Best. Day. Ever.

Emily jumped out of the car and ran to the back porch, her hood flying off to reveal brown curls. Sprinting towards the two dark-haired brothers in the backyard, she shoved the thick-haired one from behind in greeting, then proceeded to smack the tall one in the back. Zack yelped, rubbing his shoulder blades and spinning towards Emily. Matthew laughed at his younger brother as Emily stared back at the boy with buzzcut hair with a mischievous smile on her face.

“What was that for!” Zack yelled.

“Nothing, yet,” Emily smirked, reveling in the playful banter. “Something tells me you will deserve it before the evening is over.”

“Yeah, probably,” Zack replied, smiling ruefully.

Another car pulled into the driveway as another boy with slightly longer, light brown hair ran into the yard. Emily turned and greeted with him with a word.

“GAME!”

John groaned in mock dismay, while Zack swore behind her. “The Game” was something of an inside joke between Emily and her friends. The rules stated that if you thought of The Game you lost The Game, and when the lost The Game you had to tell everyone around you. As a result, just meeting certain people, such as John, or seeing certain things, called triggers, would remind her of The Game. Thus, saying “Game” turned into a sort of salutation amongst them.

John smiled as he jogged up to the group. “Just remember,” he said, turning towards Emily, “You lost too!”

Emily laughed, her brown eyes sparkling. She had been looking forward to this evening for weeks. She was a sophomore in a public high school, but everyone else in the group was homeschooled. That, along with the massive amounts of homework she received every day, meant that she barely got to see or talk to them.

“Hey guys,” Matthew, the computer geek, said, pulling them over to a laptop sitting next to a hammock. “Look at this!”

What they were supposed to look at, Emily never knew, because just as they drew next to the hammock, a figure jumped out of the fabric! Emily shouted in alarm, then laughed as Zane stood up in front of them. His short, curly brown hair was covered in wood-chips and leaves from constant parkouring and pranks. Emily wondered how long he had been there unnoticed.

“Hello!” He called with a bow in a mock australian accent. “How you doing mates?!”

“You could have hurt my computer!” Matthew scolded unhappily.

“Well, I didn’t,” Zane said with a shrug, “So there’s nothing to worry about! C’mon, let’s get a fire going before it gets too dark!”

Emily looked up at the sky. It was still blue, but the sun was beginning to set. “We’ll get some wood,” she said, grabbing John’s arm. “C’mon!”

“Wha- ok!” John said, slightly startled, following Emily into the forest.

Emily practically danced over the underbrush, leaping over logs and darting between trees. John struggled to keep up behind her.

“Wait up!” he called.

Emily glanced over her shoulder. “Whoops!” she said, climbing a tree branch to wait. It didn’t take long for John to catch up.

“I thought we were supposed to be collecting wood!” John called up at her.

Emily laughed, swinging her legs so that she hung upside down from the branch. She laughed more as the blood rushed into her head. Soon, she couldn’t stop laughing. John laughed too.

“I- I can’t-” Emily could barely get a sentence out. “I can’t stop laughing!!!”

John adopted a grave expression. “Should I be concerned?”

“No!!” Emily yelled happily. “Best. Day. Ever!”

“Well someone’s in a good mood,” John noted, somewhat bemused. “The evening has barely started yet!”

“No homework,” Emily chanted in a singsongy voice, swinging playfully on the branch, “No responsibilities,” she swung higher, “No worries,” the branch creaked, “No-”

CRASH. The branch broke and Emily tumbled onto the leafy floor. John cried out, startled, but Emily popped back up, unhurt and crowned with leaves.

“No injuries!”

John laughed at her apt finish. “In that case…” He picked up a handful of leaves and threw them at Emily. Yelling happily, she returned fire, and soon the air was dancing with the falling leaves.

Suddenly, something crashed behind them. Emily spun around, but saw nothing but a stray dog on the edge of the woods. John took advantage of the distraction to throw another pile of leaves in her hair. Laughing, Emily shook her head. When she looked up again, the dog was gone.

When they returned to the backyard with armfuls of branches and twigs, a small flame was flickering in the metal firepit, courtesy of Zack’s Boy Scout skills. Emily took over, babysitting the fire with the wood they had gathered, coaxing it into a roaring campfire. To her, fire-building was something of an art. The rest of the group walked up behind her.

“Looks like the Girl Scouts taught you how to camp after all!” Zane said half-teasingly. “I thought all you did was sleep in cabins and make crafts!”

Emily threw another stick in the fire and retorted, “You won’t be saying that when I save all of your lives with CPR someday!”

“Hey!” Zack protested. “I can do CPR too!”

