Love & Betrayal & Hold the Mayo

by Francine Pascal

  I guess there are lots of things about Robbie Wagner that are just plain regular person, still there’s a lot about him that’s different. He’s sort of aloof, and I like that. Like when the other guys are rough-housing and fooling around, he doesn’t get involved. They’re all about the same age, but he seems more sophisticated. That appeals to me too. Most of the boys I know are still at the goofy stage. It’s like he’s passed it already, except that fight business. That was really out of character—very immature.

  “That was very immature,” D. J. says to Steffi and me later in the bunk.

  It’s okay if I think it, but it bugs me to hear D. J. say it.

  “I don’t think so.” I’m stupid enough to fall for the bait. “Wally Kramer is pure nerd city.”

  “Jackass is more like it,” Steffi adds, “and it’s time someone stopped him.”

  “Oh, dear, Robbie and his girlfriends.” And with a hideous wink at me, D. J. wiggles off.

  “She is such a pain,” Steffi says. “One of these days I’m really going to let her have it.”

  “Forget it, she’s just jealous.”

  “How come you’re so nice about her lately? She’s such a shit.”

  “I just tune her out.”

  What I don’t tell Steffi is that I hate D. J. even more than she does, but I’m in no position to start any kind of trouble with her. All I have to do is give her one little piece of ammunition and she’ll blow my whole friendship with Steffi to smithereens.

  As is, we’re only okay when we’re alone, and even then there’s a tiny something that’s not quite right. As long as she doesn’t know what it is, it’s okay; I can put up with it. I think she thinks I’m just not completely happy here at camp, and since she’s the one who talked me into going, she doesn’t want to push it too much.

  Besides, in a little more than a week the summer will be half over. Not a minute too soon for me. What a disaster!

  Actually it’s not a total bomb. For one thing, the bunk turned out to be okay. Nobody inspects us, so we can keep it the way we want, which means you can’t tell the trash heap outside from the one inside. There isn’t one neat person in the whole bunk. That’s really lucky, because I think she would have killed herself or the rest of us by now.

  There never was enough room in the cubbies or the closet in the back, but somehow, in the beginning, everything fit better. Now, you can’t find the cubbies for all the clothes thrown around. Beds have not been made in weeks, and the sheets aren’t changed unless something drastic is spilled on them. Actually, it’s heaven. We all love it. It’s like living the way you always dreamed. And you don’t even have to feel guilty, because everyone else is just as bad as you are.

  Only one problem. Don’t ever misplace anything, because you will never find it.

  There’s only one cleaning job we all do. Soda cans. If you don’t take them out at night, by the next morning the entire ant population of the Western Hemisphere finds them. And they march right in the front door. The first time we made that mistake, actually it was D. J., she shoved her empty can under Claire’s bed. Naturally, she wouldn’t do it under her own. Claire, jerk that she is, probably thanked her. Anyway, the next morning there was a six-inch-wide wavy black line moving across the room connecting the door to the soda can. Four billion ants had come for the party.

  Alexandra and the twins cleaned them up while the rest of us stood around screaming, squealing in horror and disgust and rushing around shaking out all the piles of clothes on the floor. The poor ants were probably frightened to death.

  From then on: No empty soda cans allowed. Anything non-food can stay on the floor—permanently.

  This all proves that our parents are completely wrong. There’s no harm in sloppiness. Other than some wrinkled clothes, it’s perfectly fine. And if you lose something in the mess you’re bound to find it when you pack to go home.

  I’ve made a good friend in Alexandra. The twins aren’t so awful, except they never do anything alone and they agree with whoever gets to them first. Liza is fun in small doses. Claire is hopeless, and D. J. is like a wicked witch in training.

  And there’s no way to avoid her. She’s always watching me, waiting for me to make a mistake. But she’s in for a surprise—I’m not going to. All I have to do is stay loose for twenty-six days and I’ve got it made. It’s a cinch. That’s what I keep telling myself.

  I wish I could really believe it.

  Ten

  We’re all waiting for Color War to break. Color War is a special thing that happens only in summer camp. It’s a kind of big competition. The camp is divided into two teams, the green team and the gray. Then you do all the regular field sports, only you play for your team. After three days the team with the most points wins. There are also special events, like play night and sing night. Each team puts on an original musical, and the best one wins a lot of points. Everything is divided into teams, even arts and crafts, and then certain counselors judge the winners.

  If you’re on the green team you have to wear green all the time. And, except for when you go back to the bunk to dress or sleep, you always stay with your teammates, even when you march to meals or anything.

