Love and Pollywogs from Camp Calamity

by Mary Hershey

  For Jamie and Beth,

  who will sing the Weenie Man song to me

  no matter how many times I ask—

  XOXO

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  You should know right off that even though my dad wears an orange prison jumpsuit to work and my sister, Maxey, could win an Olympic medal in the bossathon, I was the happiest girl in the whole state of Texas. In one week, I was headed to camp! I was so excited I wanted to jump up and down. But when you’re nearly eleven, you’re supposed to be past that. Instead, I talked about Camp Wickitawa until Mom said her ears were going to start spurting blood.

  It’s our school tradition at St. Dominic’s that every fourth-grade student gets to go to camp for the week of spring vacation as long as they don’t get any Fs, have lice, or do anything really bad. In the “bad” category, things had been circling the drain a few weeks back. One of my two best friends, Aurora Triboni, got suspended from school for roughing up a sixth grader who goes by the name of Booger Boy. After that happened, Aurora decided to go to public school at Sam Houston Elementary so she can play basketball with sixth-grade girls who are big like her. And I don’t mean just tall. They wear bras that are all totally filled up.

  But Principal Obermeyer said that even though Aurora goes to public school now, she could come to camp with us. This is why I adore my principal. Plus, she saved my life when I nearly got hit by lightning in a big storm a while ago. She isn’t afraid of lightning or bullies, even though she used to be a little sister just like me.

  It gives a girl hope.

  I checked my camp packing list, which I’d pinned up on my bulletin board in the room I share with Maxey, my big sister. Somebody had added a few things to my list!

  Freckle Remover

  Hair Straightener

  Freak-No-More Spray

  A Personality

  Very funny, Maxey! If I even go within breathing distance of her stupid bulletin board, she goes ballistic. I got out my thickest, darkest marker and crossed off what she’d written. I was not going to let her ruin my good mood. Even though she’s in seventh grade and has already been to camp, she was extremely jealous about me getting my turn. When she first got home from her camp, she talked about it for weeks and weeks. I was only a first grader then, but I soaked it all in. I memorized every single detail, and could probably find my way around Camp Wickitawa with my eyes closed.

  I knew it has a big private lake where you can swim and ride in canoes. There’s a little store called Totem Village that sells candy and souvenirs, and a giant fire pit for sing-alongs and marshmallow roasts. The big dining hall is called Mess and it has a soda machine with all the free refills you want (and no mothers watching to make you stop before your teeth rot).

  The boys have their bunkhouses on the other side of camp, and you only have to see them sometimes. Which is good, because Maxey says that the boys go all mongo woodsy. They don’t brush their teeth even though they’re supposed to, and they eat live bugs and everything! I don’t think Donal from my class would eat a live bug, even if he is a boy. Which is why my friends and I don’t mind if he hangs out with us sometimes. (He might eat a dead one, though.) Maxey might be making some of that stuff up, but I’ll know soon enough. The girls don’t have to eat bugs, and we sleep on cots in wooden cabins. And we each get a small dresser for our things. My own dresser! At home I have to share one with Maxey.

  And if you are a very good camper, you might win Outstanding Camper of the Week. They pick just one from your whole class. I wanted to win it so bad it kept me awake nearly the whole month before camp. But I didn’t just want it. I needed to win it.

  Outside the principal’s office was a long hallway with rows of framed pictures of all the other fifty-seven kids who had won it. One of them is my mom! One of them is not Maxey, and she’s still sore about it. Now it was my turn to take my place on the wall. I could earn back my family’s honor. My dad didn’t only steal a lot of money from the people in our town. He stole our family’s good name, and I wanted it back. Everyone would see the picture in the Tyler Wash Tribune of me standing next to Principal Obermeyer. From then on, whenever people thought of the Maloney family, they’d think that the town black sheep had turned snowy white.

