“Because I’m sixty-three,” said Eileen. Abby waited, wondering if that was supposed to mean something. Eileen looked at her and shook her head. “You probably don’t remember. But my mother was sixty-three when she died.”
“Ah.” Abby could barely remember her grandmother Rina. Her mother’s mother had died when Abby had been six.
“And I really do want to spend some time with you, doing something that you love,” Eileen continued. She had her eyes on the path, not on Abby, when she said, “I understand I didn’t always make the right choices about your summers.”
Was that an apology? Abby wondered. She and her mother hadn’t talked about Camp Golden Hills in years. When Eileen didn’t say anything else, Abby decided that maybe even a vaguely worded acknowledgment was better than nothing. And, quite possibly, the best she could expect.
* * *
“You’ll thank me for this later,” Eileen Stern announced from the passenger’s seat as their car rolled through the Camp Golden Hills gates. Abby didn’t answer. She was in the backseat, behind her father, looking out the window. There was an oversize wooden knife and fork, neatly crossed and nailed to the arch at the camp’s entrance, like the heraldry on a knight’s shield. Underneath the wooden silverware was Camp Golden Hills’ motto: A HEALTHY TODAY… A HAPPY TOMORROW!
“I know it doesn’t feel that way now,” Eileen continued as they drove underneath the arch. “But, someday, you’ll be grateful.”
Abby had her arms crossed over her chest. Her thighs were sticking to the seat. She didn’t bother answering. I will never thank you for this, she thought. I will hate you for this, for as long as I live.
Her father drove slowly along the bumpy dirt road, following signs that directed campers to the Welcome Center. At their first stop, a skinny, smiling young woman in a pink camp tee shirt and khaki shorts stuck her head through the open window. “Abby Stern,” Abby’s father said.
“Great!” said the young woman, like this was the best news she’d heard all day. “I’m Kelsey. I’m one of the senior counselors. And a Golden Hills alum!” Abby didn’t miss the approval on her mother’s face as Eileen looked at Kelsey’s flat belly, skinny hips, and long, cellulite-free legs.
“Mom and Dad, you can park over there.” Kelsey waved toward a parking lot, where ranks of cars were already lined up. “Abby, grab your swimsuit, and come with me.”
Abby pulled the swimsuit she’d been told to have ready out of her backpack, and plodded after the counselor, up a hill and into a wooden cabin. Inside was what looked like a doctor’s office, complete with a paper-draped examination table, a wheeled stool, and in the corner, the dreaded Medco scale.
“Hop on up and we’ll get your weight,” Kelsey said.
Abby held up her swimsuit. “Should I change first, or…”
“Nah, just take your shoes off.” Kelsey gave her a confiding wink. “For weekly weigh-ins, you’ll want to take off as much as you can, but not for this one.”
Abby toed off her sneakers and got on the scale. She closed her eyes as Kelsey slid the weights to the right, but she couldn’t close her ears when Kelsey said the number.
“Okay, now you can change.” Kelsey bounced out of the room. Abby shucked off her shorts and tee shirt and pulled on her plain one-piece navy-blue swimsuit. A different counselor (also skinny, with a dark-brown ponytail) ushered her into a room with a plain brown paper backdrop against the wall, and a Polaroid camera on a tripod in front of it. Abby was directed to stand in front of the backdrop while the counselor snapped pictures: front, back, left profile, right profile. After the camera spat out the images, the counselor used a thick black marker to write Abby’s name, and the word BEFORE, on the bottom of each shot. She handed Abby the Polaroids, along with a folder containing a sheaf of pages. One turned out to be her daily schedule. Another detailed the 1,200 calories a day she’d be eating for her stay. “Good luck!” the counselor chirped. Abby didn’t even try to smile back.
On its website and brochures, in the ads that it ran in the back pages of the New Yorker and the New York Times Magazine, Camp Golden Hills mentioned “health” and “wellness” dozens of times. The words weight or diet were used sparingly. That did not prevent anyone from knowing that Camp Golden Hills was fat camp. Abby had been exiled there in advance of her bat mitzvah in October.
“You want to look good in the pictures, don’t you?” Eileen had pleaded, after a morning spent dress shopping at the Cherry Hill Mall, where they’d discovered that Abby had already outgrown the juniors’ department and was wearing a women’s size twelve. This fact hadn’t troubled Abby too much. At least, it hadn’t surprised her. She saw her body every day and how the world reacted to it. But Eileen was almost in tears by the time she said, “Let’s take a break” and ushered Abby to the Nordstrom café.
At the counter, Eileen had a chicken Caesar salad, dressing on the side, and coffee, which she took black. She’d ordered the same salad for Abby before Abby could ask for her usual turkey club and fries.
“What I want,” Abby replied, “is to go to theater camp, like we talked about.” She’d looked at her mother, whose expression was stony. “Why is this such a big deal? Aren’t you supposed to be worried about my d’var Torah, or whether I know the prayers?”
“You don’t understand now,” Eileen said, her voice low. “But, I promise, when you’re my age, and you’re looking back at those pictures…”
“I’m not going to care!” Abby said, stabbing a crouton with the tines of her fork.
“You will,” Abby’s mother said, leaning forward, her eyes intent. “You will care. You’ll thank me for this.”
Abby shook her head. She speared a chunk of chicken breast and doused it in the little cup of dressing. She wouldn’t look at her mother or eat a single leaf of lettuce from her salad, and, when lunch was over, she refused to try on any more dresses, until Eileen threw up her hands and took her home. Abby had gone for a bike ride. Her mother, she guessed, had found Camp Golden Hills, and put her plot into motion.
When Abby emerged from the camp office with her Polaroids and her schedule, her parents were in the parking lot, arguing.
“You deal with her, I swear to God, I can’t take any more of her sulking,” Eileen said, drumming her manicured fingernails on the roof of the sedan.
Her dad had been the one to extract Abby’s monogrammed pink duffel bag from the trunk, to ask a counselor for directions and escort Abby up the gentle slope to Bunk Five.
Abby dragged her feet up the hill, giving one-word answers to her father’s questions. She opened the creaking cabin door and peered into the dimness. Six sets of bunk beds were lined up against the walls. Half of them had been claimed, and a few girls were unpacking, putting clothes away in one of the dressers, or using sticky blue Fun-Tak to affix photographs and posters to the walls. Her father picked a bottom bunk, seemingly at random, and put Abby’s bag on top of the skimpy, plastic-topped mattress. His expression was glum as he turned and faced her.
“I know this isn’t what you wanted.”