by Jeff Norton
‘Up and Adam.’ He giggled to himself again.
‘You’re all packed and ready to go,’ said Mom. It seemed she couldn’t wait to get rid of us. She pointed to my clothes neatly folded on my chair.
‘I took the liberty,’ she said.
‘You sure did,’ I replied, noticing that my T-shirt was folded vertically, not in my preferred horizontal format.*
I grabbed my Mom-approved-outfit (NinjaMan retro tee, boxer briefs, cargo shorts) and rushed upstairs to get showered and changed. After a thorough cleansing, I moisturised and applied the make-up I needed to hide my grey zombie skin.
When I returned downstairs, I spotted two large duffel bags dominating the still newly carpeted front hall. One was marked ‘Adam’ and the other ‘Amanda’. They looked worryingly like canvas coffins. I unzipped my bag to make sure all of the essentials were packed (they were), and stuffed in my trusty PJs.
‘What’s with the pancakes?’ I asked, returning to the kitchen.
‘Not the pancakes,’ said Mom, pouring brownish golden liquid over her stack. ‘The real question is what’s with the syrup?’
‘Real maple syrup,’ said Dad with a smile.
‘I’ll pass on the tree secretion,’ I said.
Amanda shook her head at me. ‘Trees don’t have secrets, stupid.’
‘Canadian maple syrup,’ Dad added. ‘And why are we not buying American, you might want to know?’
‘Just load it on,’ ordered Amanda. ‘Don’t care where it comes from.’
Mom leaned in. ‘Adam, Amanda, your camp is in Canada. Isn’t that exciting?’
‘So eat up, eh!’ said Dad with a smile.
‘That’s a foreign country,’ I said.
‘You can’t send us there,’ Amanda protested. ‘I doubt they even have the Internet in their igloos. And I cannot be out of touch.’
‘We’ve got good news for you dear on both fronts,’ said Dad. ‘You’ll be in tents, not igloos, and a bunch of us parents got together and loads of the kids from Croxton are going to Camp Nowannakidda as well.’
‘So you can keep all your cliques intact,’ said Mom.
‘You’ll love it there, kids.’ Dad beamed. ‘The camp owner, a really nice old lady, came to town and she gave a big presentation. It looks like so much fun. Oh, to be a kid again.’
‘She showed a slide show of the campers swimming, playing sports, singing around campfires, and doing talent shows,’ Mom explained.
‘And eating doughnuts,’ added my dad. ‘She brought some – they’re amazing!’
He closed his eyes and licked his lips. ‘I can still taste them.’
‘Your father ate three,’ my Mom said, ‘because he’s clearly not worried about his resting metabolic rate.’
‘Speaking of eating,’ I said. ‘I think they have bears up there. Polar, grizzly – you know, the kind that eats kids.’
‘I’m sure it’s very safe, Adam,’ Doctor Mom said. ‘Besides, we’ve paid the money, signed all the release forms …’
‘Release from what?’
Mom and Dad looked at one another.
‘It’s fine print stuff, champ. Grown-up stuff. Blah-blah, not our fault if you get eaten by a bear, that kind of thing.’
‘Not funny Dad,’ I said. ‘There’s a reason we live in cities and houses and not in the wild. The wild is wildly unpredictable!’
‘Come on you two,’ urged my mom. ‘The bus leaves soon, so eat up!’
Amanda faked a bear impression as she devoured her pancakes.
‘And our new tenants arrive this afternoon.’ Dad smiled, rubbing his hands together in anticipation of the small fortune the vampire dentists would pay to take over our home. ‘Your mother and I are doing a road trip, just the two of us.’
‘Just like our honeymoon,’ Mom said.
I couldn’t believe how eager they were to get rid of us.
Mom and Dad walked to the bottom of the street and we joined a gaggle of parents and kids saying their goodbyes. I spotted Nesto and Corina. Jake was there too and at least a quarter of my soon-to-be eighth-grade class.† It seemed the Croxton parents were really cashing in on the vampire influx.
I waved to Nesto, who was surrounded by his siblings and enveloped in a smothering hug from both his mom and his grandma. He wriggled out leaving his elders to continue their embrace. Nesto’s mom was weeping and I wasn’t sure if it was from joy or despair.
