Just Like Me

by Nancy Cavanaugh

  The six of us looked at each other.

  “That team is White Oak!”

  The mess hall filled with more applause and whistles, as every camper and counselor clapped for us. I even saw Sarge Marge clapping back by the food counter.

  “To show just how seriously we take our theme of ‘Be the Missing Peace’ here at Camp Little Big Woods,” Donnie said, sounding even more excited than I felt, “we are awarding White Oak ten extra points for their excellent display of teamwork!”

  “Sweet!” Becca screamed, standing up and pumping her fist in the air.

  “All right!” Vanessa yelled, and she and Meredith stood up and high-fived each other.

  “Oh! My! Gosh!” Avery exclaimed. “Does this mean we could win first place?”

  Gina and I hugged each other, and Avery answered her own question. “This means we could win first place!”

  The rest of the campers didn’t seem quite so excited for us anymore, but the six of us were the happiest campers in the history of Camp Little Big Woods.

  Dear Ms. Marcia,

  Funny that on the day our cabin gets its big break and a real chance to win this camp competition once and for all, I figure out what really bugs me about Avery and Becca. They’re the perfect Chinese girls—loving Chinese food, waving Chinese fans, and being all smart and athletic just like everyone expects them to be.

  But what bugs me the most is that none of the stuff that bothers me about my adoption story seems to bother them at all.

  Julia

  PS Do I really hate everything Chinese? And if I do, why do you think that is?

  25

  The next day, just before rest time was over, Tori and I took the two bags of basketballs up the path and across the field to the blacktop where we were going to have the basketball tournament.

  Tori had planned another hike for our last cabin activity that morning, but when we said we wanted to get ready for the team competition, she let us stay down by the flagpole practicing basketball instead. Since our cabin had been using the basketballs, we had to get them to the main court for the afternoon camp competition.

  As Tori and I dumped both bags in the middle of the court, she said, “I’ve gotta run to the mess hall to get the clipboards and whistles. Why don’t you go back to the cabin and get the rest of the girls and meet me here in about fifteen minutes?”

  “Okay,” I said, taking off in the other direction. “See ya!”

  “Can’t wait to see you girls play!” Tori called after me. “I know you’re going to be great!”

  I smiled, thinking about those first-place T-shirts. It would really be amazing if all of us in White Oak went home wearing one.

  I scuffed along the path to our cabin, still trying to get some dried egg yolk off my left shoe. As I got closer to the cabin, I saw Gina’s and my beach towels hanging on the clothesline behind the cabin. I decided I’d check to see if they were dry.

  The towels weren’t completely dry, but they were dry enough, so I tugged one and then the other, pulling them off the line and draping them over my shoulder. As I turned to walk around to the front of the cabin, I heard everyone inside talking. But before I got to the porch, I stopped because I could hear that everyone was talking about me.

  “Well, it has to be here somewhere,” Gina explained. “She said it’s always on the zipper of her Bible case, and we never took our Bibles out of the cabin.”

  I felt my skin go cold and clammy.

  “We already looked for it the other day,” Becca said. “We’re probably not going to find it.”

  “Why is it such a big deal anyway?” Vanessa asked, sounding annoyed.

  “It’s part of a baby blanket from her birth mom,” Gina explained. “So it’s really important.”

  “Well, doesn’t she still have the blanket?” Meredith asked.

  “Yeah, she said she can just cut another piece of fringe from it,” Gina said. “But still, I just want to find it for her.”

  Next thing I knew, I was standing in the doorway of the cabin. I’m not exactly sure how I got there because I don’t remember walking up the porch steps.

  “You told them,” I said to Gina in a really calm voice. “You told them what I told you about the blanket. That was a secret.”

  She looked scared. And guilty.

  “I-I didn’t know it was a secret,” she stammered. “I only wanted us to find the yarn for you.”

  “Of course it was a secret. Anyone would know that,” I said, getting louder. “If I wanted everyone to know about it, I would’ve told them what the yarn was when I lost it.”

  I didn’t know if I was more angry at Gina for telling them about the blanket or at myself for telling Gina about it, which had really, actually been lying to her about it.

  Avery and Becca had to know the blanket wasn’t from my birth mom. None of us had anything like that from China. So as I stood there in the middle of the cabin with everyone staring at me, I wondered what Avery and Becca were thinking.

  I looked over at my cubby. I could tell by how messy it was that they had been looking through my things. It was bad enough when Vanessa had played the joke and switched everything, but now everyone in the cabin had messed with my stuff.

  “We were just trying to help,” Avery said. “Gina didn’t do it to make you mad.”

  Then I noticed my “Ms. Marcia” journal on Becca’s bed.

  Now I yelled, “Did you guys read my journal too?!”

  I got an instant stomachache thinking about everything I’d written in there.

  “No!” they all said.

  “We just moved your stuff around, hoping we’d find the yarn underneath something,” Avery explained.

  I grabbed my journal from the bed and took it in the bathroom with me and slammed the door.

  I heard them all out in the cabin continuing to talk about me.

