The Clover Girls

by Viola Shipman

  I rush up the stairs to the stage, my heart racing in excitement, and head backstage.

  My old stomping grounds!

  After my infamous fire baton debacle, I channeled my energy into design, and I spent countless hours backstage designing campers’ costumes for Talent Nights: from Cabaret to Cher, Wham! to Whitney, I made the costumes that transformed the Birchwood girls into stars.

  At least for a night.

  The clean freak me is mortified by the mess: backstage is filled with lights, rope, painted backdrops on wheels—starry nights, a park bench before a white gazebo, a café in Paris with the Eiffel Tower in the distance—that set scenes and moods from long-forgotten songs and plays.

  The nostalgic me saddens as I open trunks still filled with feather boas, sequined dresses and too-big heels for too-little feet.

  Memories, I think. Forgotten.

  The creative me is bursting with excitement, though, as I tear through the trunks, my heart racing even faster as I toss inspiration pieces left and right like a dog digging a hole in the sand.

  I grab armfuls of clothes and fabric and run to my old design room, a closet that I turned into my “design studio.”

  “No!”

  An old door sits atop two sawhorses.

  My makeshift table still stands!

  On it are my Tupperware bowls of varying sizes filled with needles and multicolored buttons and spools of thread. Scissors are propped into more bowls, and my old pink Singer measuring tape hangs from a nail on the wall. My old Singer is no longer on the table, though. It wasn’t mine, it was Cy Nigh’s, who brought it to me the summer after my debacle.

  “Use this to express yourself,” she told me.

  I pray that Cy, or one of her daughters, took it, and the old sewing machine has a place of honor and duty in one of their homes.

  I take a deep breath and blow on everything, dust flying, and I use my sweatshirt to wipe off my table. I set to work. I am so lost, in fact, that I scream when V and Rach appear.

  “We thought you had left until we saw your car still here,” V says. “We were packing up to leave.”

  “You scared the daylights out of us,” Rach says. “You’ve been gone for hours.”

  “What are you doing in here?”

  “Shut your eyes!” I say. “I want to surprise you!”

  They look at each other but do as instructed. I lay their outfits in front of them, as if they’re backstage and only have a few seconds for a quick costume change.

  “Okay, open!”

  “What in the world?” Rach asks.

  “Hear me out,” I say. “I went on a walk, like you did, V, to think. I thought about my mom, Em, my life, the chances we collectively never took. I thought about the Talent Night so long ago that really affected me for so long. It punctured my confidence, not only in myself but in my friendships and taking chances. I had an epiphany: I needed to take a chance again, even if it were only for myself. And I needed to find some way to forgive you. We were just kids.”

  I realize my voice is trembling.

  “I want us to redo a Talent Night.”

  “What?” Rach asks.

  “For real?” V adds.

  “For real,” I say. “I think I need this. To believe in myself again. Humor me. Please. Then we can all be on our way.”

  “From the looks of all this, you already have something in mind,” Rachel says.

  “I’m the one who’s choosing the talent for everyone tonight,” I say. “No winners. No losers. Just us. Just trust.”

  V and Rach glance at one another again.

  “Okay,” V says.

  “Okay,” Rachel agrees. “But will you trust us, too?”

  “I will,” I say, nodding.

  “Okay then,” Rachel says. “Let me make a few calls first to let my staff know I’ll be staying another night.”

  “Then try them on,” I say. “Then we have to practice.”

  “Then we need wine,” V says. “To pull this off.”

  Three hours and two bottles of good northern Michigan sauvignon blanc later, I take a seat in the auditorium. Two battery-powered floodlights we found in a closet, miraculously still working, are aimed at the stage.

  “Ready?”

  “Drunk? Yes. Ready? No.”

  I laugh at Rach’s honesty.

  Conservative Rachel walks out onto the stage dressed in shocking pink tights, a white leotard, a razor-thin purple belt cinched over the leotard, an electric-blue blouse tied in a knot around her middle, electric-blue leg warmers and a white headband. I’ve ratted her hair to the moon, and she’s wearing blue eye shadow and my big white triangle-shaped earrings. I hit Play on my cell to the song I have cued and ready.

  I snort so loudly it echoes when she belts out the chorus to “Let’s Get Physical” by Olivia Newton-John—inspired by my conversation with my assistant. In fact, it sounds as if a wild pig has entered The Lodge. Although Rach is doing ’80s exercises while she sings, including using a Suzanne Somers ThighMaster I found in a trunk, I’ve forgotten how talented she truly is. Her singing voice is worthy of winning The Voice.

  When she finishes, I jump out of my seat, screaming and applauding.

  I swear I see her eyes mist. “Thank you,” she says, before calling out, “Next, sucker!”

  I wait for Rach to join me and then click off the floodlights. I hear V’s heels click across the stage. When she stops, I turn the lights back on.