  You can see what a big deal all of this is. It gets to be very important, and you really go all out for your team. Anyway, you never know how Color War is going to break. It’s always very exciting. Steffi told me that last year they had a small plane fly over the campus and drop leaflets announcing Color War and giving lists of team members.

  One night Steffi, Alexandra, and I are sitting around hanging out when I get this idea, wouldn’t it be fun to break Color War ourselves.

  At first we’re just kidding around, but it begins to kind of grow and before you know it we put together the whole thing. It doesn’t sound hard, and it would really be a riot. All we need is some green and gray crepe paper.

  The plan is to wait until everyone is asleep, then sneak into the bunks and tie either a green or gray piece of paper to the end of each bed. When the kids get up in the morning, they’ll all think Color War has started. It would be fabulous. No one has ever done such a thing before.

  I have Thursday morning off, so I go into town to get the crepe paper. We plan to break it just before the weekend.

  It’s imperative that Dena Joyce and Claire the squealer do not know what we’re planning.

  This means that we have to hide the paper until Friday night. The best place to keep it is where it belongs. No one would ever look for it there.

  We plan to do it around three or four in the morning. The three of us will sneak out of our bunk and each one will take one row of bunks to do.

  I get the last row, that’s seniors and intermediates, the oldest kids.

  Steffi doesn’t even tell Robbie, and on Friday night we leave the dance early and go back to the bunk to get everything ready.

  Before the others get back we set everything up, hiding black T-shirts and jeans in our beds under the covers so that we can change into them when the lights are out. We each put our supply of crepe paper in the beds too. We cut the strips into short pieces the right size to tie around the metal foot-boards of the beds. Each one takes a mixture of gray and green.

  Alexandra has an alarm watch that she sets for three thirty. She hardly has to bother, since I’m so excited that I can’t sleep a wink anyway.

  Funny to watch other people sleep. Dena Joyce, the one we really have to worry about, changes positions every three minutes. I’ve never seen such a restless sleeper.

  I keep an eye on my watch, and just before three I wake up Alexandra so that she can turn off her alarm before it goes off.

  “Huh?” she says, totally dazed.

  “Shush … it’s time to get up.”

  Then I wake Steffi, who’s just as groggy, and the three of us tiptoe out of the bunk.

  “It’s pitch-black,” Steffi whispers to me.

  And it is. It’s a new moon, which is no moon at all. I never could understand who ma
de that one up. Why not just say no-moon and not make people crazy? Anyway, it’s a no-moon, and the only lights around are the tree lights and there aren’t many of those, so we’re really in the dark.

  It’s a little better when your eyes get used to it and, of course, we know our own bunk.

  I push open the screen door and it squeaks. We stop dead, but nobody seems to have heard. Quickly the three of us slip out onto the porch. We’d be in big trouble if this wasn’t our bunk, but luckily we know how to avoid the broken places in the flooring.

  “What do you think?” Steffi asks us.

  Alexandra’s answer is a big gulping sound. That’s exactly the way I feel too. Scared. It sounded like such a fun idea when we were sitting around planning it, but now … it’s turned scary. If they catch us we’re really finished. And there are a million ways for this to go wrong. If somebody wakes and sees us they’ll probably scream. I can just see that, one kid screaming and then all the others wake up and start screaming too. What if they think we’re thieves? They could even attack us.

  “You want to forget it?” I ask them.

  “Oh, no,” Alexandra says, shaking her head furiously, “absolutely not. No way … unless, of course, you want to …”

  “Uh-uh,” I say.

  “… or maybe Steffi?” You can tell she’d love Steffi to say no.

  But Steffi says she’s not going to be the one to chicken out.

  “Me neither,” says Alexandra, and then to me, “and you certainly can’t since it was your idea.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it.” For the first time I’m not so crazy about Alexandra. It’s easy to see that none of us wants to do it. It’s funny, but we’re all stuck.

  “Should we vote on it?” I take one last chance.

  “What’s the point of a vote if no one is disagreeing?” Al asks.

  “I just want to be democratic.”

  “Okay,” she says, “anybody for chickening out?”

  We all raise our hands. And then we crack up laughing.

  “Come on,” Steffi says, “we have to do it. It’s such a fabulous idea.”

  “We’ve gotten past the worst part already,” Alexandra says.

  “How’s that?” I ask.

  “What’s worse than Dena Joyce?”

  “It’s settled,” I say, “let’s move it.”

  And the three of us go off into the black night, each one of us heading for a different row.

  The minute I leave them my knees begin to buckle. The idea of doing this is scary enough but the idea of doing it alone is absolutely terrifying. Next time I’ll keep my big mouth shut.

