A Dreamer'sn Destiny Chapter 1

CRASH! Troy looked around and noticed he was on his bedroom floor. His blankets were sprawled everywhere and one pillow inconspicuously made its way across the room in a sleep-induced throw. After realizing he wasn't in a temple, but instead on his cold floor he said to him, "It must've been a dream. Man I need to stop drinking Mountain Dew before I go to bed." He felt around on his stand for his phone. When he finally found it he looked at the clock, it read 4:22 AM. "4:22, I still have two hours before I need to get up." He grabbed his misplaced pillow and crawled back it to bed and threw all the covers on top of him. He closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep, but he just couldn't. He rolled around, tossed and turned, and ended up on his back, staring up at the ceiling with so many thoughts rushing through his head.

"Where was I, what was I doing who was that other person? It all felt so real, but it must've been a dream, it had to have been a dream. Maybe a snack or two will help me settle down."

Troy quietly walked through the hallway and downstairs, careful not to wake his parents or his sisters, because in his mind, he wasn't sure which was worse. Troy finally made it to the kitchen. He slowly turned on the light careful not to blind himself, and opened the fridge. He stated at the contents inside for a while before making up his mind. After mulling his options he decided on a couple of slices of cold pizza and a tall glass of root beer.

Troy walked out into the living room and sat down on the couch to enjoy his "meal." He grabbed the remote and turned on the TV, but quickly remembered to hit the mute button. As he flipped through channels looking for something to watch he began to chow down into his first slice of pizza. Eventually he stopped at his favorite channel ESPN. "Hmm I wonder what tape delay hoops game they have on tonight." He said through a mouthful of cheese. After washing it down with a swig of root beer he read the caption on the screen. "Duke at North Carolina. Sweet! I can see the end of this now!"

Troy used the game to clear his mind off of things, as he watched one of his favorite players, Tyler Hansbrough, systematically pick apart Duke's defense, he gave a silent cheer with ever basket and raised his still half full glass in the air in celebration.

With less than two minutes left in the game and North Carolina holding a seventeen point lead. Troy felt confident. Watching his team gain a strong victory over their hated rivals relaxed him and cleared his mind, he felt he would be able to go to sleep. He looked at his phone again. "4:52, not bad, I can still get some nice sleep in."

As Troy began to leave he got up to gather his dishes, he looked up and noticed his sister Carly standing at the top of the stairs looking down at him. "What are you doing Troy? Do you realize it's five in the morning and we have school in two hours?" She asked in a demanding tone.

"Nothing its fine can't sleep that's all, needed a little snack to calm me down. Hey, sorry I woke you."

"It's okay," Carly said as she walked downstairs and sat on the couch next to where Troy was sitting, "Come on what's up, no one gets up in the middle of the night, indulges themselves in food and watches old basketball without a reason. What's yours?"

"It's nothing," Troy replied as he started walking toward the kitchen.

"Come on, I'm your sister I know when something's up I'm not stupid. So get back out here and let's talk about it."

"Fine, hold on a minute though," Troy said as he went into the kitchen to reload his plate and glass with more if he was to stay up.

As he was walking back into the room he told his sister, "You do realize that neither of us are probably getting back to sleep right?"

"Yeah I know, oh well, what's 2 hours, I mean I'll just sleep later."

"True, true, you got a point there," Troy said as he sat down in his spot, and exchanged the glass in his hand for the remote on the table, turned on the early edition of Spertscenter, and began to eat more pizza.

"Troy," Carly said and gave him a stern look.

"What you want a piece?" Troy said with the most innocent look ever for someone with half a slice of pizza hanging out of their mouth.

"Ew no, how can you stand to eat that stuff cold anyways?"

"What? It tastes pretty good. You don't know what you're missing" He said eagerly trying to get her to join in his early morning feast.

"Nah, I'll pass," Carly said, "must you watch sportscenter at the same time?"

"As a matter of fact yes I must"

"Ugh fine, just don't turn it up, the last we need is to wake Abby up."

"Heh yeah true, she is not a morning person" Troy said as the both laughed at the thought of their sister exploding at them at five in the morning.

"So Troy, anyways, what's going on?" Carly asked him, foregoing the small talk.

"Eh, a few things, I don't know, I've just had a lot going on lately." Troy said calmly before downing some more root beer and watching Chris Lofton sink another 3-point shot in a highlight reel versus Kentucky.

"Like what? Come Troy, you're not helping, be more specific. Um is it school?"

"I don't know, I guess a little, I mean there's all the homework, bad teachers, and all the drama. There's a lot of drama I have to hear about. Then there's soccer too and the field trip and grr, there's just too much stress."