  Going to camp was the biggest thing that had ever happened to me! I was even taking our special big suitcase, which I’d never gotten to use in my whole life. I’d never been on a vacation before. Not even once. For one, our family—which was down to me, Mom, and Maxey—couldn’t afford it, and two, my mom never stopped working. She was a nearly famous girls’ high school basketball coach, and if she wasn’t coaching, she worked extra games as a referee Just to Make Ends Meet. Which they might have if she wasn’t trying to pay back some of the people my dad stole money from.

  I had all my favorite clothes washed and rolled up on the bed, army-style, like Grandpa did his. Before he died last year, he taught me a lot of cool stuff like that. I can still hardly think about him without wishing I was with him when he went on to the Great Big Pasture. Pretty Girl, his old white cat, sat right on top of Grandpa until it was time for the ambulance to take him away. And one of the paramedics got her scratchy signature right on his arm.

  I lifted Pretty Girl from the nest she’d made in the suitcase and gave her a soft kiss on the head. She was so old and skinny she felt like a chicken carcass with no meat left on it. Her purrometer started up, and I sang Grandpa’s favorite song, “Puff the Magic Dragon,” to her. She loved hearing it. Pretty Girl was going to miss me bad. I’d be super lonesome for her too, but I had a feeling I’d be so busy having a blast that Pretty Girl was going to get the worst of the missing.

  Shows you what I know.

  • • •

  Every Friday after school, we have our Angel Scout meeting, which is like Girl Scouts, only instead of selling cookies, we sell chocolate bars that taste like brown crayons. We do a lot of good deeds, and wear beanies with angel wings that look more like alien ears. What I love most about Angel Scouts is our leader, Sister Lucille, who is a redhead like me. Secondly, I love the fact that I’m the treasurer of the whole troop. Maxey says me being treasurer is the definition of irony, and people must have elected me as a joke. Being treasurer is not a joke, and I am excellent at it. There was just that one time a few months back when all the money went missing, but it was not my fault. And we got it all back. Thanks to me, we have more money than ever since I talked Father Frank, my mom’s best friend, who was taking a time-out from being a priest, into making a big donation.

  “Effie! Over here!” called Nit. She’s my other best friend. “Found them!”

  Instead of our regular meeting at school, Sister Lucille had brought all the fourth-grade girls to Earline’s Eighty-eight Cents Store so we could by our toil
etries for camp. Afterward we were going to Big Arlene’s for dinner as a special treat. The boys had their own separate meetings on Fridays with our teacher, Mr. Giles. They were probably out skinning javelinas or having spit contests. I scurried over to the aisle where Nit was hunting down some of our supplies.

  “Perfect!” I said. She’d found the flashlight batteries. “Hey, look, if we buy this big pack, we get a free disposable razor! We’ll give it to Aurora so when she starts shaving under her arms, she’ll be all set. She said her mom wants her to wait until sixth grade, even though she’s pretty furry already.” I peered at the razor through the package. “These don’t expire or get rusty, do they?”

  “Naw, it will still be good,” Nit said. “Do you have Aurora’s list there too?”

  Aurora was at basketball practice at Sam Houston’s but was going to meet up with us for hamburgers.

  “She mostly has snacks on her list.” I read it off. “Three extra-large bags teriyaki-flavored jerky, a six-pack of strawberry sugarless gum, malted milk balls, pretzels, jumbo bag of tortilla chips, jalapeño bean dip—”

  “Effie, I don’t think they have dip at Earline’s.”

  “Yeah, me neither,” I said, scratching that off the list. “I’ll go grab the rest of her stuff, and you go find the little shampoos and lotions, okay? We’ll get some extras for Aurora even if she didn’t ask for them.”

  “Good idea!” Nit hurried off.

  I took my basket and headed to the snack aisle. I could hardly stop myself from shivering with excitement. If shopping for camp was this much fun, I couldn’t even imagine what a hoot it would be once we actually got there.