  V is standing high atop red pumps in a giant-shouldered, black-and-white polka-dot dress. A bright red, wide-brim hat sits atop her auburn hair, and she is wearing a matching red leather belt cinched through a gold circle belt buckle. V is angled dramatically in the center of the stage, one white leather-gloved hand perched on her hip, the other behind her, as if she’s a beautiful bird about to take flight. Her legs are turned, ankles bent, elbows pointed, light beaming through her limbs. She is staring at us, her glossy red lips barely parted, like she’s going to tell us a secret, and her eyes turn gold, blue, green in front of our very own.

  “She looks exactly like she did on her first Cosmo cover,” Rach whispers.

  I grab her hand and stare at her. I’m glad you understood my vision, I tell her without saying a word.

  “Girls on Film” by Duran Duran begins to blare from my cell, and V struts around the stage, striking poses, like the supermodel she was and still is. When Duran Duran sings about smiling wider and making a million bucks, V drops to the floor and hits her signature tiger pose, and we go crazy.

  When the song ends, Rach and I rush the stage.

  “That was amazing!” I say.

  “I didn’t look like a dancing hot dog?” V asks. “Like the one in the concession stand trailer the drive-in theaters used to play?”

  “Oh, no,” Rach says. “You were radiant.” She holds out her hand. “You were born to model.” V takes it and grips it.

  “Thank you for making me feel beautiful again,” V says. “Thanks for giving Em’s dream a shot, even for one more night.”

  “Oh, no, there’s one more performance!” Rachel says.

  They grab my hands and lead me onto the stage. V runs offstage, her pumps click-clocking on the wood. She returns holding a baton. Series of marshmallows have been taped onto the ends.

  “I don’t think I can,” I say.

  “You told us you’d trust us,” Rachel says. “We trusted you.”

  “This Talent Night was your idea!” V says. “The marshmallows were ours! Safe but effective.”

  “Says who?” I ask.

  “Marshmallows burn,” V says as if she’s Bill Nye the Science Guy.

  “I just don’t want to get burned again,” I say. “By anything. Or anyone.”

  “It’s time to erase that memory,” Rachel says. “For all of us.”
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  “What if it erases my hair?”

  “That’s a small price to pay for redemption,” Rach says.

  They hand me the baton.

  “Where did you find this?” I ask.

  “In the back, with all the other stuff,” Rachel says. “It’s the one you used that night. I think everyone was scared to touch it. I think everyone thought it was cursed.”

  They look at me.

  “This is insanity!” I say.

  “No, it’s a new start!” Rach says. “Trust. Starting now.”

  “Okay,” I say.

  “Hold on,” Rach says. She returns with a glass of water.

  “Gee, thanks,” I say. “But I’m not doing that dance number from Flashdance.”

  “For your hair,” she says, deadpan.

  “That inspires confidence,” I say.

  They run to the side of the stage. “We have a short window,” V says. “Marshmallows burn quickly.”

  “How do you know?”

  “We’ve already tried it out,” V says.

  “Unsuccessfully,” Rach adds.

  “Great. Me, drunk, with fire. I don’t see how this couldn’t end well.”

  Rach holds up the water. “Go!”

  V produces a fireplace lighter, ignites the marshmallows, and then starts the music. It’s already cued to the chorus.

  I take a huge breath, throw the old baton into the air, marshmallows flaming, and as it rotates down toward me, I shut my eyes and say a prayer.

  For my life.

  It’s then I can feel Em beside me.

  I say another prayer.

  For forgiveness.

  For new starts.

  For taking chances again in life.

  For trusting my friends once again.

  You got it, I can hear Em say.

  The music blares.

  Burning down the house!

  Suddenly, I hear V and Rach cheering, and when I open my eyes, the baton is in my hand, my arm extended into the air. I pull it down, blow out the marshmallows and pop one in my mouth.

  “Our Talent Night winner!” Rach yells as V applauds.

  They hug me tightly.

  “We are so, so sorry for what we said about you,” V says.

  “Sometimes those who seem the most confident are really not,” Rachel says. “We say things we don’t mean to make us feel better. Believe me, I’ve become an expert at that.”

  “Thank you for saying that,” I say. I let them go and look at Rach. “I do have to ask you one more question, though: Did you try to sabotage me by making me do that fire baton routine?”

  “Oh, Liz. No. Never. I just wanted you to take a chance. Step into the spotlight. I still do. I never would intentionally hurt you.”

  Then why did you try to steal my boyfriend? I think but don’t say out loud.

  I nod.

  “I haven’t had this much fun in ages,” V says.

  “Me either,” I say. I realize my voice is shaking. “Ages,” I whisper.

  I tilt my head and smile.

  Me either, I swear I can hear Em’s voice say.

  PART FOUR

  Friendship Rock

  Summer 1986

  It is a rainy day, thunder booming and echoing off the lake, the kind of humid summer afternoon when even the sheets are damp. Rachel is playing Uno with Em in her bunk when Mr. and Mrs. Nigh enter, followed by nearly all the counselors. Rachel knows it’s bad. Even the youngest camper knows it’s bad when everyone comes to get you.

  “Rachel?” Mrs. Nigh says, her voice as soft as the rain. “We need to talk to you about your father...”