"I know what you mean, school sucks doesn't it? I've had 3 tests this week, in hard classes,"

"Whoa wait, you have hard classes? Since when?" Troy said sarcastically

"Ha ha very funny. Seriously, school's stressful for everyone. I mean, don't get me started on our teachers, grr I could teach better than some of them! Yeah I am sorry though, you do have to suffer through a lot of drama, but then again, I kinda do end up usually somehow in there. And soccer, I'm just sick of sick of it. We have fun but sometimes, I don't know it's just not as fun."

"Hey wait a minute, who has the problems here, me or you?"

"True, I'm sorry, I did kinda go crazy there, didn't I? But see, we all have the basic same set of problems, but that doesn't mean we all get up at 4 in the morning and eat nasty pizza and watch reruns of college basketball games."

"Well it's 4 o'clock somewhere so people are always eating at 4 in the morning, it just might not be 4 in their time zone."

"Don't try to twist the words of that stupid country song around, it's not working."

"Oh fine"

"So what's the real problem, is it girl problems? I thought you finally got things sorted out with that."

"Well that's not the big thing, but yeah, I don't know,"

"How do you not know?"

"I don't know"

"Ugh Troy, not funny, well do you still like her?"

"Yeah, of course,"

"Well have you told her?"

"Um-"

"That's a no. Gosh why won't you tell her?

"I don't know, I really want to, I guess I'm just scared to or something,"

"What that's crazy, why are you scared? Don't tell me rejection. I mean I know the whole thing with Taryn didn't work out."

"Oh jeez, don't bring her up. That was just, I don't know, bad timing. She doesn't have anything to do with this."

"Okay well if you say so. But come on Troy, gosh you're always like this; you always have been to shy to tell anyone. You're never shy about anything else, come on,"

"Jeez, somebody's bossy for four in the morning. Chill. I mean, I guess I am just scared. I know it could work with us, but I wish I knew what she was thinking."

"Well there is one easy way to find out what she's thinking."

"What?"

"Tell her idiot!" She told him as she hit him across the head.

"Hey, what was that for?" Troy asked as he rubbed his head where she hit him.

"To hopefully knock some common sense into you. Now tomorrow you're going to tell her you like her, okay? Good."

"I'll think about it. Even thought it'd be so much easier if I could figure out what she thought of me, but I doubt I'll be able to."

"Troy, look, you and her are great friends, it shouldn't be this hard. Just talk to her don't just go up to her randomly and say, 'Hey I like you' just strike up a conversation and wait for the right time, it'll work I promise."

"Jeez, okay, who died and made you miss love advice giverer. Is she like paying you or something to do all this for her? If so I'd like to know how much because I'll pay you triple to do this for me instead."

"No she's not paying me. I'm trying to help my brother since I see he's in trouble."

"Ha, who are you and what did you do with Carly?"

"Shut up. Fine, well if that's not the big thing that's bothering you, then what is? And Don't give me any stupid answer or I'll hit you again."

"Okay, besides school, and besides her, the thing that brought me down here, don't laugh is this crazy dream I had."

Carly looked at Troy with a face of disbelief and tried to hide her laughter but eventually burst out into a laughing fit. "Ha ha you're kidding right?" She said as she wiped her eyes to rid the tears from laughing so hard. "Aw you poor baby, did someone have a bad dream?"

"Hey shut up, it wasn't a bad dream, it was just weird, that's all."

"Well, there's your culprit right there," Carly told his as she pointed to his empty glass and crumb-ridden tray.

"Yeah, my dream was your ugly face. That was the whole dream. Imagine being stuck in there," Troy replied sarcastically.

"Well actually I'd love to be stuck in a dream all about me personally. But fine, what was it really about?"

"Okay I was in this temple thingy, and I had a sword, it was a cool sword. Anyway, and I went through hallways, into this big room and I grabbed this thing. There were 2 more like them. Then some person in a hood came and started attacking me, but I woke up before it ended. It seemed all too real though. And I kinda fell out of my bed apparently. Then I came down here, and then you came down here and then, now this."

Carly looked at him with a blank stare. "Wow, yeah, definitely no more pizza for you."

"Actually I blamed it on the Mountain Dew," Troy interrupted.

"Okay no soda in general then. Well that explains what then thud was that woke me up. Idiot, thanks again for waking me. Well as weird as it was, and not matter what you think, it was a dream, they do feel real at times, but they aren't. Gosh you're so weird sometimes; I can't believe you and me are related sometimes."

