Damn. Stupid dare. Arms burning, I sliced my paddle desperately through the choppy water, my canoe rocking percariously from side to side. Behind me, the distant whine of the speedboat engines grows louder. “Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I berate myself as the canoe almost tips me into the frigid river. Of course I took the smallest boat possible from the boathouse. It was supposed to be easy. A little light breaking and entering. Mr. Jhara was on a trip to Cairo for the week and the house was completely empty. All I had to do was hop the fence, climb the drainpipe, open the window, grab the map and be gone. Easy-peasy right? Wrong.

The fence was seven feet tall, with spikes lining the top. After getting snagged at the top and having to contort myself to get down without falling on my head, I nearly got caught by security! You heard that right. Who leaves security behind at an empty house in the middle of a suburban neighborhood? Ducking and doging security officers that could double as brick walls, I made it to the drainpipe. Trying to climb it was like trying to hold onto a greased pig: next to impossible. Still, I perservered and after slipping and some colorful swearing, I managed to make it to the study window. Mr. Jhara had found an old Spanish trade ship and wanted to use the map to guide a team of divers to go down and retrieve it. This ship was supposedly stuffed to the gills with gold, but Mr. Jhara wanted to put it in a museum so everyone could see it or some garbage like that. My friends dared me to steal the map so we could dive and get the treaure first. Only problem: this was proving to be the most difficult dare I had ever taken on. Jimmying the window took _forever_ since the stupid thing had like five freakin’ locking mechanisms on it. At least the window opened quietly. With some of these older houses, the windows creaked like my nana’s knees. The desk was solid oak with a million drawers. Of course Mr. Jhara didn’t leave the map on the desk so I had to search the drawers. Every single drawer. Just my luck, no map. I turned and scoured the office looking for another hiding place. I spotted a large oil painting of some obscure landscape and pulled on it. It swung cleanly away from the wall to reveal a safe. Bullseye! Just as I was reaching for the keypad (all these rich folk use obnoxiously easy combinations to their safes), the office door slammed open and a huge man was staring at me. Built like a grizzly bear, he stood silently glaring. Slowly I pulled my hand away from the safe. Backing towards the window, I raised my hands. “Hey there buddy.” He growled at me and I winced. “Listen, I know you’re just trying to do your job, but I’ve got a dare to complete so howsabout we make a deal? You come back in five minutes and I’ll be long gone by then. What do you say?” He lunged for me and I leaped backwards, turning to dive out the window. I grossly misjudged the distance and ended up flying out the window, sailing past the little awning on the lower window and crashing inelegantly in the topiary bushes lining the yard. Groaning, I laid there trying to figure out if I was still alive until I heard a wailing alarm start. Swearing, I got up and half limped, half ran to the boathouse. Pulling at the door and cursing whoever decided to add doors that weighed a million pounds, I made my way inside. The river was my exit plan C, but sometimes you had to do what you had to do.

Scanning the boats, I realized one key flaw: I had no clue how to start or drive any of these. They were all rich-person speedboats with a million buttons and screens. I spotted a canoe and ran to it, hoping that security was as dumb as they looked and I could get a decent head start. Dumping it into the water, I steadied it as best as I could before climbing in and paddling away. Overhead, the clouds were dark and a chilly wind blew over the water. Thunder rumbled in the distance and I paddled as fast as I could to try and get to shore. Freezing rain pelted me as the river churned in the wind. Security was unfortuately not as dumb as they looked because I could hear the whining of speedboat engines. Of course they get speedboats while I had to use my own brute strength, which wasn’t much, to fight the river and paddle this damn canoe.

Somehow, I managed to make it to shore without capsizing or being caught and dragged the canoe onto the beach before taking off into the trees. Living next to forest all my life meant I could navigate the local woods with my eyes closed. In the dark, with rain pounding on my head and branches whipping around in the wind, it took all of my concentration just to stay alive. I didn’t even realise where I was until I almost slammed headfirst into an iron gate. THE iron gate of the house I just exhausted myself running from. I must have gotten turned around in the forest. I turned to get away and ran smack into a rock solid chest. Turns out my good friend the security officer from the study had been combing the woods and must have seen me running. I had just enough time to curse my friends for even daring me to do this in the first place before he grabbed me and I passed out from pure exhaustion.