to slip her unlaced boots over her socks before she crawled up to the zipper holding the tent flaps together and opened it slowly to keep down the noise.
The full moon gave Lauren enough light to see by as she crept between two rows of tents and into a cluster of trees at the edge of the field.
‘Rat,’ Lauren whispered. ‘Are you out there?’
The heavily built twelve-year-old called softly back in his Australian accent. ‘Over here.’
Lauren smiled as she sighted Rat, sitting with his back against a tree trunk. ‘How’s it going?’
‘Been better,’ Rat said, as he ran a grubby hand through his tangled hair. ‘Twisted my ankle when we crossed that lake and my back is killing me. You?’
‘About the same,’ Lauren said, giving a resigned shrug as she sat in the grass and snuggled up beside Rat.
‘How come you’re so late?’
‘Bethany. I thought she was never gonna fall asleep.’
The pair turned to face each other and exchanged a quick kiss.
‘Is that all I get?’ Rat asked indignantly.
‘You smell like BO and you’ve got dried-up baked-bean sauce around your mouth.’
Rat tutted. ‘Well Large had us walking and running for like, twelve hours. You’re no pot-pourri yourself.’
Lauren gave some thought to this before leaning in again and giving Rat a much longer kiss.
‘You know,’ Rat said when they broke off, ‘I’ve been thinking.’
‘Riiiiight,’ Lauren grinned. ‘That explains the clanking noise I could hear when you and Andy were walking in front of me earlier.’
‘Seriously,’ Rat said, a touch irritated. ‘We’ve been sneaking around behind everyone’s backs ever since I finished basic training. I reckon it’s time we went public.’
Lauren scowled at the grass between her legs and let out a deep groan. ‘If I’d known you were gonna start on that again I would have stayed in my tent.’
‘I want a normal girlfriend. This is driving me nuts.’
Lauren grabbed hold of a branch and hauled herself off the ground. ‘Goodnight, Rathbone.’
‘Don’t be like that,’ Rat said, as he reached out and grabbed Lauren’s trouser leg.
‘Let off or I’ll boot you one.’
‘You’re doing my head in, Lauren.’
‘I like it the way it is. I don’t want the pressure of everyone talking about us, and making snide remarks and asking what’s going on all the time.’
‘You’re so full of crap,’ Rat snorted. ‘You’re just scared that James will take the mickey. It’s totally immature.’
‘Hey,’ Lauren snarled, raising her voice above a whisper for the first time. ‘I’m not immature. Now let go of my bloody trousers.’
‘You’ll have to tell James that you’ve got a boyfriend sooner or later,’ Rat said, as he defiantly tightened his grip and tugged Lauren towards him. ‘I mean, he’ll get upset if you don’t invite him to your wedding and he’s bound to suspect something when you start knocking out kids …’
‘What makes you think I’ll ever be getting married?’
‘I spent all day looking forward to meeting up with you,’ Rat said, as he gave up the struggle and let Lauren go. ‘But you know what? I’m sick of this. It’s pathetic.’
Rat letting go coincided with an almighty tug from Lauren and the sudden lack of resistance caught her by surprise. She took an awkward stumble, tripped over a tree root and ended up clattering into the low-slung branches of a neighbouring tree.
‘Moron,’ Lauren growled.
‘This was totally worth losing an hour’s sleep over,’ Rat said caustically.
As he stood up, he grabbed a golden object from the pocket of his fleece and threw it at Lauren.
‘What’s that?’ Lauren asked, as she picked it off the ground between her boots.
‘Mint Twix bar, limited edition. The one you’re totally addicted to.’
Mr Large had given the cherubs strict instructions not to bring extra food or items that weren’t on the equipment list.
‘Large would have made you exercise till you puked if he’d caught you with this,’ Lauren said. She tried to keep up her grouchy tone, but couldn’t help letting a rush of warm emotion into her voice.
‘I know,’ Rat said, trying to make out that he couldn’t care less.
Lauren was totally flattered that Rat had taken a huge risk, just so that he could give her a gift. Rat cared about her and why the hell was she ashamed of that?
She stepped back towards Rat and gave him a big hug followed by a theatrical smooch on the cheek.
‘Sometimes …’ Lauren smirked, but was unable to finish her thought. ‘Sod it, we’ll tell everyone. We can go to the cinema together and hang out in each others’ rooms and …’
Lauren’s