"Yeah me neither, meet my sister the freak."

"Yeah real mature," She said sarcastically as she pushed him. Troy grabbed a pillow from the couch and hit her with it in retaliation. Carly grabbed the pillow on the other side and hit Troy. After knocking each other senseless a few times they both felt better about everything.

"Hey, I'm gonna go try and get a little more sleep before we're supposed to really get up, you should probably do the same." Carly said as she got up and headed towards the stairs.

"Yeah you're right, I probably should. I'll go up after putting the dishes away."

"Okay, good night see ya in a couple hours,"

"Okay night," Troy said as the walked away. "Hey Carly,"

"Yeah?" She said stopping on the stairs.

"Thanks, you made me feel a lot better, and for the advice too."

"Well we're even. You've done the same for me when I needed it."

"Yeah true, thanks anyways, night." He said as the walked away. Troy went into the kitchen and threw his glass and plate into the sink. "I guess it was just a dream," He said as he walked away back upstairs to his room. He picked up his blanket and pillow and threw them back on his bed. He set his phone on his table and lay in his bed. But he still couldn't sleep. He was still too busy thinking about that dream. "Who was that person? Where was I? What was that object? Why did it seem so real? Will I ever know the answers?" Troy stared at the ceiling as if hoping the ceiling tiles could provide him with guidance.

When the silence of the tiles set in Troy tossed and turned and ended up on his side staring out his bedroom window. Troy sat up and began to look out his window. He looked up at the stars gazing aimlessly at them hoping they could show him some direction. The twinkle of the stars was mesmerizing but no answers were to be found.

He then looked down closer to earth at the house next to his, the home of his two best friends Merideth and Courtney. All the lights were off, like any normal house at this time. "Well I guess I'm the only crazy one tonight." Troy said to himself sarcastically. "Hmm, who knows it's worth a try. She's done it to me, I'll do it to her," Troy said to his reflection in the mirror.

Troy rolled back across the bed and reached to his stand for his phone. He flipped it open, but stopped for a minute, blinded by the brightness of the screen in the dark room. After he could see again he scrolled through his phonebook until he came to Merideth's entry and selected the Send Message option. He typed up a simple message to her saying, You awake? He knew most likely she wasn't and that she wouldn't get that message for a few hours when she woke up. But he's been woken up by her random messages at odd hours when she couldn't sleep, so he decided that that'd make them even.

Troy watched the little envelope icon go in and out of the mailbox telling him his message was being sent. Once the envelope found its home in the mailbox, telling Troy it was successfully sent. Troy closed his phone up and set it back on his table.

He rolled back over to how he was before and pondered to the stars one last time hoping they would change their mind. After realizing they weren't going to, Troy closed his eyes and began to fall asleep.

A couple minutes later his phone rang, his loud ringer brought him out of the state of sleep he was almost in. He quickly rolled across the bed and grabbed his phone hoping it was Merideth. But when he looked at the screen all it showed was a picture of a clock. He opened his phone and looked at the time. The clock read 6:00 AM. Troy looked at it in disbelief. "Aw come on, I was just getting to sleep, argh, oh well," Troy gut cut of by a long yawn of his own. "Eh, I guess I better get ready." He said as he rubbed his eyes. He looked out his window towards Merideth's house. "I guess she's not awake." He said to himself.

Troy got a shower, put his clothes on, brushed his teeth, and made an attempt to brush his hair. He went downstairs to find his family sitting around in the kitchen. His mom was cooking a second set of eggs on the stove, his dad was sitting at the table enjoying his coffee and reading the paper. Carly was standing at the counter sipping a glass of Orange juice. Troy walked over to the fridge, poured himself a glass of orange juice and went over to the counter by Carly. "Are you as tired as I am?"

"Yeah, lets promise we're never gonna have a crazy brother-sister pillow fight at four in the morning again."

"Works for me. So did you ever get back to sleep?"

"Yeah, for about half an hour. You"

"Yeah, at about five fifty-eight." Carly stopped drinking her orange juice to think about what he said for a minute.

"Wait as in, you got two minutes of sleep?"

"Yeah pretty much,"

"Jeez, that's sucks." Carly said as she sipped more of her orange juice and glanced over to their other sister, Abby, who was sitting at the table scarfing down a mountain of scrambled eggs topped with loads of ketchup. "Look at herm she didn't lose a bit of sleep, she up and ready to go,"

"Yeah lucky her," Troy said unenthusiastically as he glanced over at his sister too. At that moment she looked up with a mouthful of eggs and managed a "What?" out of her stuffed mouth. Troy and Carly just looked down and shook their heads.