  Rachel’s father had a heart attack at work. Dropped dead on the spot. No way to revive him. Gone, in the blink of an eye. Mrs. Nigh was going to drive her back to Detroit.

  My childhood is officially over, Rachel knows.

  She remains calm until everyone leaves, and then she blazes out of Pinewood Bunk and runs directly to Birchwood Lake. She sprints into the water—still wearing her jeans, tennis shoes and green hoodie—and swims toward Friendship Rock.

  Thunder booms, rain pours, and it is dark as night. She is sobbing so hard, she can barely breathe.

  “Rach? Stop! Come back!”

  A voice calling from the shore.

  Em.

  Rach continues to swim. The farther she goes, the more exhausted she becomes, weighed down by her grief as much as her waterlogged clothes. When she finally looks up, searching the lake, she cannot find the rock. Rachel stops, rain pounding her head. Lightning flashes, and she looks up into the sky.

  “Dad?” she yells. “Dad!”

  The last memories she has of her father are of him tucking her into bed, singing, You are my sunshine, my only sunshine..., eating cherry pie on their way to camp and holding her high in his arms so she could put the topper on the Christmas tree.

  Rachel stops fighting. She gives up and begins to sink.

  “I’ve got you, Rach! I’ve got you!”

  Rach is in Emily’s arms. Emily is kicking with all her might.

  “Em, I’m so tired.”

  “Hold on!” she hears Em yell. “Hold on, Rach! Do you hear me? Don’t let go!”

  “HELP!” Em yells. “Somebody, help!”

  But it is so loud between the rain and the thunder, and the buzz of camp.

  Rachel is tired. She now only hears splashing. She sees a lump in the water, Em’s wet hair trailing behind. And then Rach passes out.

  The next thing she knows she is on shore, and Em is beside her. A nurse is blowing into Em’s mouth. “Breathe, Em! Breathe!”

  Rachel tries to sit up, but someone holds her down.

  “No!” she screams. “Em! No! It’s all my fault!”

  Suddenly, Em spews water, and everyone sighs with relief. Rachel goes home, Em goes to the hospital, and when they both return the next year, neither is the same.

  Rachel seeks to fill a void left by her father. She seeks to battle others as she does her mother. She seeks to gain attention from men, and overpower other girls, rather than earn respect from either one.

  Em becomes even more of a loner, lost in her books, clinging to The Clover Girls as if she were drowning, and they were her Friendship Rock.

  Em seemed to understand that all of this—like the four-leaf clover she found that first day—was a sign: she would be the first to die and yet the only one with the strength and the power to keep the others alive and together.

  Summer 2021

  Veronica

  My head throbs, and I search for my phone. I know it is somewhere around me in my bunk. I feel left and right, back and forth. I sit up and finally feel something odd on my body. I squint, trying to adjust my eyes, and that’s when I find it: my cell has been taped in my cleavage. There are words written in red lipstick above and below it. I adjust my eyes yet again to try and read upside down what has been written on my chest.

  DON'T BE A BOOB!

  CALL ME!

  I laugh and then slap my hand over my mouth so as not to wake the others.

  I haven’t acted this silly since my college drinking days. I haven’t had pranks pulled on me since camp. And then a question hits me: How drunk was I last night?

  I slowly—and with great agony—free the phone from my skin. I illuminate my cell.

  6:00 a.m.

  My body clock is completely off. I wish the time on my cell was, too.

  My mind and body have yet to adjust to the time change. I am still on Pacific Time, which means it’s the middle of the night there. But I’m used to going to bed very late, long after David and the kids, and still rising early. My internal alarm just won’t turn off.

  And it’s way off.

  I shut my eyes, and last night flashes in my head, in s
trobes, like it did when I was modeling. It was a stupid night, filled with lots of laughter and wine, a night where time slowed and the only thing that mattered was having fun.

  Just like we used to do in camp.

  I think of Ashley and Tyler ensconced at their camps, which are nothing like Birchwood. They are more boot camp than summer camp, with an intensive focus on improving a certain skill set. Tyler is not only working to bump his SAT scores at one camp, but will be working on a short film at another to bolster his chances of admission to college and demonstrate his talent in filmmaking. Ashley is at cheer camp and then acting camp, competing against stunningly beautiful and talented girls whose entire lives revolve around both, girls who’ve been in gymnastics since they were three, or already have agents and have landed commercials or roles off-Broadway. I was lucky to have been discovered.

  Discovered? I think. Or disloyal?

  I think of Rachel and what I did to her. Would the outcome have been the same had I not lied to her? Would I have been discovered anyway? The question still haunts me.

  Because my gut says no.

  I was clueless about the time, effort and money other families spent on their children, or how long many models had been working in the industry just to get their big break. Many of my colleagues despised me for my good luck. Just as many despised their families for pushing them down paths they didn’t want to tread.

  I think of my children.

  Are they really doing what they love? Or are we exerting too much force? Are they happy? Or are they doing this to make us happy?

  Another director and actress in LA, I think. How cliché. I stop. That’s about as original as having an architect and former model for parents.