The door closes before I get a retort out of my fallen-open mouth. “Well, this is going great.”
“Sorry about her,” Anna says, turning back. “The girl she was talking to when I introduced you? That’s her little sister. So to Keely, every camper is Kiana. She’s protective.”
“It’s fine,” I lie. “She’s right. I should go to the nurse.”
“You know, tonight’s activity is just practice for our talent show. So I’m sure you could lie low in the bunk.” Anna presses her forehead into her palm. “I’m so sorry. We’re making a terrible first impression. It’s not normally a shitshow like this, I swear.”
“No—it’s fine.” But here’s the thing about It’s fine: The more it’s said, the less it’s true. “I made a terrible first impression. Geez.”
“Not even close. Look, I’ll tell Rhea you’re going to Miss Suzette’s. Can I do anything else for you?”
“No, I’m really fine.” Sure I am. With my pinkened eyes, I’m the picture of stability and grace. “Actually . . . any chance you could forget all that stuff I babbled about?”
Anna smiles kindly. “Maybe not forget it. But I can promise I won’t tell anyone. We Daybreakers may not make a great first impression, but we’re excellent secret-keepers.”
I hope she gets my gratitude through a simple nod.
Before I push out the door, I hear her voice. “Hey, Lucy?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m really sorry your mom’s sick.”
Those are the words she says, but I hear the ones that sit behind them: You can talk to me about it if you want. Even though we only met an hour ago. “Thank you.”
The mess hall is full of discordant voices and forks scraping on plates, but I train my eyes downward as I walk out. My hair falls forward like tendrils of vines, hiding me until I emerge into the humid dusk.
I follow the curve of the lake, trying to find a vantage point where I can see the chapel light at Holyoke. I just want to know it’s there—a harbor still waiting for me.
Instead, in the fading golden daylight, I spot Jones sitting on a log by the waterline. Near him, the boy from the fight runs a few paces and hurls a long stick into the lake. It smacks against the water, splashes cutting up. Next, he flings a rock, then what looks like a strip of tree bark—his skinny body pitching forward in a heave of rage.
When the last of his debris pile has dropped beneath the water’s surface, he turns, stumbling back toward his counselor. Only then do I notice those little shoulders, shaking. Jones gets up to catch him beneath the arms, and the boy leans in, sobbing. I can’t look away as Jones stands there, holding him but otherwise gazing out across the placid lake. Like this happens often, angry kids clutching at his shirt as they cry until they’re emptied out.
And that’s why I don’t get to cry, I guess. Because they do. Because we’re older but we’re not the grown-ups who seem too far away to really understand. I tuck that thought inside me, warm and small like balled hands inside hoodie pockets. Beneath the beech trees and sugar maples, feet crunching against dead leaves, I hope for strength. Because as much as I want to be the one crying, I want to be the kind of person someone can hold on to.
CHAPTER SEVEN
6:45 a.m.
I startle awake, disoriented, and nearly smack my forehead against the bunk above me. Camp. Daybreak. A back that aches where it was elbowed. I remember now. After leaving the mess hall last night, I crashed into a dreamless, weighted-down sleep, barely even stirring when the cabin girls came in for lights-out. My co-counselors must think I’m an absolute moron.
If you’re going to quit, please just do it now. Something about that comment makes me resolved to try again. I tiptoe out of bed and change in the communal bathroom, dim lightbulbs flickering overhead.
At the lake’s edge, I pull my swim cap over my head and position my goggles. The sun is stretching its arms up slowly on the horizon line, and I stretch mine out as I dive. Dear God, my brain begins, thank you for—no. No thank-you. I reach my arm out, a sleek stroke against the water. Make her better. I kick my legs evenly, with extra force to propel me. You owe me that. Don’t you?
I swim out and back, until I hear . . . a bugle? From somewhere. How retro. It blasts out the cheerful tune used in place of alarm clocks for the military. I wrap my towel around me and hurry back, hoping my absence hasn’t been noticed. The girls are just getting out of bed, and I tug my swim cap off to untie my hair.
“You were swimming, Hansson?” asks the girl named Payton. “It’s early!”
“Well, I’m on a swim team, so I have to practice.”
“You wear a swim cap?” Nadia asks.
“Yep.”
“I do too! To keep my hair nice.”
“Hey,” Simmons says, as she dismounts from the top bunk. Her eyes flick across my face, hunting for clues about my apparent insanity. “You’re still here.”
Well, I was going to apologize. But I truly don’t appreciate the surprise in her voice. “I’m here.”
She studies me for a second, then smiles. I hope this means she heard the determination in my voice. “Well, then. We have optional yoga on the Great Lawn, breakfast, then showers for those who want them. We also have rest time after lunch if you want to shower then.”
“Okay.” I straighten up. “And look, I—”
“It’s fine. Maya! Out of bed. I mean it.”
“Ugh,” Maya says, face pressed into her pillow.
I really relate to Maya.
8:00–9:00 a.m. Breakfast
Simmons sits toward the end of the table, already surrounded by our cabin girls. I sit next to a girl with two shiny black braids, and a few others fill in around me.
“You eat a lot,” a girl comments, staring at my pile of food. Her name is Clara, I think.
“Swimming makes me really hungry.”
“Me too.”
The girls sitting nearest me are just kind of watching me. And I have no idea what to talk to them about. At Holyoke, I’d ask about their churches: What are you learning in Sunday school? Do you sing in choir? Are you doing Vacation Bible School this year? Without that shared language, I don’t know what to talk to third graders about. It’s summer, so they don’t want to talk about what they’re learning in school, right?
One girl stares at me as she shovels oatmeal into her mouth. “You’re pretty.”
“Thank you. So are you.”
“Yeah.” She keeps studying me. “You have a lot of freckles. Like, a lot. Have you ever tried to count them?”
“No, but how many do you think?”
She squints. “Probably a bamillion.”
I only barely stifle my laugh. “How many is that?”
“It’s like a bajillion but less.”
“So. What’s your favorite activity that you’ve done so far at camp?”
“We got to do beads,” Clara says. “Everyone else made bracelets and stuff, but I made a key chain for my mom.”