by Beth Vrabel
“You’re really fired?” I asked. “I thought Mr. Bosserman was just brutzing. I didn’t think he’d actually …”
“Yes, she’s fired,” Kira said. “Thanks to you.”
Jessica crossed her arms and glared at me. I opened my mouth to say sorry, but she turned away.
“But what if our stuff doesn’t turn up?” Megan asked, not looking at me. “Someone has been stealing our stuff. We should call the cops.”
“The cops?” Jessica’s eyes widened. “Whoa, now! I’m in enough trouble. Mr. Bosserman would probably call my college and get me in trouble there, too, if cops get involved in our campsite when I’m in charge. Please, guys. Please, let’s just do a thorough search.”
I slumped over to my bunk, putting my things one by one back into my bag. April and Amanda piled things onto my bed while Kira, Jessica, and Megan searched the rest of the A-frame.
“Hey! Look at this!” Jessica called suddenly from the A-frame entrance. She held up a bracelet.
“Is that yours?” April asked Megan.
Megan twisted the bracelet so it was inside out and read the inscription. “To Megan, the baby of my heart. Love, Mom.” Her face shined. “Yes! It’s mine. Thank you, Jessica!” She threw her arms around the counselor.
“See!” I shouted. “I didn’t take anything!”
Everyone ignored me.
Jessica patted her back. “I told you it probably just slipped out of your bathroom bag! See, I’m sure everything else will turn up, too.”
“What about my bag?”
“And my laptop?”
“And my trilobite?”
Kira crossed her arms and glared at me. “You’re not off the hook yet.”
Jessica waved her hands. “Let’s just get to bed. If Mr. Bosserman sees we’re all still up …” Her usual perky face was twisted with worry. “I’d be in real trouble.”
“Okay,” April agreed. “Maybe someone found my laptop and returned it to the computer lab.”
“I’m sure of it!” Jessica clapped. She flipped off the overhead light and everyone settled into their bunks. I waited until I heard steady breathing from all around except above me.
“April?” I whispered.
“Go to bed, Lucy.” April’s voice was frosty. “I don’t want to talk to you now. Maybe not ever.”
Have you ever felt like things have gotten so bad, they couldn’t possibly get any worse?
Listen to me: they can always get worse.
I lay awake most of the night, thinking about how and why so many things had gone wrong. I made a mental list of the problems.
Problem one: April changed. From the time we got to Camp Paleo, she stopped being the April I thought I knew. From the way she wears her hair to how she speaks, she’s different. The April I know—the April in my pack—is a dork. She says everything in bursts. She doesn’t worry about her hair. She’s not some athletic superstar.
And then this annoying voice inside started talking to me, saying maybe that was just the April I thought I knew. Maybe Pack April talked in bursts because no one gave her a chance to stretch out her thoughts. Maybe Pack April was only a dork because everyone expected her to be one. It’s like SSCPB said in her post: Camp should be a time for you to live the way you want to live, nobody breathing down your neck about how to act or who to be. Maybe that’s what April had been doing all along, and I was too stubborn to notice. Maybe Camp April was the real April. And the real April hated me.
Problem two: I had lied to Jer about April liking him and to Megan about Ash liking her. If April hated me now, that was nothing compared to how she’d feel if she found out about the lie. I crossed my fingers she’d never find out. And Megan? She’d be crushed. Little voice said this problem needed to be figured out pronto.
Problem three: Shemanda was mad at me. The little voice whispered that Sam would be, too, when he found out about my fight with April. I told the voice that Sam wasn’t even here so it should just shut up about Sam.
Problem four: the thefts. Who was stealing all of our stuff? This time the little voice was testy and pointed out that none of my stuff was worthy of stealing. I again told it to shut up.
Problem five: Jessica was getting fired because of me. Little voice hissed that this should make me feel guiltier than it did.
Problem six: a mosquito bit my butt in the bathroom and it was super uncomfortable. The little voice told me to be grateful I wasn’t the girl in the neighboring A-frame who couldn’t make it to the bathroom during our hike and squatted in poison ivy.