Emily pretended to brush off his comment, while John faked alarm. “Why would all of us need CPR at once?” he asked, looking at Emily. “Are you plotting something?”

“Well, someday I think she’s gonna give me a heart attack from all the times she smacks me in the back!” Zack noted, half-amused, half-annoyed.

“You deserve it,” Matthew noted from behind the computer. Emily shrugged and focused on the fire. Matthew and Zack had a notorious rivalry as brothers, but Emily could argue that her past romantic relationship with Zack might have been even more notorious. She wasn’t sure which fault of Zack’s Matthew was referencing, but either way, she wasn’t going to bring it up. Things seemed to finally get back to normal between the two of them, and she wanted to keep it that way.

“Hey guys!” called Zane from the branches of a tree. Emily looked up, startled.

“Zane,” she yelled at the figure swinging idly, “You’re going to kill yourself someday, you know!”

Zane laughed off her concern and neatly backflipped onto the ground. Rolling her eyes, Emily grabbed the back of Zack’s shirt before he could try the same stunt.

Zack looked at her for a moment, smiled mischievously, then grabbed a stick protruding from the fire and ran off with it! Emily let go of his shirt in surprise and yelled after him, but Zack just whooped and yelled like an indian chief. Zane grabbed another torch and followed him. Emily looked exasperatedly at John, who looked nervously at the tiny flame trailing over Zack’s head. Matthew just put in headphones and buried his head in his computer screen.

For the next fifteen minutes, Emily focused on chasing down Zack and Zane. Luckily, Zack’s flame had gone out in the wind, so Emily focused on running Zane down, which was no easy task. Though Emily prided herself on being the only member of the group who could run over three miles, Zane was much faster than her. Unlike Zack, however, Zane was somewhat sensible, and blew out the faux torch after a minute. Sighing in relief, Emily turned back towards the campfire, intending to give Zack another good hit between the shoulder blades, when Matthew yelled and a cacophony of notes filled the air.

“Turn it off!!!” Matthew yelled, now computerless. Turning in the direction of the noise, Emily saw that Zack had somehow acquired Matthew’s computer. Coming from its speakers was Zack’s favorite sort of music: Dubstep. Emily groaned in mock distress, but Matthew was having none of it.

“GIVE ME BACK MY COMPUTER!” he roared, running towards Zack. Zack looked delighted to get a rise out of his older brother and sprinted away with the laptop. Suddenly, the same dog Emily had seen in the woods burst out of the forest! Before anyone had a chance to react, chaos erupted.

Obviously deciding that the two brothers were playing some sort of game, the dog proceeded to run right in front of Matthew, then chased Zack. As a result, Matthew found himself sprawled on the ground, and Zack was soon playing a sort of involuntary tag with the animal, swearing at the top of his lungs.

Zane followed Zack, grabbing the dog’s collar, but only succeeded in getting dragged through the dirt a few feet before being forced to let go. Emily ran over to Matthew, who seemed unhurt except for a small scrape, but looked thoroughly ticked off. Emily ran for some bandaids, passing John, who seemed to be still processing what was going on in front of him. Suddenly, Emily had an idea.

“John! Fuzz!”

“Now is not the time to make us lose The Game, Emily!” Zane yelled, dusting himself off and taking off after the dog again.

Emily groaned. John’s dog, Fuzz, was another common trigger for The Game. “Not that! John, see if you can calm the dog down!”

John’s puzzled expression lit up with understanding. The sound of Dubstep filled the yard again as Zack ran back around the house. As he passed by with the dog on his heels, John called to him, “Zack! Stop running!”

“Are you crazy?!” Zack yelled back. “No way! This thing might have rabies or something!”

Zack kept going, the consistent “wubs” fading into the background. John and Emily exchanged nervous looks. Neither of them had thought of that. Suddenly, John grabbed Zane’s arm as he ran past.

Zane looked at John in irritation. “What?”

“You were close to the dog,” John noted. “Was it foaming at the mouth or anything that would make it look like it has rabies?”

“No,” Zane said, panting. “It just looks like it was chasing Zack for fun.”

“That’s what I thought,” said John, “but I had to be sure. Try to get Zack to stop running, okay? It should calm down the dog somewhat.”

“Even if I have to tackle him!” Zane promised, running off again.

“Don’t let him break my computer!” Matthew yelled.

“Alright!” Zane yelled with some annoyance. As Zack ran around the house again, Zane stationed himself on the opposite side of the yard. When the frantic tag-team turned back into the front yard, Zane was waiting for them. Lunging, he grabbed Zack and pulled him into a rough stop. The dog jumped up in excitement, and Zack shielded his body with the computer.

