"Dig harder," Ethan urges.

"Faster!" David screams when I feel a fingernail break and stop digging for a fraction of a second to check it.

The problem is, we're not digging in the sand. We're digging up rocks that may have been here for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Maybe our holy forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob walked on these rocks we're digging. It's not an easy task, and now the sun has come up and hits me in the face. I wish I had my sunglasses, because now I'm squinting. I'll be able to blame my premature wrinkles on this rock-digging experience.

I feel a tickle on the back of my hand. I need to scratch it, but don't want to stop digging because I want to show Avi that I can be a good ditch-diggin' soldier and

I don't want to small-yamean-small back to the base. I really want a ride.

When the itching bugs me so much I can't ignore it, I hesitate and look down at my hand.

Oh! My! God!

There is a HUGE creepy black spider crawling on me. I throw down the shovel and shake my hand vigorously.

"AAAHHHHHH!" I scream and run, not able to stop the heebie jeebies. I keep shaking my hand just in case the creepy crawler is still on me.

What if it bites me?

What if it's poisonous?

What if it crawls up my sleeve?

What if it already laid creepy spider babies on me!

"What's wrong?" Jess cries out.

"Are you hurt?" Miranda yells over my screams in a concerned voice.

"Did something bite you?" Nathan calls.

I can't stop to explain, because I'm still jumping around and shaking like a madwoman.

I'm barely aware of Avi attempting to subdue me. I flail my arms and slap his hands away because I'm still worried the spider is on me.

But then Avi twirls me around so my back is against his and he wraps his arms around me so tight I can't move.

I'm breathing hard and I'm sweaty and smelly and totally freaked out from spiders and embarrassment because everyone is watching me.

Now I'm in Avis arms, which are like a vice holding me still.

"Wasitacrav?"

"No, not a crab," I gasp. Do crabs even live in the desert?

"I didn't say crab. Ah'crav. .. a, uh..." He's searching his brain for the English word so he can translate. "Scorpion?" he finally says.

"No."

"Are you hurt?" he asks. He's so calm I stop struggling against him.

"I don't know. It was..." I choke out the word. "A spider."

"A spider!"

Everyone else laughs hysterically.

"I... I think it was a black widow. It was really big! And hairy! And it was crawling on my SKIN!"

"Black widows aren't hairy," he says, but instead of making fun of me like everyone else, my boyfriend turns me around, takes my hands in his, and inspects them. "It's gone."

"What if it crawled up my shirt?" I say, squirming. I swear I feel little prickly legs on my back. It could be my imagination, like when you're talking about lice and you start scratching. But it really feels like spiders are crawling all over me.

"Don't panic."

I keep squirming. "I'm afraid it's still on me. Avi, help me. Please," I beg.

Without hesitation, he picks me up like I weigh close to nothing and calls out for Liron to follow us.

He hurries behind a large boulder. "Take your shirt off. Nobody can see you." He turns around, giving me privacy.

I unbutton the shirt as fast as I can while Liron stands next to Avi. Her back is to me, too. I think he called her over because he didn't want to have our entire unit see him take me somewhere alone. He doesn't want us to get in trouble again.

Liron is our chaperone.

I can't believe I need a chaperone when I'm with my boyfriend.

"Okay, it's off. I'm not going back out there in my bra." I mean, Avis seen me with just a bra on, but not in public.

Avi holds out his hand, his back still to me. "Give it to me."

"My bra?"

He glances back at me, even though we both know one word from Liron to Sergeant B-S about him seeing me with no shirt will probably have him doing pushups again. "No. The shirt."

After I hand it to him, I watch him carefully inspect it from top to bottom. He turns it inside out, making sure its free of creepy crawlers. He even opens the pockets and inspects those.

He tosses the shirt back to me. "There's nothing on it, or in it. Trust me."

"Thanks," I say. If there's anyone at the top of my trust list, it's Avi. Now that I'm calm, I can't confirm that the spider was hairy. And maybe it wasn't as big as I made it out to be.

Liron shakes her head. "If I didn't see it with my own two eyes, I wouldn't believe it."

"What can't you believe?" I ask her.

"Avi Gefen inspecting a shirt for a spider."

"Why?" My boyfriend is my hero; why shouldn't he help me?

Liron chuckles. "Avi tells everyone else in SayeretTzefa to suck it up, whether they're tired, bleeding, or throwing up from exhaustion. But with you... and a little spider..." She shakes her head. "I don't get it."

After I have the shirt back on, they both turn around to face me. Avi points to me as he talks to Liron. "You saw her--she was freaking out."

"And you came to her rescue. She's ruining your reputation."

"She's my girlfriend," Avi says defensively. "What would you want me to do?"

"Treat her like a soldier, like you treat the rest of us. She didn't sign up to be rescued, she signed up to be a trainee."

"This isn't about Amy. It's about us."

Wait. One. Second. Did he just say "us" as in Avi and Liron "us"... not Amy and Avi "us"?