Chapter Fourteen
When the sun came up, I made a decision.
Not a decision to be happy, because I know that never works when your life is crumbling to pieces. A decision to put the pieces back together. Then maybe I could be happy.
First up, swing by Nurse Gabby’s for Calamine Lotion for my butt bite. Little voice is telling me that was TMI, but I just didn’t want you to worry.
Second: Shemanda.
I found them by the picnic tables, hashing out a plan for where to find another fossil. Both of them turned toward me with crossed arms. Maybe this wouldn’t be as easy as I hoped.
“Listen.” I took a deep breath and let out the little speech I had prepared. “I’m sorry about the mess I made with April, and I’m sorry that your trilobite is missing. I hope you know that I never, ever would steal from you or anyone.”
They looked at one another. Amanda nodded.
“Yeah,” Sheldon said. “We know. You do a lot of stupid things, but you don’t steal.”
“But we’re not getting involved in this April thing,” Amanda finished.
“Understood. I’m going to fix things. I swear!” I bounced on my heels a second. “Thanks, Shemanda!” I threw my arms around them.
“You’re welcome,” they said together. As I walked away, I heard Sheldon whisper, “Did she just call us Shemanda?”
Here’s the plan for solving the Jer problem. Brace yourself—it’s a shocker.
I’m going to tell him the truth.
I’m just going to go up to him, tell him I’d lied and that April wasn’t just playing hard to get. I didn’t know if she liked him in that way. I would tell him I’m sorry and that it was wrong of me.
Chances are, he wouldn’t forgive me. But I kind of deserved that. And, with any luck, I’d never see him again after the end of this week.
I had to tell him and quick. “April! April!” I heard him call from a picnic table on the other side of the camp. “Check it out!” He was juggling a grapefruit, an apple, and an orange. April nodded in his direction and went back to talking with Kira and a bunch of other girls from a different A-frame. How did she know everyone? Seriously, every Camp Paleo camper seemed to know April. A lot of them were clustered around her now.
“April! April!” Jer called again. Now he was juggling while jumping from foot to foot.
I had to put this kid out of his misery. The closer I got to Jer, the more April turned away. I guess Jer didn’t realize it was because she hates me and not because his juggling/jumping show wasn’t impressive enough, because he snagged a second grapefruit off the picnic table and added it to the mix. He started kicking it around like one of his hacky sacks while still juggling the other grapefruit, apple, and orange.
“April! April!”
April turned around to appease Jer just as I moved right behind him. She locked eyes with me, sighed super deeply, and turned back around.
Jer called for a kid to toss him another piece of fruit, which he added to the juggling routine.
“Jer,” I said. “I need to talk to you.”
“Back up, Lucy. I’m not exactly sure how to stop this.” Grapefruit, orange, grapefruit, apple, and plum swirled between us. I moved so I was between him and April, forcing him to see me.
“You’re in my way,” Jer sighed. “I can’t see April!”
“This is about April,” I hissed back at him, watching the blur of fruit.
Jer missed the apple and it landed on the ground between us. “What about her?”
“She doesn’t really like you. I made it up.”
“Haha. Very funny. Of course she likes me.” Grapefruit, orange, grapefruit, plum.
“No, really.” I focused on his face, not the flying fruit. “I lied. She’s not playing hard to get. She’s not into you. I’m sorry.”
Jer stared at me with huge, green eyes. His hands fell to his sides.
“You what?” April yelled, standing right behind me.
Crap sandwich.
Grapefruit, orange, and plum hit the ground. I quickstepped back before the second grapefruit fell. “Look out!” I shouted.
The squishy slam of grapefruit hitting April will haunt my dreams. After impact, April didn’t cry or even make a sound. She just sort of folded over onto herself. I caught her before she hit the ground. “April!” I screamed. Her eyes fluttered a little and then her arms flung out.