"Nothing, just go back to eating your eggs." Troy told her.

"What you want some?" Abby said with her mouth still full. "Cause mom's making more; they'll be done in a couple minutes."

"Nah, I'm fine, I'm not hungry." Troy replied which caused Carly to laugh, knowing that he had inhaled four pieces of cold pizza a couple hours ago. Which prompted an elbow belong to Troy to end up in her ribs.

"Okay, jeez, sorry." She told him. She turned to Abby, "That's okay; I'm content with my orange juice."

"Okay, more for me then," she replied before eating another forkful of eggs.

Troy finished drinking his orange juice and put his glass in the sink. "I'm gonna go watch some TV, call me when we're leaving." he told his sisters.

"Sure," they both replied as he walked away. After he was out of the room Abby put down her fork on her finished plate. "What's up with him?" She asked her sister.

"I don't know," Carly said, even though she did know. "It's Troy, what do you expect?"

"True," Abby replied. She looked at her phone; it read 6:45 AM. "Well time to go, let's get our stuff and grab Troy.

"Okay, hold on," Abby said,

"Why?" Carly asked before Abby grabbed her stuff, grabbed her fork from her eggs and grabbed a bite from the fresh batch of eggs.

"Okay, let's go," Abby replied after gulping down the eggs. Carly shook her head in disbelief.

"Do you have an end to your stomach?"

"Nope! C'mon, let's go."

Carly and Abby walked into the living room where Troy was sitting watching sportscenter reruns he had already seen.

"Come on, let's go." Carly said as she headed to turn the TV off.

"Fine, let me just see what the weather's like," Troy replied.

"I'm guessing cloudy, seventy-five percent chance of rain, high of sixty-seven." Abby said sarcastically. Troy turned to the local weather channel.

"Cloudy, seventy-five percent chance of rain, high of sixty-seven, wow," Carly read on the screen. Amazed, she looked at her sister, "You cheated,"

"Did not," She replied,

"Use dad's newspaper?" Troy asked.

"Yeah," Abby replied.

"Then why didn't you just tell us you read it in the newspaper?" Troy asked.

"That's not as fun," Abby replied with a smirk on your face.

"Come on you two; let's go before we're late." Carly said as she walked towards the door. Troy got up and followed and before reaching the door turned and softly said, "Weirdo," to Abby. Abby stuck her tongue out at him and made a funny face, ending the discussion.

When they finally got to school, Abby and Carly ran off with a few of their friends. Troy noticed Merideth standing by the stairs in front of the school and went to go talk to her.

"Hey what's up?" He said nonchalantly.

"Not much, hey, sorry about not replying to your message. I kinda got so busy packing I kinda forgot." She replied.

"It's okay. Packing for what?"

"Um, our field trip today."

"Cookie say what? Field trip?"

"You know, the trip that's today, to the ancient temples, we've been studying about them for 2 months now. You always talk about how you can't wait for the trip so you can find some treasure or something, and I would always say, Troy that would never happen, and then call you a freak or a dork or a crack head or something."

"You call me a freak or a dork or a crack head all the time."

"Yeah, true, but you know, that trip,"

Troy thought for a minute and then he remembered, "Oh yeah that trip! Uh-oh, oh crap!"

"What? What's the problem? Hey, Troy, where's the stuff you packed?"

"Um, see there's a funny story about that."

"Please tell me you packed Troy. Please, we have to spend three days there." She said as she put her hands on his shoulders and shook him, "Three days!" Troy bit his lip and looked around for a distraction, but none were appearing.

"You didn't pack did you?"

"Nope,"

"Gosh Troy, you're such an idiot, how'd I know this was gonna happen? You're lucky I'm here."

"And why is that? So I have someone to constantly torture me and call me names? Because you know you don't have to take that job, my sisters do a nice job of doing that. Which by the way, remind me to kill them later for not reminding me."

"Aw, me? Call you names? Psh, you must be mistaking me with someone else because I'm such a perfect little angel," Merideth replied trying as hard as she can not to laugh. Troy rolled his eyes in response.

"So why am I glad you're here then?" Merideth turned around and picked up a giant black duffle bag and handed it to Troy.

"To give you this." Troy looked inside the bad and found an assortment of his clothes.

"Where did you get these? I've been looking for some of these. I thought they were lost in my void of a room."

"A little birdie gave them to me."

"My sisters?"

"Yep,"

"Well why didn't they just give them to me themselves?"

"Duh Troy, that wouldn't be much fun would it?"

"So you were in on it?"