"Oh, shit." Avi rubs his temples as he squeezes his eyes shut. "I didn't mean to say that in English."

Fear, deep and strong, slices through my body. I'm afraid to ask, but can't stop myself more than I can stop myself from breathing.

""What are you saying, Avi? Are you two, like, a couple or something?"

Chapter 11

milk + meat = not kosher my boyfriend + kissing another girl= not kosher

I turn to Liron for answers.

"Avi, tell her," Liron says.

""Yeah. Tell me." When he hesitates, my entire body goes numb. "It doesn't matter, anyway, because Nathan and I have been dating since February, after you left. I wanted to tell you, but I didn't want to upset you."

Phew. I can't believe I got the lie out without choking.

Crunching stones alerts us that someone is about to join us. It's Nimrod. He looks at Liron, then Avi, then me. "Hakol Beseder --everything okay? No more spiders?"

"No spiders," I say. "And everything is just hunky-dory. Right, Avi?"

I lied to Liron and Avi because I didn't know what else to do. I'm in total shock. "Was everything Avi told me back in Chicago about how much he loves me a complete lie? "Were all those letters he wrote me lies, too? He knows I have trust issues because my parents never married and I didn't even have a relationship with my father until last year.

No wonder Avi doesn't want me here. He wants to be free to have his relationship with Liron on base and then have me, his American girlfriend, on the side.

Ugh, the thought of it makes me sick.

I storm back to my group, leaving Nimrod with the lovebirds. Okay, Avi and Liron don't look or act like lovebirds, but he's obviously dating her behind my back. And I'm obviously the idiot girlfriend thinking it was worth it to spend time at a military boot camp to see my boyfriend.

Now I'm stuck. I would quit, but I begged my dad to sign me up and there's no turning back now. If I leave with my tail between my legs, I can just imagine what my dad will say. "I told you you're too young to have a serious relationship with Avi. I told you the program wouldn't be easy, and you couldn't handle military life. Next time listen to your father."

I glare at anyone laughing at me. Every comment, every snicker, is like nails dragging down a chalkboard, making me cringe.

Jess runs up to me. "Amy, are you okay?"

"I'm fine," I snap back, which earns me a weird look from my best friend.

"Did you get bitten?" Miranda asks me.

"No. I don't want to talk about it."

Our team hasn't finished digging the hole yet, although all the other teams have. Nimrod's team is giving themselves high fives, so I assume they're the winners of the challenge.

Liron orders her team into formation without looking my way.

Avi peers down into our pathetic, three-inch-deep hole.

"We lost," Nathan tells him. "Which isn't a big surprise considering we had one less person and no team leader after you guys disappeared."

"We're not going back until our ditch is finished," Avi informs us. "No giving up."

Like he did with our relationship?

Since Avi left Chicago, I haven't thought of anyone else. I haven't been remotely interested in another guy because I know he's The One. He said we were going to be together forever, that he wanted to marry me one day. I believed him, which makes me the dummy.

Listen, I know I have to finish high school, go to college, and get a job. But I also thought my future included Avi, too.

A big army truck comes into sight, kicking up desert dust in its wake. Nimrod and his team hop on and, within a minute, are out of sight.

My team members are still shoveling, per Avis orders. I'm purposely ignoring anyone with a name that starts with an A, has an /at the end, and a Vin the middle. I can feel his eyes boring into my back like Superman's X-ray vision. But my boyfriend isn't Superman, at least not anymore.

And now, to save face, I have to pretend Nathan and I are in love. I'm not sure Nathan will go for the charade. Dare I tell him? He's afraid enough of Avi as it is.

Avi tells the rest of the teams to file out and head back to base while we finish digging. Tori is shoveling, although she's not going fast and I think we might be here for a few days. We're all so hot and sweaty I wonder if skin can actually melt off of our bones.

"Amy..." I hear Avis voice from behind me.

"Is someone talking to me?" I ask Jess. "Because all I hear is hot air." I tap on my ears with my palms, pretending to clear my ear canals.

Miranda taps me on the shoulder and nudges me to turn around. "Avi's right behind you, Amy. Maybe you really did get bit by that spider and it affected your hearing."

Thanks, Miranda. Not. The girl is not too quick on social cues, that's for sure. I love Miranda to death (okay, not to death ... that's a bit over the top), but she can definitely use lessons in how to not take everything so literally.

I turn to Avi with a cool smile on my face. "Did you want something, O Unfaithful One?"

"Don't say that."

"Why not? It's true, isn't it?"

"You walked away before I could explain, Amy."

"So explain now."

"Not with an audience."

"We have no choice, Avi, do we?" I focus on kicking a large rock. "Did you sleep with her?"

All conversations immediately stop. Everyone waits for Avi to answer. I think the air even stops moving (although I can't say that's a big feat because there wasn't a breeze to begin with).

"No, I didn't sleep with her--"

"Did you kiss her?"