“She’s disoriented!” I screamed to the gathering crowd. “She doesn’t know what she’s doing!”
Suddenly, April’s eyes popped open and she pushed me with two hands, sending me onto my butt. “I am trying to get away from you!” she screamed. “Get away from me!”
“Back again?” Nurse Gabby opened her door to my tear-stained face.
“Not her!” Jer elbowed me aside. “April!” He and Ash each had an arm around April. “She took a grapefruit to the temple.” April held the grapefruit up as evidence.
“Oh, dear,” Nurse Gabby said. “Did she lose consciousness?”
“Only for a second,” I said. “It was just a grapefruit.”
Nurse Gabby nodded. “You’d be surprised. I once had a patient who got a concussion from a yoyo.”
“Concussion!” April gasped.
Nurse Gabby prodded the bruise on April’s temple. “Not a lot of swelling.”
“That’s good, right?” I asked.
Nurse Gabby frowned. “It could mean the swelling has gone inward.”
“Why are you still here?” April snapped at me, but her words ran into each other. Her eyes drifted shut and then snapped back open.
“Tired?” Nurse Gabby asked.
April nodded and Nurse Gabby eased her head onto the pillow at the top of the cot.
“I’m so sorry, April!” I yelled as Nurse Gabby shooed us out. April didn’t move, just laid there like Snow White, holding a grapefruit instead of a poisoned apple.
Ash and Jer turned on me as the door snapped shut.
“You know,” Ash said, “I defended you when my sister said you were mean and selfish. April said you were her friend, so I figured Kira was wrong. But she wasn’t, was she?”
Jer stared at me with wide, green eyes. “Why would you lie to me like that?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but nothing came out. Because there was no way I could justify what I did. I had become a Becky, pushing someone to do something just because it was what I wanted. No. I was worse than Becky.
Becky only hurt me. I had hurt lots of people.
Like it was on cue, Megan ran up the path to Nurse Gabby’s office. “I heard,” she huffed, putting her hands on her knees to breathe. She must’ve run the whole way from the picnic areas.
“Is April okay?”
“She has a concussion,” Jer said. “Thanks to Lucy.” He turned to face Megan. “If she hadn’t lied to me about April liking me I wouldn’t have even juggled. April likes Ash, not me.”
“She doesn’t like me!” Ash gasped. “We are seriously just friends. I don’t like any girls here.”
“But you said Ash likes me!” Megan whipped toward me.
Ash’s mouth dropped open. “I don’t like you.” At Megan’s squeak, he put his hand out. “I mean, I don’t like you that way. I’m not into … I’m not ready …” Ash’s fists clenched and he stomped his foot. “Thanks a lot, Lucy,” he whispered and then stomped off.
“I can’t believe you,” Megan hissed and walked away.
“Wait up,” Jer called as he ran toward her.
I sank back down on Nurse Gabby’s stoop.
Nurse Gabby came to the stoop with her cell phone in hand about a half hour later. “Is she going to be all right?” I asked.
“She should be,” the nurse said. “Not a lot of statistics on concussion by grapefruit. I need to call her parents.”
“Does she have to go home?” I asked.
“Nah, but she’ll need to take it easy. No more swimming, archery, or any of the other Camp Paleo stuff. It’s all bad for the recently concussed.”
“Recently concussed?” I raised an eyebrow at Nurse Gabby, wondering if she had made up a word.
Her eyes scanned me on the stoop. “Why don’t you head back? It’s got to be close to dinnertime.”
“I’ll stay here, if that’s okay,” I said.
Nurse Gabby looked up from her phone. “You must be a good friend to her.”
I shook my head. “No, I’m not.”
Grandma came to bring April dinner an hour later. She shook my shoulder and woke me from where I’d fallen asleep on the stoop.
“Want me to tell her hi from you?” Grandma asked.
I shook my head again.
Grandma handed me a cookie, but I didn’t take it.
“Hang in there, Toots,” she said, and put a ham sandwich next to me on her way back to the cafeteria.
