Dylan's pov

I couldn't sleep on Sunday night.

It wasn't because I was homesick, or wide awake, or simply just not desiring sleep. In fact, under any other circumstances, I could have fallen asleep within, legitimately, seconds. The week had exhausted me, from the long hours on set to the late night escapades that my castmates had chosen to drag me along on. I was more tired than I had been in my entire life, and all week I had craved nothing more than going to bed early tonight.

And now that Sunday had come, my mind refused to be silenced.

As I laid in bed, it was the thoughts that had circled my head all week, like a dog chasing its tail, that kept me up. No matter how hard I tried to stray my thoughts onto another topic, I always found myself back on square one, the same confusing subject.

Thomas Sangster.

The past week had been nothing but confusing. Why was he suddenly being so nice to me? He was supposed to hate me, not clean my room and bring me lunch and buy me coffee. Was this some form of joke?

And more importantly, did I want him to stop?

I stared into the darkness of my room, listening to the creaks and groans that emitted from the walls of the hotel. Emma had left earlier in the week, leaving me alone in the large room. I curled up under the heavy duvet, praying for sleep, but knowing it wouldn't come. Clenching my eyes shut, I forced my body to relax, but when my thoughts continued multiplying behind my tired eyes, I finally gave up.

Tossing the blanket from my body, I stood from my bed. I strode across my empty room towards the heavy wooden door, then threw it open, squinting in the onslaught of light. I cast a glance down the hall, then vanished from the doorway, determined to go find some comfort food.

I found a vending machine within minutes, mouth watering as I scanned the unhealthy food (thanks, America). I eagerly put in a dollar bill, bouncing like an excited five year old as a bag of oreos slid from the shelf. I spun back around once I held it, only to cry out and drop them (RIP oreos) upon being greeted by a small figure in front of me.

I stumbled backwards, more surprised than actually afraid. My heart beating frantically, I sagged in relief upon recognizing the figure.

"Thomas," I breathed. "You almost gave me a heart attack."

Thomas looked tense, dark bags beneath his eyes. His eyes fell to the carpet, as though shrinking beneath my gaze. "Sorry," he muttered, quiet and low.

The air held a certain fragility as we stood so near, the only sounds being our shallow breathing. I shuffled forward, but he stepped back, and my eyebrows crinkled in. Confusion rose in my chest, particularly towards this timid side of him that I had never witnessed before.

"What are you doing up?" I finally asked, my voice scratchy from speaking so hushed. It was nearing two in the morning, after all. He should be asleep. I should be asleep.

Thomas still refused to glance up. "Just couldn't sleep," he said curtly. He fidgeted nervously with the hem of his pajama shirt (which read, 'You Snooze, You Lose' in bold letters) and seemed peculiarly smaller than I had ever seen him before.

For some reason, my chest clenched with his words. My mind flashed to earlier in the day when I had snapped on him, and hoped that that wasn't the real reason he wasn't asleep now.

But judging by the way he kept shrinking away from me, I guessed that that was exactly the cause.

I bit my lip, watching him intently. After a beat had passed, I said, "Well, goodnight then."

Thomas nodded shortly, but didn't say anything back.

When I was finally back in bed, oreos long forgotten, I still found myself staring at the blank ceiling. But this time, it was the guilt eating away at me that prevented me from falling asleep.

______________________________________________________________________________

Monday morning, when I saw Thomas, it was clear he was going to pretend like the previous night had never even occurred.

It just so happened that we were both the first to arrive at costume fitting this morning, at precisely 7:00 am. He greeted me with a happy smile, as though he had a complete change of heart overnight, and offered me half of his apple.

"Um, sure?" I said as he handed it to me, more than confused. He seemed like a completely different person from the boy I had witnessed in the early hours of the morning. I was pretty sure he was upset last night, so I wondered what could have changed in less than five hours.

I raised the apple to my lips, sniffing it slightly. A devilish smirk formed on his mouth as I took a bite, the bitter juices slipping past my lips. His smirk widened as he watched, and my eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"What?" I finally asked, mouth still full.

He shrugged, turning away. Then, at the last second before he disappeared into another room, he tossed over his shoulder, "I found that on the ground this morning, by the way."

I immediately gagged, spitting apple chunks on to the ground. Bastard, I thought.

"You're going to have to clean that up, you know," a voice drawled behind me as I wiped angrily at my mouth. I glanced back, immediately straightening up when I saw it was Wes Ball.