"Psh, of course,"

"You're all crazy, you know that? All of you, crazies."

"I know. We try."

"So how long has this been going on?"

"Oh a couple weeks, every now and then when we would go out and do something they'd go run a few clothes over to Courtney."

"So Courtney was in on it too?"

"Yeah, she thought it was hilarious. We hid everything in your room, it was my idea, but we couldn't hide it in my room incase you came over."

"Yeah true, whoa wait; this was all your idea?"

"Did I say that out loud? Oops my bad."

"So what would you have done in I had brought my clothes?"

"Umm well you would've had extra! Yep yeah well go with that."

"You had no idea did you?"

"Nope, we were all praying you'd forget."

"So this is what it's like to be on punk'd."

"Yep," Merideth pulled out her phone and held it to Troy and started her video recorder... "Come on say it, say it."

"Fine, I'm Troy Setters and I just got punk'd. There you happy? Didn't think I'd ever have to say that."

Merideth closed her phone and put it back in her purse. "Yep, wait til they see this."

"Wait til they see this," Troy said in a childish voice mocking her.

"Whatever, come on, grab your stuff, the buses are here." Merideth said as she grabbed her bag as a group of buses pulled up.

"Fine, I'm gonna get you back," Troy said as he grabbed his newly acquired bag.

"Is that a threat or a promise?" Merideth replied walking to the bus.

"Both," he replied as they got on the bus. "Oh, back seat!" he said as they ran to the back seat and threw their bags on the awning behind them.

After everyone had gotten on the bus and taken their seats, the buses pulled away from school, next stop, ancient temples. Shortly after they left, Merideth asked Troy, "Uh, where's everyone else like you know, our sisters?"

"Um, good question, our luck, on a different bus," Just then Merideth's phone rang, she had a message from Courtney, it read, "Where are you?"

Merideth replied, "On the first bus with Troy you?"

"On the third bus with Carly and Abby"

"Oh great Troy, they're on a different bus. We're screwed."

"Yep pretty much. So what are we gonna do for two hours?"

"I don't know," Merideth replied, looking around for some inspiration to provoke conversation. Then she found it.

"Gosh Troy, you're getting hurt more than me, how'd you get that huge bruise on your leg?"

"Bruise on my leg? What are you talking about?" Troy replied confused looking down to his leg. "There's no bruise."

"Uh Troy, other leg." Merideth said,

"Oh, I knew that,"

"Dork,"

"Yeah, whatever," Troy looked at his other leg. "Oh wow, that is a huge bruise. That explains why my leg hurt so much this morning."

"You didn't know it was there? When did you get it?"

"It must've been last night when I fell out of my bed. I must've kicked the bed post on the way down or something. I don't know I was asleep!"

"You fell out of bed. No seriously how did you get it?

"I'm serious, I fell out of bed."

"You fell out of bed?"

"Yep, and apparently I threw my pillow across the room too. I must have good aim in my sleep because I hit the dartboard and knocked it down. Found it lying next to the pillow when I woke up."

"Oh my gosh Troy, I'm surprised even on your standards. That's hilarious. How did you fall out of bed?"

"Well when I was in a sleep-induced state of unconsciousness. My subconscious told my central nervous system I was in trouble and sent a signal to my cerebral cortex telling my body to thrust it self in such a way that the projection would cause my descent to end with me gaining velocity and striking the floor consequently causing me to awake from my state and discover I was resting on the floor." Troy said, trying not to laugh as he said a bunch of stuff he didn't even know what it meant.

"Shut up," Merideth told him "You know I hate when you use big words."

"Yeah I know, well that's what you get for stealing my clothes."

"Ugh fine, crack head. So really, what happened?"

"Well, you're gonna think this is stupid, but I had this really weird dream last night, it seemed almost realistic.

"Oh my gosh I had one too. Except I was smart enough to stay in bed, gosh Troy. Well in mine I was in this really weird old temple thingy. And I was going through these passageways, oh and I had a sword, and then I jumped out of the ceiling and landed in this giant room with these two golden things sitting there. And there was some cloaked guy holding a third one, and I was about to fight him, and he asked me who are you, then I woke up. Oh well it was good for him cause I would've beat him anyways."

"You think you would've?"

"Yeah, I would've went BA BAM BA BAM on him and he would've been down,"

"Heh, alright, if you say so."

"So what was your dream about?"

Troy decided not to tell her since they were so awkwardly similar. So he made something up from the top of his head.

"Um, sky diving. Yeah, ended up jumping out of a plane and falling thirty thousand feet."

"So? What's so weird about that?"