“Take the laptop!” he yelled at the yipping dog, “Just don’t bite me!”

“It doesn’t have rabies, you moron!” Zane yelled in his ear.

A whistle and soft clicking noises came from the other end of the yard, and the dog ran towards John. With his arm outstretched, John coaxed the dog to come closer. Emily stood off to the side, tensed in case anything should go wrong.

It didn’t. Within 30 seconds, the dog was on its back, allowing himself to be petted. As John examined the dog’s collar, Matthew stormed up to Zack, exchanging a pointed look with Emily.

She nodded with a mischievous smile, muttering so only Matthew and John could hear, “Already planning on it.”

John smiled knowingly, and Emily walked closer to the group of boys on the other end of the yard. Matthew had already snatched the computer away from Zack and was examining it for any damage. Dubstep still emitted from the speakers.

Turning towards Zack, he said, “You’re lucky it isn’t broken.”

“How was I supposed to know it didn’t have rabies!” Zack protested.

Zane laughed. “That doesn’t excuse the fact that you took the computer!”

“It was sitting right there…” Zack argued defensively. “The temptation was too great to resist- OUCH!”

Emily smiled mischievously behind Zack, her palm bright red. Zack wheeled on her for the second time that day.

“I thought you said you had already done one for the day!”

“Oops,” Emily smiled sweetly. “The temptation was too great to resist.”

Zane and Matthew erupted into laughter. “You must really regret teaching her how to smack people on the back like that, Zack.” Zane noted.

“No kidding,” Zack muttered as John walked up, the dog trailing him.

“Where is Sanchez Drive?” he asked. “The dog belongs to someone there.”

“How am I supposed to know where roads are?” Zack protested. “I only just finished Drivers Ed.!”

“It’s down the block, turn right, then left, then left again.” Matthew immediately recited.

“Dang…” Zane muttered, impressed. “Do you have the whole neighborhood memorized?”

“More or less,” Matthew noted proudly. “I also know the layout of every road within thirty miles and-”

“We get it!” Zack yelled, cutting Matthew off. “Why don’t you go take the dog home, if you are so smart?”

“What!” Matthew protested. “I’m horrible with animals!”

“I’ll come,” John offered.

“Me too,” Emily immediately volunteered.

“Do you think that’s a good idea?” Matthew asked, giving Zack and Zane a sidelong glance, obviously unhappy with leaving the two troublemakers alone at the house.

“I would prefer to know where you guys are,” Emily explained, “and it would be better to have someone responsible come along. No offense, John.”

John pretended to be offended, the laughed. “None taken.”

Matthew was not convinced. “How do you know they won’t set the house on fire?”

“Hey, I’m not that crazy!” Zane protested.

“He is,” muttered Emily, looking pointedly at Zack.

“But-” Zack began to protest.

“Zack,” Emily cut him off, “You told me that you once tried setting tin cans on fire in your garage in the middle of the night when you were bored. Do you really think it’s all that unlikely?”

Zack grinned sheepishly. “It was fun though!”

Matthew sighed in exasperation, and Emily walked over to the fire. Flicking on a flashlight and throwing everyone their own, she quickly doused the fire.

“We’ll never be able to light it again!” Zack complained.

“I will.” Emily smiled, motioning towards Matthew and grabbing John’s arm. The dog jumped around blindly in the dark.

“You realise the wood is wet now,” John noted as the sound of Zane and Zack’s fire starting efforts faded into the distance.

“I’m a Girl Scout,” Emily laughed. “We do more than just crafts! I consider myself a bit of an expert at fire-building!”

John laughed.

“You want to know a secret, though?” Emily whispered.

“Umm, sure?”

“I learned it from a boy scout.”

The three teenagers laughed, and the dog barked at the noise.

“Well, either way, you fixed Matthew up very nicely!” John noted.

“You didn’t have to clean it up that much!” Matthew complained, looking down at his leg. The scrape had been thoroughly cleaned and bandaged.


“You’re not supposed to put a band-aid on something when it’s dirty!” Emily protested.

“It hurt though!”

Emily laughed, and the conversation ended as they dropped off the dog. The family was very happy to have their pet back and thanked them profusely. At Matthew’s insistence, they hurried back to the house. Thankfully, it was still in one piece. Zack and Zane were yelling in the backyard. It sounded like they were still trying to light the fire.

Matthew walked back over to his computer, opening it protectively. Laughing and talking with John, Emily proceeded to relight the fire. Zack got the marshmallows, Zane made everyone skewers, and the rest of the evening passed without incident.

It was still the best. day. ever.