“I knew enough to stay away from you!”
He laughed as he punched open the door. “You make a point.” Ethan tilted his chin at me. “Catch ya in another life, Phoenix.”
I leaned into the table. “You know my name.”
Evan blared the horn when Ethan didn’t budge from the door. Ethan waved his middle finger his brother’s direction. Another, longer horn sounded. “I knew it before I said one word to you.” With a wave, Ethan gave me what was possibly the most real smile I’d seen from him.
Through the window I watched Evan’s truck leave. I was still looking through the window a few minutes after it had peeled away when someone showed up across from me. I figured it was the first camper who’d signed up for stick decorating, but it wasn’t.
“Not that I don’t encourage initiative with my counselors, but what are you doing here getting everything set for the crafts today?” Ben swept his hand down the table and last at me, like he was confused.
“Just getting things ready before the campers show up,” I said, hiding my confusion about as much as he was his. “Just like I have every day for the past month.”
“You think you’re scheduled for the crafts today,” Ben said like he was talking to himself.
“Yeah?”
“You didn’t check the schedule.”
My eyebrows came together. “No?”
Ben sighed, then shuffled through a few pages on his clipboard before holding it up in front of me. I glanced at the crafts column. “Naomi’s scheduled to lead crafts today?”
“So I’ve got the last day off or something?” I asked.
Ben sighed again, then stuck his finger at a different column on the schedule. My name was there. Beside the hiking box. Inside which was written, The last hike of the season. The Matterhorn was the route listed.
I swallowed. I’d been serving a sentence in the prison known as the craft room, and I was getting let out on the last day. I got to lead the last hike of the summer. From low woman on the totem pole to top one. How had that happened?
“Thank you, Ben.” That damn ball was making its reappearance in my throat. I’d felt a lot of it lately. “Thank you so, so much. You don’t know how much this means to me that you trust me enough to lead this, you know…after my string of screwups.” I set down the container holding the beads. No more crafts for me.
“I’m glad it means so much to you, but don’t you remember?” Ben tapped the schedule with his knuckles. “I don’t make the counselors’ schedules.”
My breath caught. How could I have forgotten? At least for a second. “You mean, he…scheduled me for the hike?”
“He did.”
I had to turn around so I could sink onto the bench. My knees were temporarily out of order. “Where is he?”
Ben was quiet.
“Ben?” I twisted enough so I could see him. “Where’s Callum?”
He was quiet for another second, and then he shifted. “Gone. He left late last night after drawing up today’s schedule.”
“Gone?” The word wasn’t computing.
“I’m sorry, Phoenix.”
I dropped my head into my hands. Callum had avoided me for two weeks. He’d scheduled me for the big last hike of the season. And he’d just left without saying a word? Without explaining why?
“He’s gone,” I said to myself, hoping that the sooner I accepted it, the sooner I could move on.
“Why?” My fingers curled into my scalp.
“Why did he leave?” Ben moved closer, but I could tell he didn’t know what to do: Pat my shoulder in sympathy or suggest I pull myself up.
I shook my head. “Why did he schedule me to lead the Matterhorn hike?”
From the corner of my eye, I noticed Ben shrug. “Because you earned his trust back.”
After that, I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t know what to do.
“Are you going to be okay? Campers will be lining up outside for the hike in a few minutes.”
I blinked a few times and stood up. My smile was still in place when I turned toward Ben. “I’ll be great.”
His face cleared before he held his arm out in the direction of the front lawn. “Then, lead on.”
I practically sprinted from the dining hall, and when I burst through the door, I sucked in the fresh air like I’d been locked up in some dank, stinky basement for years.
Thanks to the cool morning, I’d put on my hiking boots instead of my Tevas, so other than grabbing a pack from the shed and filling a couple of water bottles, I was ready to go.
A few campers were already waiting on the lawn when I returned with the pack. I went through it twice, to make sure it had everything I’d need in the event of an emergency…and then I checked it once more just to be safe.
By then, all fourteen campers who’d signed for the hike had shown up. As I went through the checklist of having campers check their water bottles, their boots, and their pack straps, I moved around them, giving a hand or a high five as I passed. I hadn’t just learned how to get a group of people through a hike from Callum; I’d learned how to make sure they enjoyed it.
I crouched down to double-check my own laces right before we left. Three miles up, three miles down. I should have been nervous. This was the first outdoor activity I’d led in weeks. It was the big final hike of the summer. Disaster had struck the last time I’d been responsible for a group of campers.
It wasn’t nerves that I felt, though. It was something else. Something different and new and something I couldn’t put a name to. Confidence? Courage? Those weren’t quite right. Close, but not close enough.
I knew the route. I knew I’d stick to the route. I knew everything would be okay. I knew I could handle it if it wasn’t. I knew we’d all make it to the end.
“Okay, everyone. Ready?” I stood in front of the campers and waited for their attention. “We’re going to stick together, stay together, and work together. Any questions?”
One of the older guys in the group raised his hand. He was smiling. “About that together part…”
A chuckle spread among the campers.