  “What are we going to do?” Vanessa said.

  “Should we go get Tori?” asked Avery.

  “We’re supposed to leave in like five minutes for the basketball tournament,” Becca said.

  I was sitting on the floor in the bathroom, leaning against the wall by the shower.

  Gina opened the door a crack and peeked her head inside.

  “Julia, I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to make you mad.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Will you forgive me?”

  I still didn’t say anything.

  “Just come down to the basketball tournament with us, and we can talk about this later,” Gina suggested.

  “Forget it,” I said, getting up. “I’m not going.”

  I walked back into the cabin, kicked off my shoes, and jumped up to my bunk.

  “But you have to go,” Avery said.

  “No I don’t, and I’m not,” I said, lying on my back and looking up at the ceiling.

  “What are we gonna tell Tori?” Vanessa asked the other girls.

  “Tell her I’m sick because I am,” I said, even though she wasn’t talking to me.

  They all looked at each other and then finally walked out of the cabin, letting the screen door bang behind them.

  I sat up in my bunk, and as soon as I did, a few heavy, silent tears dripped down my face. I squeezed my journal to my chest and sobbed, thinking of what was written in it. It seemed like they were telling the truth about not reading it, but what if they had really read it? It was so personal and private. Stuff I’d never said to anyone. Why hadn’t I thought about hiding it? Why had I left it out in the open where anyone could read it?

  I wiped my face with my T-shirt and jumped down from my bunk. As I headed back to the bathroom to splash some cold water on my face, I saw Avery’s journal sticking out of her cubby. I walked over and carefully slid it out of its place where it was propped up next to her shampoo a
nd conditioner. I sat on the edge of Becca’s bed with it closed on my lap, and when one lingering tear dripped onto the cover, I opened the journal and read.

  Dear Ms. Marcia,

  I am honored you chose to do your adoption article about us. I hope my story helps so many people.

  I flipped to another page.

  I sort of wish we were going to the Chinese culture camp. I mean, it would make our reflection about our adoption more focused on our heritage, but I do love Camp Little Big Woods.

  I flipped around some more.

  Gina told me something about Julia today.

  My heart raced when I read my name.

  Julia has a baby blanket at home that she thinks is from her birth mom. I don’t know why she thinks that because Becca and I both have a blanket just like it. Mine is pink and Becca’s is yellow. My mom told me that a church donated the blankets to our orphanage, and that’s why all the babies had one when our parents came to get us. I wonder why Julia thinks it’s from her birth mom. I always knew where my blanket came from, and when I talked to Becca, she said she knew too. I didn’t want to tell Gina the truth because I was afraid she might tell Julia, and I just don’t know how we should tell Julia about this.

  I was right. Avery and Becca knew the truth about the blanket.

  But no one knew the truth about me.

  • • •

  A while later, I still sat on the floor, leaning against Becca’s bunk.

  I heard the screen door creak and looked up to see Avery standing in the cabin.

  I stood up quickly.

  “Tori told me to come check on you,” Avery started to say, but I must’ve had a strange look on my face because she stopped talking before she finished what she was saying.

  “I already knew the blanket wasn’t from my birth mom,” I said almost in a whisper. “I was only pretending it was.”

  I said the last part so quietly I wasn’t sure Avery even heard it, and I was glad because I wondered if maybe I should just skip the truth and go back to pretending.

  But it didn’t matter whether Avery heard it or not because when she walked closer to me, she saw her journal lying on the floor next to me. I hadn’t had the chance to put it back yet.

  “You read my journal?” Avery screamed. “You had no right to do that!”

  She rushed over to me and grabbed her journal off the sandy floor.

  The screen door opened again. It was Becca this time.

  “Hey, Julia, did Avery tell you the good news? We won the basketball tournament. Tori wants both of you guys to hurry down to the lake,” she said.

  But then she saw the looks on our faces and stopped talking.

  “None of us read your journal!” Avery said to me. “We were only trying to help Gina find that piece of yarn for you.”

  Avery brushed the sand off the back cover of her journal.

  “I can’t believe you told Gina the blanket was from your birth mom if you knew it really wasn’t!” Avery said. “That means you lied to her!”

  “What’s going on?” Becca asked.

  “You want to know what’s going on?” Avery asked. “I’ll tell you what! Julia just read my journal, that’s what!”

  Avery sounded as if she’d never be able to forgive me.

  I knew exactly how she felt because I’d felt the same way when I thought they had read my journal.

  “You read her journal?” Becca exclaimed.

  That’s when I started to cry, and then Gina came into the cabin.

  “Tori says you guys better hurry up,” she said. “Did these guys tell you that we won?”

  But when she saw that I was crying, she asked, “Are you still mad, Julia?”

  Avery and Becca both talked at once, and my tears turned to sobs.

  “What’s going on in here?” Vanessa exclaimed when she and Meredith walked into the cabin and saw the four of us.

  “Julia read Avery’s journal!” Becca said.

  “And she lied to Gina about that yarn,” Avery said. “Technically, she lied to all of us because—”

  “What?” Gina asked. “You lied to me? About what?”

