Triple Dog Dare at Cranberry Hollow by Patrick Colin Jackson (f/f, qs) After an hour, Marcie's bright green Pontiac Banshee completed the drive up the old dirt road to the edge of Cranberry Hollow. Four sensational-looking teenage girls emerged from the car: blonde-haired Erica; red-haired Marcie herself, who also happened to be Erica's fraternal twin sister; brown-haired Lucy and black-haired Simone. All were dressed in the uniforms of a posh Catholic high school named San Pellegrino Academy. Said uniforms would make Kelly Bundy proud since they were so short, snug and full-throttle sexy. Erica was carrying a large basket in either hand, while Marcie toted a video camera. The girls walked up to the edge of this swamp and halted. Marcie proceeded to recite the "slate" for them. "All right, The Omega Elite Presents ... Cranberry Hollow Initiation Number Twelve. Take one in five, four, three, two ..." She signaled that they were "on the air." Erica asked Lucy and Simone if they remembered how the initiation worked. Then she quizzed them both. Their answers were flawless: both pledges were to cross the swamp, meeting Marcie and Erica on the other side of Cranberry Hollow. En route, they were to gather a bushel of cranberries. There was one other condition: the pledges had to take the dreaded "Cranberry Shortcut," which was straight through the wettest and most treacherous swampland the wilderness had to offer. This was to guarantee that they hadn't simply hung around the outskirts of Cranberry Hollow with berries bought from the general store. Erica wished Lucy and Simone well, then turned to leave with Marcie. Without warning, Lucy issued the Challenge. "Erica? Before we do this ... Roll the Boxcar." Erica was caught slightly off guard, but didn't sweat it. Tradition was tradition, after all. She turned to address both Marcie and the video camera. "Fine ... Marcie, I've been Challenged. Somebody bring me the dice and the crate." With one hand, Marcie reached into her pocket and produced a dice boat containing one pair of black dice. This she handed to Erica, while Simone ran back to Marcie's still-unlocked car. Simone came back with a small plywood crate. Erica shook the dice boat and emptied it into the crate ... a twelve. Marcie and Simone applauded, but Lucy didn't seem impressed. "Congratulations, Erica ... now try it with these. Double or Nothing." Lucy produced a pair of dice from her own pocket. These new dice were blue. Erica became somewhat defensive. "Excuse me!? I've already overcome the Challenge. Tradition is, when you make the Boxcar, whatever you say goes." "So why are you so worried? You're the highest roller the school's ever known. What's the big deal?" Simone was getting suspicious herself. "Yeah, that's right Erica, when was the last time you ever /missed/ the Boxcar ... and had to join the Initiation?" If Erica was being defensive before, she had graduated to being more so than ever. "Now, look ... I've been through the Initiation like everyone else. I came back with the cranberries and the mud to prove it. The club records can verify that. So do you want to join the Omega Elite or what?" Lucy continued goading her. "Well, I'm sure you haven't held back all these months because you were /scared/." Simone joined in. "Of course, she'd have as much right to be as the rest of us ... everybody at school and her brother knows the Hollow's chock full of quicksand, plus Lord-knows-what-else." Erica scoffed. "Quicksand, schmicksand! You've been hearing too many horror stories. The closest thing to quicksand in that hollow is a mud patch too small for a piglet. And my abstinence is a tribute to Lord Luck ... nothing more, nothing less." She turned to face the camera. "Let all bear witness that if I ever missed a Boxcar, I would gladly join the Initiation." Lucy shoved her way past Erica to face the camera herself. "Let all bear witness to /this/: Forget Challenges and Boxcars; I Triple-Dog-Dare you to enter the Hollow with us and help lug our cranberries through that quicksand. Get what I mean?" Erica glared harshly at Lucy, until Marcie snapped her fingers insistently while mouthing Erica's name. Erica strode over and stood beside Marcie, who hit the "Pause" button on her camcorder. The twins spoke to each other very softly. "Erica, you have to go with them." "What!? Don't tell me you're taking their ..." "They Triple-Dog-Dared you, and they did it on-camera. Have you any idea what's going to happen to you for refusing a Triple-Dog-Dare?" "I'm going to assume it beats rolling a boxcar any day of the week." Erica lightened up a bit. "You know the rules of this club better than I do." "I haven't been Assistant to the past two presidents for nothing. Anyway, if you roll again, the rules say I've got to catch it on video and /not touch the tape/ when you're done. If either of us deviates, the roll doesn't count. Do you want the whole club to find out how their presidents load the dice to stay out of the initiations?" Marcie was very proud of her sister being president of the Omega Elite and of being her twin's assistant. It was the next best thing to being president herself. Defeated, Erica turned away from her sister and walked back to Simone and Lucy. Calling up every ounce of bravado in her fifteen year old body, she spoke. " ... Show me that quicksand." An hour later, Erica and both pledges had reached the heart of the swamp ... the wettest, quietest and mistiest part of Cranberry Hollow. All three girls had removed their snappy school blazers and were carrying them on one arm. As club president, Erica was strictly forbidden from helping the pledges in any way ... except to tell them that they were going in circles. She was about to say this when she stepped right off a steep, rather high ledge. Luckily, Simone and Lucy were there to catch her. Fifteen feet below them was an expanse of steaming, who-knew-how-deep water. On the other side of this little swamp was a large cranberry bog! A wide stream ran into the swamp on one side and out of it on the other. "So how are we getting across?" Lucy