  I turned the corner and banged right into a brick wall. Only it wasn’t a brick wall at all. It was Kayla Quintana, fellow Angel Scout and my archest enemy of them all. The Person I Least Like to Run Into When I’m Alone.

  She has mean eyes and mean lips to match. She likes to wear very tight, sparkly clothes when she isn’t wearing her black and green plaid school uniform.

  “Watch it, Effeline!” she snarled. Kayla used to be Aurora’s best friend until Aurora smartened up and realized what a snake Kayla is. No insults to snakes intended. I’m pretty sure that Kayla would like to see me dead. She loves to torment me. It’s a special hobby of hers.

  “Sorry,” I said automatically. I wished I could take it back. I’m a very polite girl. I once apologized to a lamp when I crashed into it. I looked down into Kayla’s hand-basket and drew in my breath. The whole thing was nearly full to the brim with teriyaki-flavored jerky. What was she doing? Trying to buy out the whole jerky section so Aurora wouldn’t get any? Or was she going to try to lure Aurora back to her at camp? This had a very bad smell to it.

  I tried to move around her but she sidestepped, blocking me. This is one of Maxey’s favorite games, and I suck at it. I spun around to go the other way, but she grabbed the back of my sweater with her claws.

  “Leggo, Kayla,” I said, a warning in my voice.

  “Leggo what?” she said.

  “Let go of my sweater right now!”

  “Or what? You gonna do something about it? Where’s your little friendship club? You get kicked out already?”

  “Girls?” Sister Lucille said, coming up behind Kayla. “Everything okay here?”

  “Fine, Sister!” Kayla said. “Effie’s sweater just got caught on my basket. I was trying to get it free without tearing it. I think it’s the only one she has, you know.”

  My face burned. The Quintanas live in the fanciest house in town, and Kayla loves to make fun of my family because we’re kind of poor.

  “Let me see, Kayla,” Sister said. “Move your hand.”

  “Oh, got it, Sister!” she said. “There you go, Effie. Not a single tear or snag.”

  I whipped around and gave her a muddy look. I didn’t even care if Sister Lucille saw.

  Sister peered into Kayla’s basket. “I don’t think this is what your mother wanted you to spend all your toiletry money on tonight. Let’s leave some of this jerky here and go find you some soap and toothpaste, shall we?”

  I tried not to smile as Sister led Kayla off to the boring aisle. I grabbed the bags of jerky I needed and went to find Nit again.

  I know Kayla is jealous of what she calls my “little friendship club.” Her mouth makes this mean twist whenever she says it. Up until just a few months ago, I didn’t have a best friend. Or even a pretty good friend. Ever since my old best friend, Lola Jo, moved away when I was in second grade, I’d been the odd girl out. Some kids are still kind of funny around me because of my dad, even though that whole mess happened five years ago.

  Now I’m the only girl in my entire fourth-grade class at St. Dominic’s who has two best friends! Aurora is extremely sporty and loads of fun, and she would give you the shirt right off her back. Even though it would be three sizes too big. Aurora double-crossed me once when we first became friends, but I gave her another chance. Before you start thinking I’m like a saint or anything, it was Nit who talked me into forgiving her. She said Aurora was still UIK (Under the Influence of Kayla) and couldn’t help herself. But she’s cured of it now.

  My other best friend, Nit, which is short for Trinity, is really smart and not a freak like some people think just because she has a talent for figuring things out. Sometimes even before they happen. If you’re Irish, which I am, we call that “fey.” It usually comes in extremely handy.

  Except I think Nit’s fey button was in the Off position, because we did not get any warning about what was going to happen the minute I set foot in Camp Wickitawa! Or maybe Nit did know, but she didn’t dare tell me. Because if I had known what was in store for me during my very first vacation away from home, I would have had the special suitcase unpacked faster than you can say John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt!

