's doing, then she's doing it perfectly. I wonder how the boys are doing at the other side of the campsite; I really hoped to talk to Christian during this camp, but with how segregated the boys and girls are, it was virtually impossible. I got him after we're done though, knowing him, he's got a lot to say.
As we sat around the fire on our fourth night eating smores and getting ready for bed, Miss Verne tapped her cup. "Good evening ladies."
"Evening."
"I think as we're nearing the end of our time here, it's important to build your relationships with one another," she started. "I know we had a rough start in term one with a few…issues between students, but I think we should be able to resolve them tonight, or even tomorrow. So what I want you to do now is to sit in pairs and talk to each other. Sit with whoever you like and talk about whatever you want, there's no rush; we have until midnight."
As people began to scramble for others to talk to, I gave Yasmina a thumbs up, and she nodded, heading over towards Joanna. I scanned the area, looking for someone to talk to, and I noticed Sofia sitting in a corner, her gaze settled on the fire. Against my better judgment, I got up, and slowly walked towards her, contemplating my decision with each step I took.
Sabrina stood in front of her. "Find someone else."
"Sab, let her come," Sofia stated, surprising both Sabrina and I. "I figured she'd want to talk to me."
After staring me down, Sabrina stepped aside so that I could sit next to Sofia. Together, we stared at the fire, waiting for someone to break the ice. It was the first time Sofia and I just sat together without bickering, and honestly, it felt like we were still best friends. Sofia and I were like sisters, and to have this huge rift between us drove away the confidence I once had in coming to talk to her.
"Camping is for losers," she quipped, whistling slowly. "Rather be home watching Ginny and Georgia."
"Right? I haven't watched the new season yet and that bothers me," I continued. "Marcus is and will always be my comfort character."
She chuckled. "I'm glad that hasn't changed about you."
"Even though a lot has changed between us…"
The silence returned. It was as if I stepped on thinning ice and it broke, drowning me in the ice cold water. I looked at Sofia for some sort of negative reaction, but when I was met with sadness and contempt rather than bitterness and anger.
"And I'm sorry about that, really," she began. "I fucked up by dating your ex."
"And I messed up by trying to become head girl knowing that you've always wanted it," I continued. "I guess I was just mad at the fact that you'd do something like that to me, and to this day I still don't know why."
"Me neither."
"You're lying."
"You can't tell."
"We've been friends for a while now, I'm sure I can tell when you're lying, Allen," I fired back. "If you're not comfortable with sharing why you did it, I understand, but you don't have to lie to me about this; I'm over it."
"Are you over Liliana?"
I hesitated. "Sometimes I'd like to think I'm completely over her."
"Then why jump into something with Yasmina if you're not completely over Liliana?" Sofia said as we glanced over at Yasmina, who was laughing.
"So you do believe Yasmina and I are together." I smiled.
She snickered. "I never doubted it for a second; you could've been a one night stand for all we know, but a regular fling doesn't have the connection you two have and you know it."
If only she knew that I wasn't so sure of our position.
"I guess so," I agreed. "But if you never doubted me, then why did you do all this?"
"Audrey suggested it because you were going a little too far."
"Is Audrey suddenly your master?" I joked.
"Kendall."
"My bad." I looked at her instead. "Why aren't we friends anymore?"
Sofia's gaze met mine for a split second before she looked back at the fire, taking a deep breath. "Rather wouldn't share."
"Will you share it someday?"
"Someday," she confirmed.
"And will we be able to become friends again?" I bit my lip,
After a long, drawn out sigh, she nodded. "Someday."