Nicole, an ambitious but overlooked student at elite private school, Waterbridge Academy, is ready for her junior year to be all kinds of fun.
While her focus should be classes and homework, they take second string to Highjinks, the epic prank battl...
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It was only weeks ago, a morning hijINKs update would have been about fluffy bunnies or glitter bombs, yet it felt more like years. Instead of exciting everyone, the update turned into subdued little worker bees, floating through their work in a cloud of smoke.
Hours later, while fish sent from the Dell was being prepped for dinner, Dean and his friends trudged back into camp, each carrying armfuls of firewood. There was no verbal apology, but they dropped their hauls off at my feet, before skulking off to help with something that wasn't their job. It was a better apology than a word.
Full for the first time in nights, I sat by one of the fires after dinner. As I peered into the pit and the dancing flame within it, I was thankful for the respite from complaints and tension. But if we didn't get phase two going soon, it would return.
Kellen and Jackson were coming to join me, having just finished eating. Kellen—and his gun—had disappeared after running Dean out of camp and resurfaced only as dinner was wrapping up. His injuries hadn't been looked at, nor would he let anyone do it. I watched as he swatted a medic away from him in annoyance as he approached, I shook my head and gestured for the bag.
Kellen stretched out on the ground and rested his head on the rock I sat on, leaving the other available seat to Jackson. Within two minutes, everyone who sat with us was made uncomfortable enough by our broody silence to leave. When the medic's bag dropped at my side, I pulled Kellen's head into my lap offering him no way out. Jackson chuckled but made no comment.
"A gun, Kels, what were you thinking?" I sighed.
He grunted in pain as I dabbed at the wound that Dean's attack had opened up. I examined it carefully, but I didn't think it would need stitches. In any case, they wouldn't be done in the dark if he did need them, so it would wait till morning. It did however need a good cleaning with alcohol. He didn't answer my question, so focused on gritting his teeth and digging his nails into his palms as the alcohol stung the gash.
"Kels?"
"Katie gave it to me before we left the academy. I figured it would be safer to have it, just in case."
"To use against our classmates?! Why did she even have it? And what if someone else found it?"
"Nicole," he sighed, a rare time he called me by my actual name. "They were past listening. I just needed to scare them." I would have protested but he opened his eyes and held my gaze. "Or would you rather me let them break you again?"
I sucked in a breath and averted my eyes from the look he was giving me. I couldn't formulate a response for all the somersaults my stomach was doing.
Jackson took my discomfort as a cue for him to speak. "So, we've got to do something, yeah?"
"That's what our meeting with the others tomorrow night at the Dell is about," I said. "Brian, Robert and Emma will be in charge here while we're gone."