Then I found Corina in the crowd, all alone. I moved to tap her on the shoulder and remembered the no touching rule.
‘Your parents aren’t into family send-offs?’ I asked.
‘They’re busy, you know with the dentist convention.’
‘Hey, Adam,’ said Jake, clutching an orange plastic bag from Croxton Hardware and Comics. ‘Yo, Corina.’
She stared at him. ‘Never yo me!’
‘Guess what’s in the bag,’ Jake said excitedly.
‘Let me take a wild guess,’ said Corina. ‘Not hardware.’
‘I stocked up for the summer,’ he said, revealing a stack of graphic novels. ‘I don’t think they have comic shops in the wilderness.’
A big bus rounded the corner and musically honked its horn. It sounded like a war cry from a tribal drumbeat. The destination sign announced ‘No Stop Till Nowannakidda’, and as the bus stopped, its door hissed open, a grinning camp director leaned out and invited us to: ‘Climb on for a one-way ticket to summer fun!’
He introduced himself as Gordon, but claimed his camp name was ‘Growl’, which he said while embarrassingly impersonating a bear.
Growl wore cargo shorts, an open plaid shirt over a white T-shirt and a sweat-stained baseball cap over his flowing, golden hair. He looked like a twenty-something surfer who’d been kicked off the waves one too many times.
‘All aboard, kids!’ he called. ‘I’ve got a checklist and I intend to check it. And parental types, give your kids one last squeeze. It’s camp time for them!’
He called off our names one by one, and each of us, except for Corina, gave our parents a goodbye hug.
Once everyone was aboard and settled in surprisingly clean and comfortable seats (with seat belts I might add!), the bus driver, a grim, gaunt-looking man, started the engine.
I grabbed a seat beside Corina, right behind Nesto.
She twitched when the door closed. ‘I don’t think this is a good idea, Adam.’
Thirty human kids were locked inside a steel bus with one hungry vampire.
She licked her lips and I whispered into her ear, ‘Be strong, Corina.’
Corina smiled. ‘You’re a good friend, Adam.’
Growl announced that the trip would take about ten hours – four hours to the border and then another six or so to reach the woods where Camp Nowannakidda was nestled in ‘an ancient native forest filled with wonder and excitement’.
‘And mosquitos?’ I asked.
‘Oh yeah,’ he said with bizarre enthusiasm. ‘There’s a lot of bloodsucking at Camp Nowannakidda.’
‘They have no idea,’ said Corina, pinching her nose.
I shook my head at Corina. ‘Just keep the cravings at bay.’
‘I’m doing my best,’ she said with a nasal voice that made her sound a bit like a cartoon character. But since I valued our friendship and my limbs intact, I wasn’t ever going to tell her that. She unpinched her nose and took a big breath in. ‘I can smell the blood moving though everyone on this bus. Well, not you, Adam, and not Ernesto because he mostly smells of must and rotten roadkill.’
‘Did you say roadkill?’ Nesto asked, turning around. He was sitting in the seats in front of us. ‘Hey, have either of you guys ever been to camp before?’
Both Corina and I shook our heads.
‘This is the first summer when I haven’t been forced on a Meltzer family road trip.’
‘My parents haven’t exactly encouraged mingling with the masses,’ Corina said. ‘When we visited my relatives in Transylvania last summer, Mom sent me off to
a sort of summertime finishing school with “our kind” and I suppose that was like camp for vampires. We mostly learned how to be snooty and aloof.’
I caught Ernesto’s eyes widen. We were both thinking the same thing: that explains a lot.
‘What?’ Corina snapped, seeing our silent understanding.
‘I’m excited about the food,’ said Nesto.
‘Somehow,’ I said, ‘I don’t think camp catering is going to be our finest meals.’
‘Nah,’ Ernesto laughed. ‘I’m excited for the wild food. I’m thinking moose, beaver, deer, maybe even a bear. A chupa can’t live on squished squirrels forever, Adam. It isn’t natural.’
‘I honestly don’t know whether to be impressed with your optimism or disgusted by your appetite.’
‘Why not both?’ he chirped.