Shemanda stopped by the nurse’s office on their way to screen time and told me that a bunch of things—a wallet, an iPhone, and an expensive pair of sneakers—were stolen from Sheldon’s A-frame while the campers had been swimming. “Nothing of mine was taken,” Sheldon said. “I guess the thief doesn’t appreciate the value of geological rock picks.”
“Don’t feel bad,” I said. “The thief didn’t take anything from me, either.”
Whoever it was, the thief only targeted expensive items.
“Why don’t you come with us?” Amanda asked as they left the office. “The nurse told us April has to stay for another hour, then she’ll get to go back to the A-frame.”
I started to say no but changed my mind. I wasn’t sure I was ready to see April once she left the office. Plus, I could try to find her laptop in the meantime.
I read the SSCPB post from yesterday.
Dear Campers:
We are winding down here at Camp Paleo. Only a few more days of camp! Think about what you’ve learned these past two weeks. For me, that goes way beyond dodging a ball or shooting an arrow. I’ve learned that I can start fresh, be anyone I want to be. The only trouble is, some people don’t want you to change. They might like you just the way you were. Or maybe they like how the old you makes them feel.
Don’t let that hold you back, fearless camper! Be yourself anyway.
I’ll reveal a little more about myself: I got this gig as your SSCPB by writing an essay. TechSquare owner Alan Bridgeway himself wrote me back, letting me know I was named your blogger. He said he liked that I was going to take these two weeks to really figure out what I liked about me and what I didn’t. He told me he started Camp Paleo just for this reason, based on how he and his dad traveled and camped when he was a kid. When it was just the two of them, roughing it, he said he saw possibilities everywhere. Sometimes, he said, he didn’t like what he saw. He even would go out of his way to not go camping with his dad because it made him face some hard truths about who he was and what he wanted. He said he’d be checking in on me at the end of these two weeks to find out what I’ve learned.
What would you tell Mr. Bridgeway, fellow campers?
Let me know,
Your Friendly But Different SSCPB
I sucked on my bottom lip for a long time, thinking about those words. I hoped Mr. Bosserman would get a chance to read this post and understand that his son wasn’t avoiding him when he didn’t want to travel every summer. Sometimes he was avoiding himself.
Was I doing that? Was I meddling into so many people’s lives because I didn’t wan
t to look at my own life? What was I scared of, really?
Little voice kept whispering Sam’s name to me. I told it to simmer down. I had to fix all these messes I’d made before I saw Sam next. He’d be so mad at me. Even worse, he’d be disappointed.
I swallowed some guilt and Skype-called Sam, but he didn’t answer. It was like he had given up on me, too.
I checked the lost-and-found section of the computer lab, but can’t say I was surprised that April’s laptop wasn’t there. Someone at Camp Paleo had sticky fingers. But who?
First Kira’s designer makeup bag, snagged at the beginning of camp. I wasn’t ready to cross Kira off the list of potential culprits. I’d seen way too many crime shows for that. It’s classic to make yourself appear like a victim to throw off the heat.
The next theft was more than a week later, when Megan’s bracelet went missing. Of course, this could’ve been an accident, not a theft, since Jessica found it in the A-frame. But that same day, Amanda’s trilobite disappeared.
The next night, April’s laptop.
And today, someone snagged three things from the boys.
Whoever it was, she was stepping up her game. It smacked to me of being desperate. Maybe it was just that camp was ending in three days. Or maybe it was something else.
I kept coming back to one person.
Chapter Fifteen
We left screen time and made our way to eMagine’s mess hall for dinner. The grill still smelled like eggs and charred chocolate when ignited, so we’d be having dinner in the mess hall for the remaining camp days.
And I meant to go there. I really did. During my hours of solitude, I’d promised myself to stop the meddling, sneaking, lying ways that had gotten me into this no-friends-pile-of-problems-and-April-concussed mess. But my feet didn’t turn toward the mess hall. They kept right on going toward the Camp Paleo site.