“Together. That’s our marching beat today, people.”
Doing one last head count, I turned in the direction of the trailhead. I checked my pace. I checked the line behind me every minute. I checked the trail for loose rocks and tree roots. And then I started over. I knew what I was doing. I’d been trained by the best.
Callum. I couldn’t not think about him, especially on a day like this, leading the last hike of the season, the same one I’d done with him on my first day. Instead of feeling like losing him had made me weaker, I focused on how having him in my life—in whatever way I had and for however short a time it had been—had made me stronger.
I wasn’t weaker because of Callum O’Connor—I was stronger.
That was what I focused on as I set out on that hike, climbing higher with every step.
I’d done it. Fourteen campers had made it to the top safely. Fourteen had made it down safely. One counselor had done the same.
The last hike of the summer was over, suitcases were packed, and storage sheds had been swept and locked. The summer was over. At least almost over.
I would have been happy to skip on the stick ceremony, but the other three members of the Ainsworth family were going and adamant that the fourth would be as well. I would have rather spent the night lying on the beach by the lake and staring up at the stars, but they had it in their heads that the stick ceremony was not to be missed. Apparently, I was the only one who hadn’t drunk the Kool-Aid when it came to the ritual of spilling one’s guts in front of a bunch of people before dropping a stick in a communal fire.
“Come on. This will be great.” Dad nudged me as we found our spot in the ring of campers already circling the campfire. It didn’t look any different from the other campfires we’d had every night for the past few months.
“Great is a matter of perspective, and comi
ng from mine, this is the definition of child abuse.” I nudged him back.
Mom was shaking open a blanket for us all to sit on. She’d even packed a snack bag filled with popcorn and licorice. This might not have been the movies, but I appreciated the effort she was making to keep us all together. Harry crashed onto the blanket with a grumble. He was down with the stick ceremony, but he’d been grumbling the past couple of weeks about something else. With this being the last night here, his grumbling had hit record highs.
“My wrist is fine. The doctors are just trying to ruin my life.”
“Next summer.” I crouched down beside Harry and took my turn. Dad and Mom had exhausted just about every comforting avenue. “You’ll be big enough to do the ropes course, and your wrist will be perfect. The year will fly by.”
“No, it won’t. It will crawl by.” Harry was picking at the grass with his good hand and glaring at his bandaged wrist like it was to blame for everything.
“Harry, it will. I promise.” I put my hand on his shoulder, but he shrugged it off.
“Whatever.”
I sighed, not having anything else to say. I knew the ropes course was important to him, but he was acting like it meant the difference between life and death. I’d never seen him so disappointed over anything—finding out we’d lost our house and were changing schools included. I guess this was the ten-year-old-boy dream, and it was just out of reach. What he wanted most and couldn’t have.
I knew the feeling.
As I was thinking what I could possibly say to make him feel better, Ben weaved his way to the campfire. It was cold tonight so everyone was bundled up pretty good, except for him. He was still rocking his tie-dyed camp shirt and khaki shorts. It gave me chills just looking at him, so I tucked my jacket around me tighter, although it wasn’t really a jacket.
It was a flannel shirt. The same one I’d worn the night during the rainstorm. The same one I’d buttoned on, the same one he’d unbuttoned, the same one I’d left his cabin in later that night. He’d never asked for it back, and I’d never exactly been eager to return it, and now he was gone.
I wondered how much I’d think about him after I left here. I wondered how long I would. Would he eventually go away, like a bruise fades with time? Or would he always be there, like a wound that might get better but leaves a scar behind?
“Welcome to the stick ceremony.” Ben clasped his hands together and looked into the crowd. “We all come together at the end of the year to share an experience that touched us. Some people talk about something they learned, some talk about something they need to confess, some talk about a problem they’re dealing with.” Ben turned to face the fire. “It doesn’t matter what you say, so long as you say it.” Ben walked around the campfire a few times, not saying anything. Everyone was quiet, looking as afraid to move as their neighbors next to them. Finally, Ben clapped his hands. “Let the ceremony begin.” He waved his arms like he was inviting everyone to speak at the same time.
No one went, though. Not for the first minute. Not even the second. People who’d been holding their sticks in front of them tucked them beneath blankets or sat on them. I watched campers who didn’t seem to have an off switch when it came to talking seal their lips shut.
From the corner of my eye, I noticed Ben looking around the group. If he was surprised no one was leaping up to expose their soul, he didn’t show it. He might have been the least uncomfortable person here, though.
Everyone else was keeping their eyes forward, afraid to make eye contact. A few people actually had beads of sweat dotting their foreheads. A couple on the outskirts slipped away like no one could see them, though I knew everyone did.
At the five-minute mark, still no one had spoken. I hadn’t made a stick or anything, but it was a stick ceremony, right? Any stick should do. Scanning the ground for something that could work, I found a “stick.” If that was what you could call it, because it was more twig than stick.
My fingers curled around it, and I paused another second, giving someone else a chance to suck it up and go first. No one.