"No parachute,"

"Well that I guess would explain how you fell out of bed, and you're supposed to be the smart one." She told him jokingly.

"Yeah yeah yeah, whatever. Well I didn't get back to sleep."

"So then you texted me?"

"Well there was stuff in between, but yeah"

"Well I watched some sportscenter, ate some cold pizza. Carly came down and-"

"And what?"

Troy decided not to tell Merideth about the details of their conversation. "She got mad at me for waking her up so I hit her with a pillow, and she hit me with a pillow, and then we got tired. She went to bed, I went to my room, stared at the ceiling, couldn't sleep, so I texted you. Unfortunately my alarm went off two minutes later."

"Oh, sounds um interesting."

"Yeah, not really, I decided, you text me at the randomest times all the time so I'm gonna text you. Now we're even."

"What nu-uh."

"Why bother, I'm not gonna argue, I never win."

"Exactly!"

"Well since I only got like four hours of sleep, you mind if I get some sleep on here?"

"Well what am I gonna do then?"

"I don't know, draw me a pretty picture, look out the window, get some sleep, you'll think of something."

"Fine. I'll figure out something to do I guess." She said as she pulled her ipod out of her pocket and turned it on.

"Thanks, wake me up when we get there."

"Okay maybe." Troy gave her an evil glare.

"I'm kidding, I'll wake you up."

Troy plugged his headphones into his phone and began listening to music. Just as he was falling asleep it beeped, signaling he has a message. He looked at his phone, it was from Carly. "I don't know where you are, but remember our little talk last night."

Troy, half-asleep, typed up a shaky response. "I will im geuting around to it. Ill do it eventually I promise. Im too thremd right now im gohng to skeep ill do it later. You shoukd sledp too."

After the misspelled response, Troy fell asleep finally. Merideth decided to draw a picture of trees and birds and any other random things she saw out the window, including a stop sign.

A couple hours later….

"Troy Troy Troy, wake up, we're here." Merideth said as she pushed him, trying to wake him up.

"What? What? Okay I'm up."

"And you didn't fall out of your seat congratulations!"

"Thanks, so we're here?"

"Yep, come on; let's go, we have to get assigned our cabin,"

"Cabin, we're in cabins?"

"Yeah we're you not paying attention at all?" Troy gave her his "duh" look.

"Yeah, true."She replied.

They got off the bus and headed over to their teacher, Mr. Romsey, who was assigning cabins.

"Let's see, Troy and Merideth," He said as he scribbled down a number on a piece of paper on his clipboard. "Cabin 17, off you go,"

"Whoa you're putting us in the same cabin but-"Troy started to say before Merideth interrupted him.

"What he means is thanks for putting us together, we're happy." As they walked off to their cabin, Merideth asked Troy, "What was that all about?"

"Oh nothing I was just saying their suppose to usually separate boys and girls, I mean think about our school and the people in it."

"Oh ew, nasty."

"Exactly. I mean I'm not complaining, I'm just surprised."

"Oh, okay, just making sure."

"Yeah, I'm sorry, from now on, open mouth, insert foot."

"Yep, good boy."

When they finally got to their cabin they noticed how huge it was. The cabin was a luxury house. Complete with all essentials, refrigerator, TV, games, the works. When Troy walked he looked around and remarked, "Um this isn't a cabin, it's more like a vacation home."

"I know, it's huge," Merideth replied. "Well let's go see who else were stuck with."

"Heh, we get the one hidden in the woods of course."

"Hmm, yeah, these woods look familiar, I just don't know from where,"

"And you say I'm crazy, come on, quit staring at trees and come inside," Troy told her laughing at her. But when he stopped for a second to look at them, he realized they were oddly familiar, but he couldn't figure out where they were from either.

When they walked into the living room they were met with a pleasant surprise. Troy's and Merideth's sisters were sitting on the couch laughing at the video of Troy Merideth sent them while he was asleep. Troy's friends, Ben and Keeton, were over playing Guitar Hero against each other.

Ben and Keeton paused their game to see who had gotten there.

"Hey Troy, what's up man? So you in here with us?" Ben asked

"Yep, I'm stuck with you guys," Troy said kiddingly,

"Hah sweet, now we got all three setters here, the party can begin now!" Keeton said, heading to the kitchen to raid the fridge.

"Courtney and Abby ran over and gave Merideth a hug, glad to see their best friend was gonna be their. "Oh my gosh we thought we were gonna be stuck with these two idiots," Courtney said, referring to Ben and Keeton.

"Ha yeah, unfortunately now we got three idiots," Pointing to Troy while saying this.