"Oh, hi Wes," I greeted. I gave an awkward wave, still unsure how to act around my boss. "I'll clean it up, don't worry."

Wes chuckled. I watched him fidget with the ball cap perched on his head as he seemingly pondered something, but then his mouth closed as he thought better of it. I gave him a half-smile, then bent down to clean up the mess that jerk-face made.

"Dylan?" Wes suddenly started above me, after a moment of silence had passed. I turned to him in acknowledgement. "Are you the out-doorsy-type, by any chance?"

I shrugged, ignoring why he may be asking. "I guess, yeah. Why?"

Wes nodded, grinning evilly. "How does camping sound?"

I froze, then began to stand. "Um...with you?" I mean, wasn't that unprofessional for a boss to want to hang out with his worker? Especially when that worker is twenty years younger? And--oh lord, what if Wes was actually some creepy pedophile who was secretly gay and he just wanted me--

My thoughts were broken by Wes suddenly laughing. "No, Dylan, with your castmates."

"Oh," I blushed. Yeah, I guess that made more sense. "Why?"

Wes looked towards the doorway where some of the cast was beginning to file into the room. "I want the chemistry in the movie to seem authentic...," he said, eyes focused intently.

I cocked my head in confusion, so he continued. "And the best way to achieve that would be some team bonding."

I nodded slowly, and after he asked me to tell everyone, I whipped out my phone. I opened up the group chat that we were all a part of, then typed in my message.

DYLAN: Guess who's going camping guys

KI HONG: Don't you dare say it, O'Brien

DYLAN: See you guys at 6 tonight.

Objections and complaints immediately flooded my phone, but I ignored them all. With a flutter of excitement dancing across my chest, I slipped off to go get some measurements for my costumes.

____________________________________________________________________________

The sky had already morphed into a kaleidoscope of colors by the time the entire cast had stumbled onto the pitch. I stared at the sunset in awe, eyes flickering from the fluorescent orange streaks erupting from the tip of the horizon to the deep blue limits farther away. Behind me, my castmates were attempting to build a fire, but I stayed rooted to the spot.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" I heard a familiar voice drawl. I didn't even have to glance over to recognize that the voice belonged to Kaya.

I hummed in lieu of reply. It was silent for a moment, the two of us just staring at the horizon. We waited until the bright colors had dulled, and then I couldn't help but sigh.

I looked over at her and whispered, "Why is it that we always lose the beautiful things in life the fastest?"

If Kaya was surprised by my sudden profoundness, she didn't outwardly show it. "I don't know," she replied just as softly, "But I sure wish I did."

Our soft moment fell away as a chorus of shouts rose from the cast, and our heads whipped to the side. Then we were both running towards the group, who were floundering around like chickens who lost their heads.

"What's going on?" I shouted, pushing through the crowd. My eyes fell on the disaster, and I audibly gasped. Behind me, Kaya whispered oh my god.

Because there, waving his arms around like an idiot, stood Will Poulter, his pant leg ablaze in flames.

I froze, eyes wide in shock. Will was shrieking and Kaya was screaming and I was mentally hollering stop, drop, and roll, you idiot!

And then Thomas was suddenly there, using his jacket to furiously beat out the flames.

When Will's fire was completely out, everyone fell silent. Will and Thomas panted heavily in unison, and by the looks of it, Thomas's jacket was slightly singed at the end.

Suddenly Thomas spoke, voice low and rumbling, "Blimey, how big of an arse do you need to be to light your bloody self on fire?"

Silence. Then, before I could stop myself, I had burst into laughter.

The rest of the cast quickly followed suit, and then we were all laughing at Will, who laughed at himself. The crinkles of happiness in everyone's eyes had replaced their original discontent towards camping, and I found myself supporting myself on Kaya as I laughed.

Finally, we gathered our wits, and I managed to choke out, "Seriously, how did you light yourself on fire?"

Will wiped at the corner of his eye, and then stuttered,"I--I just--I dropped the match."

Ki Hong scoffed. "If I recall correctly, it actually happened that you were frustrated that you couldn't light the damn fire, then held the match up to your pant leg to prove that it 'couldn't light anything'."

And then we were all laughing again and it felt so good and so right, and I knew that tonight wouldn't be so bad.

By the time we had all settled down, we realized that now that the sun had almost completely set, it was beginning to get cold, and we still didn't have a fire. Luckily, Thomas came to the rescue.