Corina sighed. ‘I suppose they’ll have nothing vegan. Good thing I packed a duffel bag full of candy.’
‘Apparently there’ll be doughnuts,’ I said.
‘Now you’re talking, zom-boy.’
‘My mom ate, like, ten at the presentation,’ said Ernesto. ‘She said they were to die for.’
* I’m asking for a plastic folding board, like the ones they have at Gap, for Christmas this year, but until then I keep a cardboard replica under my bed.
† Jake is probably my best human friend and we go to the comics store together every Wednesday.
6
In Which We Invade Canada
The bus trundled north as the flat Ohio landscape breezed by. Eventually we hit Detroit and stopped at the Canadian border. Two uniformed guards, a moustached man and a scowling woman, climbed aboard to inspect us.
‘Welcome to Canada,’ said the man. ‘What’s the purpose of your visit?’
Growl spoke up. ‘These lucky kids have got a summer of fun, activities, and adventure ahead of them at Camp Nowannakidda.’
‘All right,’ said the woman, ‘we’ll just check your passports and you can be on your way.’
‘Hand ’em forward,’ demanded Growl. ‘Come on, campers! Adventure awaits!’
Everyone passed up their blue passports and Growl shared the stack with the border officers. The moustached man strode down the aisle to check me out. He looked at my passport photo, which was just over a year old.
‘New with the make-up, kid?’ he asked.
‘It’s a phase,’ I said.
‘Just lay off the perfume up north,’ he cautioned. ‘It’ll attract the bears.’
I wasn’t thrilled about someone else holding on to my passport, but right then my anxiety turned to the bears.
I just hoped that Nesto’s chupacabra could keep the bears away.
It wasn’t long before we were on the open Canadian road, a highway surrounded by cornfields. I noticed a sign for a rest stop up ahead and asked Growl if we could stretch our legs and get some fresh air.
The bus driver mumbled something about tanking up and Growl agreed to pull us over at the next service station.
As we pulled in, I noticed a giant, golden doughnut on a pole. In neon lettering, it read: Can Nibble Donuts!
‘Doughnut run!’ announced Nesto.
‘Do you know what’s in those?’ I asked.
‘I’m with chuppy,’ said Corina. ‘I’m starving and after four hours in the tank with the scent of blood, I’m dying for a doughnut.’
Growl led everyone off the bus and they lined up to spend their dough on fried dough. I joined Nesto and Corina as they approached the counter of the doughnut seller. I spotted a sign that asked: ‘Can Nibble? Yes you can!’ It proudly declared that the Can Nibble Donut Corporation had over two thousand shops serving the doughnut needs of Canadians from coast to coast.
‘Can I help you?’ asked the lady behind the counter.
‘I’ll pass,’ I said.
‘Watching your figure?’ she asked.
Nesto laughed. ‘I’ll have a Cruel Summer Cruller, a Sunrise Sprinkle, and a Chocolate Concoction.’
‘I’ll take a party pack of Can Nibblers,’ said Corina, pointing to the sign above the counter. The Can Nibblers were little doughnut holes with faces painted on them. They looked overly happy given they were about to be eaten, digested, and eventually excreted.
‘A party pack is just twelve Nibblers,’ the lady replied. ‘You’ll save more with a two-four.’
Nesto pushed his cruller into his face and nearly cried with glee. ‘Thishishamazang,’ he mumbled.
‘Sold,’ said Corina, handing over the money.
The woman looked at the American dollars and smiled. ‘Hope you enjoy our national delicacy.’
Corina grabbed a little Nibbler, smiled back at its little icing smile, and popped it into her mouth.
‘Oh My Count,’ she nearly screamed. ‘Nesto’s right. A-maze-zing!’
She quickly grabbed three more of her two-four and swallowed those doughnut holes, well, whole. I swear she purred. She stood a little taller and I think her skin almost glowed.
‘Those are weally good,’ she said, with her mouth full.
The doughnut pusher smiled. ‘I know the feelin’ honey.’
Growl swaggered up behind us with a big grin on his tanned face. ‘You guys’ve discovered our delicacy, eh?’
‘Sogrood,’ chomped Nesto.