"Yep, that's true," Merideth added.

"Hey, I heard that!" Troy shouted to them from across the room. In the meantime Carly was lying on the couch, with her phone beside her. She shot a look to Troy, then over to Merideth, then back to Troy. Troy just shook his head and Carly rolled her eyes. She got up and walked over to the rest of the group.

"Yep, three idiots now, I like the video Merideth. This was some of your finer work."

"Yeah well I couldn't have done it without your help, so lets say this is a victory for all of us. Well all of us except Troy." Merideth responded, causing everyone to laugh.

"Okay, enough small talk, let's get this party started!" Keeton said as he set a bunch of drinks on the table and Ben dropped an armful of bags of chips.

"Hey Ben, "Troy asked,

"Yeah what?"

"These are supposed to hold 8 people; there are 7 of us, who's the 8th?

"Oh, it's my cousin Mallory, she had like some doctor's appointment or something so she won't get here until tomorrow."

"Oh fun,"

"Yeah I know, hey, you don't have to be related to her though."

"True,"

The seven of them spent the rest of their night partying and having fun. Then when ten o'clock rolled around everyone had to go to bed. Troy, Ben and Keeton headed off to their half, while Merideth, Courtney, Carly and Abby, headed to the opposite.

Troy laid in his bed unable to sleep, wondering if he would have another odd dream.

"Ugh, I can't sleep, and there's no pizza to eat and no windows to look out. Hmm, its nice out why look out the window when I can be out there anyway? Maybe a breath of fresh air with help me relax," Troy grabbed his jacket and slowly moved outside, just like last night, careful not to wake anyone. "This better not become a habit," Troy whispered to himself as he opened the door. "Because Carly probably already wants to kill me, this would just make it worse." He whispered as he closed the door and stepped out onto the porch. He looked out to the horizon overlooking the woods, which brought him a pleasant surprise. Merideth was standing outside too staring at the woods.

"Can't sleep?" Troy asked as he walked over to join her. Merideth turned around, already knowing who was talking to her.

"Oh hey Troy, nope, psh when have I ever been able to sleep like a normal person?"

"Good question, probably like before we met."

"Which was a long, long time ago."

"Yeah true, you're right. So what are you doing out here?"

"I don't know, staring at the trees, looking at the stars. It's just, for some reason, this place seems familiar, but I know I've never been here before."

"I know, it's a pain," Troy mumbled to himself.

"Huh what? Are you talking to yourself again?"

"Yeah of course, don't I always,"

"Yeah because you have no friends, so you have to," Merideth said pushing him in the shoulder.

"Uh huh, sure I don't. I'm just that depressed. Gosh I thought you were my friend. I think I might go cut myself now, make the pain go away." Troy replied as he jokingly began to pretend to put his head in his hands and cry. Merideth walked over to him,

"Listen Troy, I have some advice for you."

"What, how to get friends?" He said still playing along.

"Nope, just remember, down the alley not across the lane, that way you don't break the tendons."

Troy took his head out of his hands and looked at her, and started cracking up laughing, Merideth did the same. After they both were done laughing so hard their sides hurt. Merideth asked Troy, "So really what did you say?"

"Um, I said, um, it's supposed to rain," Troy said thinking quickly on his feet.

"Yeah right, it's a beautiful night, it's not gonna rain."

"Try telling that to Abby,"

"Why?"

"She stole my dad's newspaper just to see the weather. It said it was gonna rain."

"Well, um, can you believe everything you read? Nope, that's what I thought. I'm telling you Troy, it's not gonna rain," She said as she looked up into the star-filled night sky. "It's a wonderful night out, I mean look at the sky, its' great out, isn't it Troy?"

"Yeah it is pretty cool," he said looking at the stars. "Maybe it's not gonna rain, "

"Well duh, how could it rain on such a great night like this?"

"I don't know, I guess it couldn't. Well at least I'm not the only one who can't sleep. "

"Yeah I know, this would've been a lot boring out here if you hadn't come out. Now I've got someone to cure my boredom."

"Yeah, I know its pretty great. So now what do we do?"

"I don't know, um just start talking about something, anything,"

Troy thought for a moment for a topic before one came to him with the greatest ease. "Hey Merideth, I-"just then a raindrop fell.

"You're kidding its actually raining," Merideth complained as the drops started to fall at a heavier rate.

"We should probably go inside," Troy suggested as the rain began to pour even harder.

