The two friends had been walking for hours. Luckily they were able to pass the river upstream where there were a few rocks and a giant fallen tree. The was low too so and helped them make it closer to the mountains than they expected.
"Hey, maybe we should stop and find shelter" said Justin, "we can go over there by those trees by that little hill".
Tati nodded her head and they walked towards the spot Justin pointed to. At the bottom of the hill there was a fallen tree, this was a perfect place to rest. Justin began setting up the emergency tent in case it rained, "I'll go grab some sticks to get a fire started" said Tati.
Tati went and grabbed some twigs and leaves then arranged them in a circle. Tati then began to twirl a stick quickly between her hands until there was smoke. She began blowing on the smoke and continued to twirl the stick until finally a fire caught. Tati was smiling from ear to ear, happy with herself that she was able to start a fire. She remembered when her parents would take her camping and when they fished, her parents would start a fire to cook the fish for dinner. Tati turned to help Justin with the tent but he had already built it and was staring at her weirdly again "oh god, is he going to kiss me again" she thought. Her heart began to pound out her chest and her palms felt sweaty "I definitely do not like this feeling" she inwardly rolled her eyes, "What? Why are you staring at me?" asked Tati.
"Oh nothing, I just didn't know you could actually start a fire" he teased.
"Well yeah, I watched my parents do it a few times when we used to go camping."
"Hmm, well you did a great job and looked amazing at it" he winked.
"Shut up" replied Tati as she rolled her eyes and lightly punched him in the arm.
"Ouch .. okay okay, you got it" said Justin as he jokingly grabbed his arm in pain.
"On a serious note, I'm hungry" cried Tati.
"Craving anything in particular? We have a couple of can food left, but we might run out eventually" said Justin.
"Okay then surprise me and tomorrow we can gather food while we travel. Oh maybe if we can find or make something to catch fish with, then we can try fishing."
"Good idea. Well I'll get started on dinner, you relax" replied Justin.
"Actually I was going to look at the map and sketch in more details".
Justin nodded his head and began taking supplies out to cook. Tati watched him for a few minutes as he started cooking and decided to pull out the map. She sketched in the area they were able to cross the river and key features they saw like the oak tree growing in the middle of the woods by itself or the string tied to the tree branch by the river crossing, this way they wouldn't get lost.
Tati finished editing the map and folded it back into her bag. She looked over at Justin to see if he was almost finished with dinner. Justin's back was facing her so she couldn't see what he was making, "ugh I just had to say surprise me". She decided to sit there and wait rather than bother him with trying to help.
Tati was watching Justin move around while cooking, he almost looked elegant and like he was enjoying cooking. Tati realized she had been staring at Justin for a while and shook her head. "Is this how Justin was staring at me before? And what did he mean by I looked amazing at starting a fire?" Then she remembered that while she was staring the fire she had bent over to blow at the smoke to get the flames started. She inwardly sucked her teeth at her foolish innocence, was he checking me out? Does he actually like me?
Tati started to wonder what was going on but decided to focus on other stuff, like if they had any supplies to catch fish with, if not she could make a net or something with a few leaves, sticks and vines if she could find any. Tati was getting excited about being able to fish, she almost forgot the situation they were in and that they need to find help.
"Dinners ready!" said Justin "we have a vegetable chicken noodle soup and crackers."
"It smells so good" said Tati drooling.
"Thank you. It's not my best though, I didn't really have any seasoning or anything so I had to make something with the supplies we had" said Justin as he handed her some soup.
Tati took a sip to taste it and make sure it wasn't too hot "no this is perfect" she responded as she continued to finish her soup. Justin looked at Tati with a smile his eyes gleaming with happiness because she actually like his food and finished it.
Tati then drank some water and handed the rest to Justin. She got up and stretched, the smallest yawn escaping her mouth.
"Tired already?" asked Justin.
"Yeah. We actually walked a lot and covered good distance today".
"Go get some rest then, I'll clean up here and take watch" said Justin.
"No that's okay, I'll help you clean then we can get some rest. We both should be well rested for the rest of our journey tomorrow".
"Okay fine" agreed Justin.
They both cleaned up their mess and got ready to go to sleep.