‘I’ll take a dozen Icing Igloos, and a dozen Northern Lights,’ he ordered, noticing I wasn’t stuffing my face. ‘Adam, you’re not partaking?’
I shook my head.
‘Watching my figure,’ I joked.
‘We’ll fatten you up at camp,’ he said. ‘The food rocks and there’s plenty of it.’
‘I like my BMI* where it is,’ I said.
‘Adam,’ he said, ‘like a great philosopher once said: you gotta live while you’re alive.’
‘What philosopher?’ I asked.
‘Jon Bon Jovi,’ he said.
‘Okay,’ I relented, if only to avoid getting life lessons from old rock stars. ‘I’ll have one bite.’
Corina offered me a little Nibbler – a dark brown ball encased in pearlescent icing. I bit into the soft, sugary dough. It was like biting off a piece of heaven.†
The sugar coated my tongue like a properly made bed. The dough was denser than I’d expected, but somehow not heavy. As I chewed, the jam inside oozed out, bursting into my mouth like I’d cracked a piñata of pure pleasure.
‘A two-four, please!’ I immediately ordered.
The server smiled. ‘Another Can-Nibble convert,’ she said, sharing a grin with Growl.
‘Welcome to Canada, kids,’ he said. ‘I think you’re gonna like it up here.’
* BMI stands for body mass index. It’s an important calculation to see if you’re over or under weight. I need to check if there’s such a thing as a ZMI, zombie mass index.
† Not that I’ve been – as far as I can remember.
7
In Which We Go into the Woods
There’s a song called ‘The Wheels on the Bus’, which melodically recounts all of the various activities that occur on a bus as it drives ‘all day long’. As the wheels on our bus went ‘round and round’, pushing ever northwards, an accurate version of the ditty would go something like:
The wheels on the bus go round and round,
Round and round,
Round and round.
The wheels on the bus go round and round, all day long.
The chupacabra on the bus goes totally stir-crazy,
Crazy stir-crazy,
Crazy stir-crazy and annoys everyone else on the bus.
The vampire on the bus fights her cravings …
The sister on the bus says, ‘where’s my signal?’
Jake on the bus holds a fart contest …
And the zombie on the bus wishes he was back in the grave.
Eventually we turned off the paved road, trundled down a long dirt road and arrived at a set of tall, barbed gates. I also noticed a couple of watchtowers. Everyone else had passed out from either e
xhaustion or the dangerously high levels of fart particles in the oxygen supply.* No one else was awake to wonder what the camp was trying to keep out.
‘Um, Growl?’ I said. ‘Why is the camp behind such a big fence?’
‘Bears, man,’ he said. ‘There’s bears in these woods and we wouldn’t want any of you getting eaten … you know, by bears.’
‘Makes sense,’ I said with an approving nod. For the first time since I’d heard about camp, things were looking up. Here’s a place that took safety and security as seriously as I did.
As we drove through the forested campground, I spotted baseball diamonds carved out of the woods, and a long stretch of waterfront. The water sparkled in the early evening sun. Kids jumped off the dock and splashed around in the water. They looked sun-kissed and happy, completely oblivious to the harmful effects of the sun’s UV spectrum and the waterborne parasites they were frolicking amongst. I suppose ignorance truly was a form of bliss.
Corina was eating in her sleep and I noticed her fangs had grown as she dreamt. I nudged her awake.
‘We’re here,’ I said.
She snapped at my hand.
‘Easy, tiger,’ I said. ‘And my, what big teeth you have.’
She touched her enlarged incisors and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. Her fangs retracted. She contorted herself left and right in obvious discomfort.
‘Agh,’ she groaned. ‘My back is aching. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I really miss my coffin.’
After ten hours locked in the mobile fart hothouse, I knew what she meant. ‘Maybe you can construct one in arts and crafts,’ I said.
She rolled her eyes then pinched her nose. ‘Why does it smell so bad in here?’
Nesto popped his head over the seats. ‘Hey guys.’
‘Oh, right,’ Corina said. ‘We’re travelling with the boy who refuses to bathe.’
Nesto did stink so I let him passively take the blame for the smelly situation. I didn’t think it was wise or polite to alert Corina to the source of the toxicity.†