So I stood, taking my stick-twig with me. Every eye around that circle zipped my way. The collective sigh was almost deafening.
“Hey, everyone.” I waved as I stepped around and through people on the way to the campfire. It had gotten so small it was mostly just embers now. Nothing but ashes. “I’m Phoenix, in case you didn’t already know that.” I paused, feeling like the newest member of the Idiot Club. I was a camp counselor. I knew everyone by first name and most by last, too—of course they knew my name. So far, this stick ceremony was really life changing.
What had Ben said? People talked about a problem? Something they’d overcome? Something they’d learned?
I looked into the crowd as if somewhere out there I’d find my lightbulb. Instead, I found Ben looking at me, his face turned up in an expectant expression. Then he circled his hand like he was prompting me. Just say what you need to say.
There it was. I got it.
The breath I’d been holding came out in a whoosh. “I learned a lot of things this summer, but the most important thing I learned was something about myself.”
Ben smiled at me across the crowd of campers, flashing me a thumbs-up.
I almost wanted to run, but I stayed. I’d started, so I’d finish.
“I have trust issues. Or I had them. Someone helped me work through them this summer.” I noticed campers scanning the crowd, looking for him because they knew—they’d probably learned something from him, too. “Callum taught me it wasn’t everyone else I needed to learn how to trust; it was myself…because I’m not sure you can really trust another human being until you can trust yourself first.” I stared into the fire, at the ashes scattered around the perimeter of the fire pit. Ashes—the perfect place to rise from.
“I needed to figure out I’d be okay no matter what came at me. I had to trust that I was strong enough to make it through anything. I know that now. That’s what he was trying to get me to understand, I think. That I’d be okay.” I found myself staring at my family again. We were a mess—foreclosure, bankruptcy, dysfunction, school change—and we’d be okay. All of us. “Sometimes you just have to go with the flow when things are at their worst. Save your strength for when it will really count.”
I stopped at the edge of the campfire and thought about the girl I’d come here as and the one I was leaving as. Stronger…and more vulnerable at the same time. I couldn’t have gotten here without Camp Kismet and Callum. “I learned a lot from Callum this summer, but I figured this out on my own. Trust is a lot like love. Actually, I don’t think you can have one without the other.” I studied the campfire pit. It was nothing more than ashes now, no real visible embers to see. When I dropped my stick into it, a mound of ashes exploded into a cloud. A moment later, the twig caught fire. It didn’t seem possible that something so bright and alive could rise from something so dead-looking. But it did. All the ashes needed was something to bring it back to life. “And I love Callum O’Connor.”
I left right after.
Declaring my love in front of a group of people wasn’t the route I would have preferred to go, but since the person I wanted to admit it to was gone, that was all I had.
Saying it out loud was important. It made it more real. Callum might never know, but that was okay, because I did. I’d fallen for him. In a hundred different ways. This summer was supposed to suck. It was supposed to go down in the annals as worst ever.
It couldn’t have been better.
I couldn’t stop thinking about how tonight was my last night at Camp Kismet. How it might be my last night ever here. I wasn’t sure Ben would want me back. Who knows? A lot could happen in a single day, let alone one whole year.
There were a lot of places at camp I loved, but there was one place in particular. Close to the public beach on Swallow Lake—but not so near that the random camper would find it—there was a small patch of beach surrounded by trees. It was so dark out t
here it felt like I could see every star in the sky. Callum said it was a good substitute when he couldn’t make it to the observatory.
To me, the observatory was a substitute for the beach, where I was heading after creeping away from the ceremony. The summer had been filled with work and runs and studying; I’d only made it here a couple of times, but I was taking the night off from studying.
When I could just make out the silver lines rippled across the lake from the moon through the trees, I clicked off my headlamp and finished the last little bit on my own. I wanted to give my eyes a chance to adjust to the dark so the stars would really stand out when I stepped onto the beach.
Along with the light reflecting off the lake, there was something else glowing just up ahead. I hadn’t seen it at first because I’d been too far back, but it was bright and orangish in color. Then I smelled it.
A campfire. Small from what I could see, but there was definitely a campfire burning on the beach. On the two visits Callum and I had made, we’d never seen anyone else. In fact, Callum had said he’d never seen anyone here in all the summers he’d been coming to camp. He might have been the only person besides me who knew this patch of beach. So I shouldn’t have been surprised he was…
Here.
I was able to just make him out standing in front of the fire, facing the woods. Most people who made a campfire on a beach faced the water. He was turned to the trees. Looking into them. Like he was expecting someone to show up.
I wanted to run the rest of the way to him. I couldn’t believe he was here.
I wanted to freeze in place just as much for the same reasons. Why was he here? Was he waiting for me? Did he even want to see me when he’d proven the opposite the last two weeks?
My heart overruled my head, and I jogged the last few yards down the trail. When I shot onto the beach, he didn’t look half as surprised to see me as I was to see him. In fact, he barely flinched when I burst from the trees.
I took a whole half second to catch my breath. “You.”
He rubbed at the scar at his temple. “You.”
Trusting You and Other Lies Page 24