"Give me the matches," he said, grabbing hold of the box in Will's outstretched hand. He kneeled next to the makeshift fire pit, quickly setting to work.

I didn't think as I stepped forward, grabbing some smaller twigs that lay on the ground. "Here," I said, handing them to him. "This will help with the kindling."

He nodded, placing it in the fireplace. I knelt by his side, and together we were able to get a strong fire blazing within minutes.

Our friends hollered and we bowed together, laughing slightly. "You guys make a good team," Kaya observed loudly. Everyone nodded in agreement, but Thomas said nothing in response.

I, on the other hand, restrained myself from gagging or throwing up or even objecting, because as much as I hated to admit it, I realized in that moment that yeah, maybe we did.

"So, now what?" Aml asked, eyes flickering away from the flames. We all glanced at each other, unsure what to do next.

Kaya suddenly smiled, and then she was lunging towards Thomas. "Tag!" she shouted, before dashing away.

Thomas sighed. "Seriously?" he asked, "We're going to play child games?"

"Yeah, we seriously are," I said, and then I sprinted off too, just as the rest of the crowd split apart.

I expected Thomas to brood angrily, but to my utter surprise, he chased off after Ki Hong. Ki Hong was obviously faster, but also a lot more clumsy, so Thomas caught him when he tripped over a tree root.

And so it went. Ki Hong chased Will and Will chased Aml and Aml chased Kaya, and I found that even though it was the most childish, simple game on the face of the planet, I was having more fun than I had had in ages.

We eventually grew tired and decided to conclude our game, all turning to crowd around the fire. Sweat coated most of our foreheads, but we all smiled the same bright grins. We chatted aimlessly for a a bit, ignoring the cold air that was beginning to become just a bit uncomfortable.

It was nearing eight o'clock pm at this point, so Ki Hong pulled out some dinner. He ripped open the package, and was immediately swarmed by hungry adults.

"Ooh, hotdogs! My favorite!" Thomas exclaimed excitedly, eyes wide in a childish excitement. I found myself grinning along with him despite myself.

"Of course a weiner is your favorite," Will snickered from across the fire. Thomas stuck his tongue out in reply.

We slipped into a quiet chatter after that, most of us watching the fire swallow the burnt edges of the wood. It was calming, if nothing else, to witness the glowing embers sizzle and spark, and whenever I glanced up, I could see the shimmer of the flames dancing in everyone's eyes. Time quickly elapsed, and I found that I was way more comfortable than I ever would have expected around these people who were strangers just two weeks ago.

I grabbed my own hotdog to roast over the flame at one point, which in turn earned me quite a bit of weeny jokes too. But I mean, hey, what else would you expect from a group of twenty-year-old men?

"Nice weiner you got there, Dylan," Kaya joked, which managed to stir the rest of the group.

"Thanks Kaya, I take good care of my weenies," I replied with a smirk.

Kaya bit her lip, then asked, "Oh, is there a special way to hold a weenie?"

I opened my mouth to reply, but Thomas managed to cut me off with a barely suppressed laugh. "Yeah, you cradle the tip."

At this point most of the group was in hysterics at our innuendoes, and I began to hear shouts of, "Oi, my weenie is splitting in half!" and "Your hands sure are good with that weiner," but it was Will and, surprisingly, Thomas, who put me over the edge.

Somehow, Will had managed to grab a deformed hotdog or something. It looked normal when he put it on the stick, but after he started roasting it, well, that's when things got weird.

"Guys, is my weiner bending?" Will asked, gazing intently at his dinner. It certainly wasn't only him, because even from across the fire I could see the tip of the dog beginning to bend upwards towards the sky.

Thomas didn't miss a beat. "That's what happens to weiners when things get heated."

Whether he meant it as an innuendo or not, we all certainly took it that way, and we were laughing hysterically within moments. My cheeks hurt and my stomach muscles complained from laughing so much, but still, I wouldn't trade anything for the euphoria pumping through my veins.

Much of the night continued quite like this, with jokes, laughter, and simple happiness. At some point I found myself beside Thomas, and it must have been the joy I was currently feeling that was messing up my thoughts, because it was certainly strange when I found that I didn't despise him all that much right now.

When I glanced over and noticed him shivering, I decided that it was definitely my happiness that was messing with my head. It was definitely my overwhelming joy that had ripped off my own coat, it was doubtlessly the reason I threw it at his face, and it was clearly the cause of my uncalled for stubbornness when he said he didn't want it. That, or maybe I'm just a really fucking good person.