"Okay fine," She said as they started walking back to their cabin. "B the way, what were you gonna say,"

"Oh I'll just tell you when we get inside out of the rain, "Troy said. As he put the hood to his jacket up. Just then lightning stuck a tree and set it on fire causing it to spread to other trees so fast even the rain couldn't put it out. Then the emergency alarms rang, everybody needed to evacuate their cabins and get on the buses to head for safety. Everyone ran out of their cabins.

"Troy! We've gotta go!" Carly shouted to Troy over the roar of the thunder. Troy turned to Merideth, and told her "c'mon let's go," but Merideth stood motionless, staring at the fire. "Merideth, come on, what are you-. Oh my gosh. Merideth, I completely forgot, I'm sorry. You're parent's they were killed in that huge fire, you always have hated fire since then."

"Troy come on we have to leave!" Abby shouted

"Go on I'll be there in a minute!" Troy shouted back.

"Fine, I'll see you on the bus!" She shouted back as she took off with the rest of their group.

"Merideth, look, I know you're scared, but I promise, everything's gonna be okay. You're gonna be alright, nothing bad can or will happen. This is your great night remember? Nothing bad can happen to you on your great night. I would never let anything happen to you. But please, we have to leave, it's not safe here." Merideth snapped out of her trance, and turned to Troy.

"Thank you," she told him, "I mean it, I really needed that, gosh thank you so much."

"It's fine, you're welcome, but that'll mean nothing if we don't get to those buses."

Meanwhile on the buses everyone was taking their seats when Courtney asked everyone, "Where's Troy and Merideth?"

Carly told her, "I don't know they were coming he said he'd be right behind us."

"Yeah," Abby added, "He was gonna come after he got Merideth to stop staring at the fire."

"Fire?" Courtney said in shock, "Oh my gosh, oh no, Merideth,"

"What? What's going on?" Abby asked,

"Nothing I'll be back in a minute." Courtney told them as she headed for the front of the bus. But before she could get out the door the teacher grabbed her and stopped her.

"Where do you think you're going it's unsafe out there?"

"Merideth and Troy are out there I have to go get them."

"By now, you'd never make it back before fires engulf the area,"

"No that's not true, I have to go get them," she said, struggling to get free.

"No you have to stay here on the bus"

"Well what about them, are you just going to leave them?"

"If they don't come soon, we well have two, we can't risk everyone's lives for two kids."

"No, that's not fair! I'm going to go get them!" Courtney said as she broke free from her jacket and ran out into the dark, rainy, night.

"Sir, we can't stay here much longer, we have to get out of here," The bus driver told the teacher.

"Fine they're not coming back, let's get out of here," He said as he threw Courtney's jacket out the closing doors. The buses started their engines and began to pull out.

Ben, Keeton, Carly and Abby looked at each other with confusion,

"Where's Troy, Merideth and Courtney?" Carly asked panicking.

"I don't know, what the heck's going on?" Ben replied, looking to see if they were up front.

"Please tell me they're on here, please," Abby was begging,

"Nope, they're not, Keeton" told her, "maybe they just got on another bus, that's all,"

"Yeah, they're on another bus, safe and sound," Ben told them. None of them believed it, but it was all they could do. They sat in their seats at watched outside, hoping their friends were okay.

Back at the cabin area. Troy and Merideth were heading towards the parking lot, when they saw Merideth's sister running toward them. They stopped when she met up with them.

"Oh my gosh you two, come on we have to get going the buses are about to leave, we have to go come on." Courtney pleaded.

"We know, we know, we're going, come on," Troy told her as they ran toward the parking lot.

"I'm sorry," Merideth, told Courtney, "It's all my fault,"

"It's okay, don't be, I kinda figured out what happened, put two and two together,"

"Okay," Merideth told her as they reached the packing lot.

"Oh no," Troy said, "They left without us,"

"Hey, what's this?" Merideth asked as she held up a soaked jacket.

"That's my jacket! I can't believe he just threw it out of the bus like that." Courtney told them, glad to have her jacket back.

"Wait who did that?" Troy asked.

"The teacher of course, I hate him I really do." Courtney told them, " I tried to get off the bus to get you two and he grabbed me and wouldn't let me go, so I pulled out of my jacket and ran off."

"Aw, you did that? Thanks" Merideth told her sister.

"Yeah I love the touchy feely moment and all, but I can't help but notice, we're stuck her with no buses!" Troy told them, getting a little frustrated.

"Yeah, I know what do we do now?" Courtney asked,

"I don't know," Merideth said, realizing how bad the situation was.

Troy turned around and looked them in the eyes, bangs dangling over his, with the rain pouring down and told them,

"Try to survive, that's all we can do…"