  “What is your sister doing here?” I whispered to Nit, who sat next to me in the green leather booth at Big Arlene’s. I looked around nervous-like, hoping Maxey wasn’t going to show up. Maxey and Nit’s sister, Phil, short for Philomena, are best friends, and you hardly ever see one without the other. Imagine an earthquake and a volcano teaming up. That’s how big a mess the two of them can make together.

  Nit bit the paper end off her straw and rolled her eyes. “She’s here because of the counselor-in-training thing. Sister wanted to officially introduce her to everyone tonight.”

  This was the only dark spot on our happy cloud. Poor Nit. Her sister was going to be our CIT! I would have died if Maxey was going to be at camp. I couldn’t wait to have a whole blissful week without her.

  Aurora shoved a fistful of fries into her mouth, shook her head, and grunted.

  Basketball practice makes her very hungry.

  All thirteen of us fourth-grade girls were packed into four booths. Nit, Aurora, and I had our own. Sister Lucille was sitting at a big table with Phil, Mary Peters’s mother, who is my dentist, and an older girl I didn’t know. I hoped Dr. Peters wasn’t going with us. I was planning on eating about a year’s worth of candy at camp. And I wouldn’t have a lot of time to brush my teeth.

  Nit shoved the rest of her Annie Oakley burger over to Aurora and slumped down in the booth. “She never would have been picked for CIT if she hadn’t won Outstanding Camper of the Week. It’s an automatic shoo-in.” Nit sighed hard and rolled her straw paper into a tight ball. “Phil’s been reading this book Sister gave her about being a CIT. She’s trying to act all mature now. This morning, she comes into my room to show me how to make my bed. Can you believe it? It’s enough to make you sick up.”

  Aurora laughed. “Send her over to my house. She can teach my brothers!” Aurora was the only girl in her family, except for her mother, of course, and her five brothers were extremely messy.

  “Tell me again how Phil got Outstanding Camper?” I asked. Normally, Phil is “as useless as a box of hair,” like Grandpa used to say. Hard to believe that she ever got OCW, but it did give me hope. If Phil Finch could get it, surely I had a chan
ce!

  “She saved a kid’s life that was drowning,” Nit said. “I guess they overlooked the fact that he was drowning because she’d pushed him in. Least according to what I heard!”

  “Didn’t the boy know how to swim?” I asked, scraping a sticky place on the table with my thumbnail.

  She shrugged. “You’d think! They were on the swimming platform that’s way out in the middle of the lake. I hear it’s really deep there, which makes it great for diving.”

  “What fourth grader doesn’t know how to swim?” Aurora guffawed. “He must have had a cramp or a concussion or something.”

  I took a long drink of iced tea to try to cool my cheeks before they gave me away. Truth was, I didn’t know how to swim. A lick. Or a stroke. And I could tell that Aurora was going to think it was pretty weird that I couldn’t. It was one of the reasons I wanted to go to camp so bad. You got free lessons there. And after you passed beginning swimming, you even got a cool Pollywog badge. Maxey kept hers in her jewelry box. Since Nit, Aurora, and I had only been friends in the winter and spring so far, they didn’t know I couldn’t swim. It just hadn’t ever come up.

  “So who do you think will get it this year?” Aurora asked.

  “Pollywog?” I asked, my breath catching.

  “Pollywog? No!” she laughed. “Outstanding Camper of the Week.”

  “Well, you know who’ll think she deserves it!” Nit said.

  My head whipped around. “Who?”

  “Kayla, I bet,” Aurora said. “The girl’s an attention addict.”

  Nit looked behind her to make sure no one was eavesdropping. “The most outstanding thing Kayla could do would be to stay home and give us all a break!”

  Aurora shook her head. “Don’t count on it. She probably thinks it’ll be like shooting fish in a barrel, having us all in one place twenty-four hours a day! Hey, have you guys thought about what you’re going to do for Talent Night?” She took a big bite of hamburger, and ketchup gushed out the bottom. It landed with a big messy splash on her basketball, which was in her lap. Where it is most always when she isn’t on the court.