asked, not expecting anyone to have the answer. "That stream's too wide to jump, and I won't mention this ..." She indicated the misty swamp water. Simone answered. "Well, I don't know about you guys, but I've always had a kind of a guilty pleasure ..." She donned her blazer again. Fully uniformed, she climbed down the embankment into the water ... and disappeared into it! "Simone? Simone!" Lucy and Erica hollered, trying to see their friend through the mist and low-hanging foliage. "What the heck are you doing down there?" All they could glimpse were the bubbles from Simone's breath as she swam slowly beneath the surface. Abruptly, Simone popped back up, right in the center of the swamp. She pushed waves of dark hair out of her face to reveal a grin of contentment. "AH ... this feels awesome! Hey, you guys, come on in! I'll race you." Lucy was incredulous. "Are you nuts!? Simone, we can't swim in our uniforms! What would Headmistress Grant say?" Simone continued to swim dreamily about in the tepid swamp. "That old crumb's not here. Who's going to tell her?" "Ah, well, we have to get to those cranberries somehow ..." Erica shrugged, getting back into her blazer. Then she descended the embankment and eased herself into the swamp. Smiling, she crawled through the water toward Simone. Without warning, she executed a perfect surface dive. Erica stayed under for almost half a minute, then came up looking (if anything) even happier and more comfortable than before. "God, this is warm! I need to join these pledge-treks more often!" She called over her shoulder. "See you on the other side, Lucy!" As her two friends swam toward the cranberry bog, Lucy put her own blazer back on. Resignedly, she dropped fully clothed into the swamp herself. Seconds later, she resurfaced, moaning with pleasure. She lay on her belly in the water and began to float, rolling over whenever she needed to breathe. Finally opening her eyes, she noticed a dead branch overhead. She swam close to it and gripped it with both hands. Then she used it to pull herself out of the water ... then lower herself into it again. Eventually, she dangled in the water up to her waist, admiring the way her kicky little school skirt floated in the swamp around her. The skirt - as short as any cheerleader's - looked like a miniature table cloth that way, and the effect was quite amusing. Suddenly, the branch broke and spilled Lucy back into the swamp. Still holding the branch, she floated some more while churning the swamp with her sleek legs. She had always loved the way it felt to be partly-in and partly-out of the water, loved the way her clothes would stick to her back and bottom and legs when she started kicking. Erica was right ... they would have to come this way more often. After what seemed like an hour - not to say they couldn't have gone on in the water like that for another hour - the girls climbed out and went to get the cranberries. Since they were already soaked, all three of them waded right into the bog, which came nearly up to their hemlines ... which is to say it was quite deep indeed. But Erica, Lucy and Simone didn't mind. They could always do with the exercise of slogging through this soft, wet, sticky stuff. At least the bog didn't smell like sweat, and at least there were no loudmouthed jocks to make catcalls at them ... as opposed to the San Pellegrino gym scene. As the girls picked cranberries to fill their pails, Lucy suddenly noticed that they were sinking in the berry-laced slime. They worked faster, as the colorful mire crept up over their rumps. It felt terrific, but none of them had a rope or anything to anchor themselves to solid ground. Ergo, the sooner they finished and got out, the better. Finally, Simone and Lucy had their pails filled to the rim with cranberries. They waded back to dry land ... only to discover that Erica hadn't followed them! That's when both pledges heard their president crying for help. Sure enough, Erica was up to her chest in the center of the red bog, and still sinking! Lucy and Simone tore off their wet blazers and tied them together at the sleeves. The hurled the crude rope to Erica, but it wasn't long enough. So they called for Erica to take off her own blazer and tie it onto the end of the "chain". Erica - who was by now up to her armpits - did so, but when they strained to pull her out of the red bog, one of the blazers threatened to rip. Obviously, they wouldn't be strong enough to save Erica. Thinking fast, Lucy emptied her pail of berries and tossed it to Erica ... with instructions to hold it down tightly over the berry-laced mire so that the trapped air would keep her from sinking. Erica did so and it worked. Next Simone and Lucy waded back into the red bog, with Simone clutching a large root so they wouldn't get caught themselves. By now, the pale-faced Erica had sunk to her shoulders in the colorful slime. Lucy gripped the scruff of Erica's neck, but wasn't able to pull her free with just one arm. So she told Simone to hold onto her ankle as she fell forward. Simone did so, permitting Lucy to float in the red bog while gently nudging Erica - who was now up to her neck in cranberries and mud - to dry land. Alas, Erica was sinking too fast and was sure to go under before they reached solid ground. Simone did the only thing she could do. She emptied the other cranberry-pail and tossed it to Lucy, who gouged a divot in the brightly colored mire so that Erica could breathe. They repeated this process from time to time, as Erica was being guided through the red bog to safety. Finally, Erica was boosted onto dry land. In turn, she dragged Lucy and Simone out of their berry-laced entrapment. All three girls took a nice, long bath in the vast Jacuzzi of a swamp. An hour later, they emerged from Cranberry Hollow to meet Marcie. "You guys are all wet!" Marcie exclaimed. "What happened to you in there!? And where are the cranberries you were supposed to ..." Erica cut her off. "Forget the cranberries. These two are in the club." Then she turned and gave both pledges a big, grateful hug.