"I don't need your coat, Dylan," Thomas said quietly, attempting not to draw any attention to himself. He tried to hand it back to me, but I refused again.

"Take it. You're cold," I said with my arms crossed over my chest. "I don't need it 'cause I've got a hoodie on."

Thomas sighed, looking conflicted. On one hand, it had gotten significantly colder as the night drew on, but on the other hand, it was coming from me, the guy he hated. As he tried to object one more time, I cut him off. "Just shut the fuck up and take my jacket."

Thomas finally relented, slipping it on. Neither of us mentioned that anything had happened for the rest of the night, and I was certain that the only reason any of that happened was because I was high on happiness.

We all finally settled down just after midnight, curling up beside each other around the fire.

"This wasn't so bad," Kaya finally said, as the sounds of the night started to become louder than our dwindling conversations.

"Is it always like this?" I asked suddenly. "Do castmates always get along this well?"

No one answered at first, and I was slightly embarrassed that I even had to ask. Everyone seemed to have forgotten that this was still my first movie. Thomas spoke up, and my head turned to look where he had somehow ended up laying right next to me. "No, we usually don't get along this well."

The rest of the cast hummed in agreement, and I thought for a second that that was going to be the last thing spoken for the night. And then Kaya spoke.

"Do you think Wes will be happy with our team-bonding skills?" she asked.

"Maybe," Will spoke from somewhere far away from me. "But to be quite honest I still don't know much about any of you guys."

I heard more than saw Kaya sit up after that. "You're right," she said. "Which is why we should all confess something about ourselves."

I've never seen an idea shot down so quick. Everyone disagreed, saying how we weren't middle school girls at a sleepover, and that was extremely cliche, but Kaya is Kaya, and Kaya gets what Kaya wants.

Which is how we all ended up pondering what on Earth we could admit to without weirding people out.

"I'll go first, you wusses," Kaya said, and everyone looked towards her. "When I was fifteen, I was told by my professor that I should quit pursuing becoming an actress and I should focus on my studies instead. When I landed my first acting job, I sent her a card that said, 'thanks for the advice, but you can suck it'."

We chuckled lightly, but her confession was just enough to get the ball rolling for everyone else. At first it was simple secrets, stuff that we wouldn't necessarily care if people found out, but then we dove deeper, make confessions whilst staying, "what is said at this campsite, stays at this campsite."

I learned about my castmates fears and dreams and embarrassments, and I even dared dish out some dirt on myself. I had first tried getting away with saying, "I'm gay" but they all replied "We knew that" so I fired back "Um, rude, considering I never even officially came out to you guys". And then I continued to tell them my coming out-story, in which everyone was supportive except my cranky neighbor, Mr. Gill, who had given me a brick as a congratulatory gift for admitting who I was (I can't even explain that one).

Thomas confessed last, though he seemed reluctant to do so. After only a moment of thinking he said, "I've never been in love."

Coming from anyone else, this wouldn't have surprised me, as we were all in our early twenties and were relatively inexperienced. But this was Thomas, the bad boy of Hollywood, the guy who had a boyfriend every other month. Of anyone here, I would have expected him to fall at least once.

No one questioned him, though I had a feeling everyone was thinking along the same lines as myself. We slowly grew quieter and quieter, until talking had ceased completely, replaced by only the sounds of the crackling fire.

And as we sat around the campfire, eyes too heavy to even keep them open, we listened to the songs of the night. I smiled softly, barely conscious at all in my dream-like state, finally letting my head droop to the side. Soft snores rose into the night air from my surrounding friends, and slowly I drifted off too.

I was teetering on the final edges of consciousness when I felt a small, warm body settle gently onto my chest, but I was much too close to sleep to care who it may have been.

//

A/N

ello chaps

Okay but seriously I had one goal for the chapter and that was for it to be funny but Im not funny so was this even funny? at all???? yikes

yikes yikes yikes who was I kidding when I said I might update twice over winter break oops my bad but HERE I AM BECAUSE IT'S FINALLY SNOWING

special thanks to _Gandalfthegay_ for their british words of wisdom last chapter. I used some of it here so thanks guys, you're the real mvp *hugs you*

also there was a hint to dylan's past in here but it was so so vague but you'll understand later maybe. also there was a hella cliche moment in there but I couldn't resist

I lowkey have to pee so bad that it might start coming out of my eyes so Imma leave this author's note short and go

love you, thank you for your support, have a beautiful day my munchkins

//sam\\