“Yes, but it’s still a no-brainer.”
“You, the queen of overthinking, think this is a no-brainer? What is even happening?”
“Can he afford it?”
“Yes. It’s less than his tuition right now.”
“Do you love him?”
“Yes.”
I turned in my seat to face her. I’d meant to splash her with a paddle, but when my feet touched the canoe again, I scowled instead.
“It’s bad that I love him?” she guessed, looking at my face.
“Right now it is.” I pointed to the bottom of the canoe. “It’s got a leak.” It was a pretty big crack too. No way those two had missed this.
She stared down at it and growled. “I’m sure this was Sawyer’s idea.”
I shot her a look.
“Fine, it doesn’t matter. They’re both idiots.”
“Yep.”
“Let’s go.”
We turned the canoe, and once we were pointed toward camp, I spotted Dumb and Dumber on the shore. Even from a distance, their posture was cocky.
“I bet Sawyer is so pleased with himself right now,” I grumbled.
“Itisthe first time he’s gotten ahead.”
We kept a very official unofficial tally of who owed whom payback for shenanigans.
“I changed my mind. Ben should not transfer.” I had to set down my paddle to start bailing. Those idiots hadn’t even left us a mercy bucket, so I was scooping and tossing out handfuls of water and not keeping up as the canoe filled.
Natalie was paddling hard, but as I checked the distance to shore to see if we could make it, I spotted Sawyer bent double, Ben slapping his back.
“I’m going to kill them,” I said, scooping faster. “Ben should not transfer, and when we get back to the dock, you should definitely dump him. In the water. Literally. Then dump him figuratively too.”
“I can’t,” she said, and her tone was regretful. “I really do love him.”
I heaved an exasperated sigh. “Fine. You don’t have to dump him literally. And he can transfer. But we’re making them pay.”
“Hundred percent. Because this canoe is going to sink.”
I yelled a curse I would never say in front of the campers and reached for my paddle. We were going to have to abandon the canoe and flip it before it got any more swamped and sank.
“I’m going to kill them, Nat. For real.” I dropped into the water and reached for the side of the canoe, holding on to the paddle with the other hand to stay stable.
“I’ll help,” she said before dropping in beside me.
“But youlooooovehim,” I said.
“Sure. But I don’t like him right now. He’s dead meat.”
“Yessss.”