  “Stop fighting, you guys!” Vanessa scolded. “We’ll never win those T-shirts if Tori catches us fighting.”

  “You really can’t think about anything but winning, can you?” Gina said, turning to Vanessa. “Why don’t you try thinking about someone else for a change?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Vanessa asked.

  “You know what it means,” Gina said.

  And with that, the avalanche of arguments that had loomed over us since that water fight in the dish room came crashing down. It crushed the life out of the mountain of peace White Oak had worked so hard to build.

  But then Becca’s soccer ball slammed against the wall next to the bathroom, where the life collages still hung.

  Vanessa had thrown it.

  “That’s it!” she yelled. “We are not losing this camp competition because of some dumb piece of yarn or because someone read someone else’s stupid journal or because of some other lamebrain thing.”

  We all stared at Vanessa, but no one dared to speak. She was madder than we’d ever seen her.

  “The rowboat relay race starts in a few minutes, and after all we’ve worked for, White Oak had better win that thing,” Vanessa said, sounding as angry and mean as she had on the first day of camp.

  “And if the only way to not fight is for us to keep our mouths shut, then that’s what we better do,” she said.

  “Here comes Tori,” Meredith whispered as Tori walked up the porch steps.

  “Are my little lovelies ready to row, row, row their boats?” she asked cheerfully as she came into the cabin.

  Obviously she hadn’t heard any of the fighting.

  “How’re you feeling, Julia?” Tori asked.

  Vanessa looked at all of us, held her thumb and index finger together, touched them to her lips, and slid them from one side of her mouth to the other like she was zipping a zipper. We all got the message.

  “She’s feeling better!” Becca said, a little too loudly and with way too much enthusiasm. “Right, Julia?”

  I nodded my head and bent down quickly, pretending to tie my shoe so that Tori wouldn’t be able to see any leftover tears.

  “Well then, let’s head down to the lake!” Tori exclaimed, as she turned to leave the cabin. “You girls have a rowboat race to win!”

  Vanessa glared at all of us as we followed Tori out of the cabin and down the hill toward Lake Little Big Woods.

  I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next, but I knew that if we didn’t leave our troubles on land, we didn’t have much chance of winning—because there was enough trouble between the six of us to easily sink a rowboat.

  Dear Ms. Marcia,

  The Chinese red thread is not supposed to break even if it stretches and tangles, but I feel like the piece of yarn from my baby blanket stretched and tangled and did more than just break. It ruined everything!

  I lied to myself about it.

  It got lost, and we fought about it.

  Everyone tried to find it, and now I’m worried the truth will come out about it.

  And because of me, White Oak stretched and tangled and finally just broke.

  If that Chinese proverb really is true, I bet everyone wishes they never ever would’ve met me, because who would want to be connected to the person who made such a big mess of everything?

  Julia

  26

  Down at the lake, campers and counselors from all the other cabins stood around talking excitedly about the race. But none of us said a word. Literally.

  While “Eye of the Tiger” blasted through the trees and DDDJ danced around playing air guitar, all of us in White Oak stood silently on the shore. D
D Jr. stood in the boathouse doorway and rolled his eyes and shook his head as he watched his dad. A lot of campers joined DDDJ in his mini concert with their own air guitars, and even more campers clapped and sang, “…and he’s watching us all with the eeeeeye of the tiger.” That didn’t seem to make it any less embarrassing for DD Jr., and it didn’t make any of us in White Oak unzip our lips either.

  The six of us stood on the sand with our arms crossed, not singing or clapping. If Tori had been with us, I’m sure our self-imposed silence would’ve been suspicious—it was probably the longest any of us had been quiet since we’d gotten to camp—but she was out on the dock with another counselor putting life jackets into the boats.

  “All right, campers!” Donnie said as the music faded. “The moment of truth has arrived. Our final event will determine which cabin wins these fabulous first-place T-shirts.”

  DD Jr. held up one of the T-shirts on the end of a long stick, waving it like a flag.

  “Soon we’ll know which cabin prevails, but we’ll also know which cabin truly is best at working together as a team because this won’t be just an ordinary rowboat relay race.”

  All the other campers whispered to each other, wondering what Donnie was talking about.

  “Let’s show them, Son,” Donnie said, turning to DD Jr.

  The two of them walked out on the dock to the three boats that were there. Donnie used a rope to tie the back of the first boat to the front of the second boat, and DD Jr. used another rope to tie the back of the second boat to the front of the third boat. Now all three boats were connected, like the cars of a train.

  “That’s going to be impossible!” one of the girls nearest to the shore exclaimed.

  “Not impossible, but a true test of teamwork. That’s for sure,” Donnie said, sounding proud of himself for coming up with such an ingenious way to test our ability to work together. “There will be two campers in each boat. One camper in each boat will row to that orange cone on the other side of the lake.”

  Donnie pointed across the lake and continued talking, “When the three boats reach the other shore, the campers in each boat will jump out and switch places. Then the other three campers will row back. Each team will take a turn and be timed. And the team with the best time wins.”