Winnie put down her sandwich and tilted her head in Nina’s direction. “How do you know we’re not sporty?” she asked. “I happen to play tennis on, like, a competitive level.”
Nina’s eyes widened. “Really?” she asked.
Winnie nodded. “I don’t talk about it a lot. It’s just something I’ve always done,” she said. She smiled. “I kind of stink at other sports, though,” she added. “Just so you don’t get your hopes up.”
Nina chuckled.
“You guys,” said Maya, waving her hands in front of her as she often did, “one of the best parts of coming to camp is getting to hang out with people you never would have met back home! When I was at Camp Larksong—you know, that’s what this camp used to be called years ago—my best friend ended up being this girl named Lucy, who was super quiet and into drawing. At the end of camp she drew this amazing graphic novel about all the fun we’d had! We’re still friends now, and I still have a copy of her book.”
I shot Maya a grateful look. “That’s right,” I said. “My best friends are here at camp too—they’re counselors, Bess and George. You’ll meet them later, I’m sure. But anyway, we have nothing in common—except how much we like each other! You’ll see. Being alike isn’t what makes you friends. It’s appreciating what makes you different.”
The girls all seemed to respond to that, and soon they were chatting and exchanging questions about the different hobbies they’d each mentioned during the get-to-know-you session.
As we were munching on dessert, freshly baked chocolate chip cookies, Katie looked over at Harper, who’d remained mostly silent through much of the conversation. “Hey, Harper,” she said, adjusting her position to face her quiet bunkmate. “You seem a little quiet, and that’s cool. But can I ask you a question?”
Harper glanced up, looking surprised and even a little nervous. “Um—okay?”
“What are those books you brought?” Katie went on. “Because I love to read, and I really like dragons, but I’ve never seen those books before. Are they any good?”
Harper’s eyes lit up. “They really are!” she said, with more enthusiasm than I’d heard from her the whole morning. “They’re called the Dragon’s Eye Chronicles, and you might not have heard of them because they’re only published in Britain. My dad buys them for me when he goes to London for work.”
Katie nodded. “That’s cool!” she said. “Can I look at them when we get back to the cabin? The art looked pretty.”
“Me too?” asked Cece, raising her hand like we were in class. “I just read my first fantasy book, Seraphina, and I thought it was way cool.”
Harper’s cheeks flushed pink. “Sure,” she said, crumpling up her trash with a shrug. “I’d be happy to show you . . . just make sure your hands are clean.”
As we gathered up our trash and started heading back to the cabin, all complaints about being tired seemed to dissolve into the air, and the girls chatted happily about their favorite books, their favorite activities—all the things that made them different. If the girls noticed that Harper was still a little quiet and standoffish, they didn’t seem to care. They were talking like there were a million things to learn about one another and they couldn’t wait to learn them all.
I fell into step beside Maya at the end of the line and shot her a wink. “Nice job there,” I whispered. “You might be a natural for this CIT stuff, Maya. You totally defused that fight!”
She held up her hand so I could slap her five, and I did. “Same to you,” she said. “I think we’re going to make a great team, Nancy.”
I smiled as I followed Maya and the rest of the girls down the path to the main camp.
As nervous as I was this morning, I thought, camp is really starting to feel like home.
“So how’s it going?” Bess whispered as she slid in between George and me. We were sitting on a log, getting ready for the first full-camp campfire of the week. George and I had just been catching up on what was going on in our bunks. To her surprise, George was loving working with the younger girls.
“Marcie is amazing,” she’d told me. “It’s like she has this inner voice that tells her what each girl really needs. And the kids are soooo sweet. You know what’s crazy about seven-year-olds?”
“What?” I asked with a smile. I’d already told her about my bunk, and the rocky start we’d had, leading into a pretty solid current situation.
George shook her head. “They don’t argue with you!” she said. “They just . . . it’s all on their sleeve. If they feel happy, they act happy. If they feel sad, they cry and need a hug. It’s so easy! Man, if I could deal with only seven-year-olds for the rest of my life . . .”
“You’d probably go crazy,” I filled in for her.
“Maybe. Eventually,” George allowed. “But for a week? This is living, Nancy. This is my ideal camp situation.”