  The first bunk is the oldest girls, Super seniors. They’re fifteen. I know most of them because they’re sort of in our group. At least, they’re invited to our parties.

  I get out seven pieces of crepe paper, put my shopping bag down, and carefully and quietly creep up the steps of bunk five. It’s all quiet. I turn the doorknob and gently open the screen door. It’s nearly pitch-black. I slip into the room as silently as I can and tiptoe over to the first bed. Carefully I tie a piece of the paper around the metal bar at the foot of the bed. I get the second one ready.

  I tie that one on. Nobody wakes up. This must be what it’s like to be a thief. It’s horrible and I’m a wreck, and this is only my first bunk. I’ll never make it.

  But I do. At least I finish the first bunk. I have no idea how many of each color I did. It was too dark. But it doesn’t make any difference anyway.

  By the third bunk I’m like a professional. It’s incredible how soundly everyone sleeps. I’m beginning to get excited because it’s going to work. Then I start to get giggly. I can feel it growing in the bottom of my stomach which is ridiculous since I’m all alone, but I can’t help myself.

  I tie on the first four ribbons, and then a little burp of laughter pops out of my mouth. I stop dead. There’s no other sound. Nobody heard. I swallow the next giggle, but it’s getting bad so instead of tying on the last four I just throw them on the foot of their beds and hurry out of the door.

  Now I’m in terror of doing the last two bunks. I can’t trust myself not to burst out laughing. But I’ve got to get a grip otherwise the whole thing is going to bomb.

  These two last bunks are thirteen-year-olds, intermediates. The very last is the worst because that’s where my adorable sister, Nina, is. If she wakes up I’m really absolutely lost.

  Somehow I get through the first bunk and now all I have to do is El Creepo’s bunk. I take a deep breath, then I take five more, and then three more, and then I know if I don’t get started right this minute I’ll be taking deep breaths till the dawn.

  I count to my special lucky number. It’s really mine alone because 111 bet there isn’t anyone else in the whole world who uses forty-seven for her lucky number. But it goes too fast. I may change it to 147.

  No problem getting into the bunk. I tie Nina’s on first because I have to get that over with.

  “Could I have a glass of water?” a voice whispers from the bed in the corner.

  I freeze.

  “Could I, huh?”

  There’s only one thing to do. I go into the bathroom and hunt around for a glass. It’s even darker in the bathroom. I move my hands around on the shelf where they would probably keep the glasses. But I can’t find any. This is horrendous. I don’t know what to do.

  Then I hear somebody getting out of bed. They’re coming to use the bathroom. Please don’t let it be Nina.

  I open the door to the bathroom and stand behind it. The person goes into the toilet. She closes the door. I wait for her to finish and open the door. Then I grab it so she can’t close it. She tries but I hold it. And my breath.

  She tries twice, then I hear her padding back to bed.

  I’m about to try to get out when I hear the voice again. “Big deal, can’t you just get me a little glass of water?”

  I start searching around again for a glass when I hear the slippers coming back to the bathroom. I jump behind the door again. This time the slippers stop at the sink. I hear the water. It seems like forever until she goes back to the other room.

  “Thanks,” a voice says, and then the slippers pad over to her own bed. There’s a sound of springs as she climbs into bed and then quiet.

  But she can’t be sleeping. There’s no way I can finish. All I care about now is getting out of here without being seen.

  I wait a couple of minutes and then I start walking toward the door. There’s no sound, and just as I reach the screen door, a very sleepy voice asks, “Where are you going?”

  “To the bathroom,” I say.

  “Okay,” she answers, and I slip out of the front door fast.

  Once outside I start running back to my bunk. It’s beginning to get lighter out and we have to do our own bunks, otherwise they’ll know in a minute who did it.

  We’re supposed to meet outside the bunk. Steffi’s already there and Alexandra comes right behind me.

  “How’d it go?” I ask them.

  “Horrendous,” Steffi says. “I couldn’t do the last bunk because one of the kids was up with a flashlight when I got to the door.”

  Alexandra had trouble too. One of the little kids woke up and had to go to the bathroom, so she took her. She was so groggy she didn’t even notice the difference.

  Except for a few people, maybe fifteen, we did everyone. Now all we have to do is get back in our own bunk, tie on some papers, and get back into bed.

  This is the worst part.

  We go into the bunk one at a time, very quietly. I go last. The minute I open the door my eyes shoot over to Dena Joyce. She’s dead asleep on her side curled up like a baby. From this side it even looks like she’s sucking her thumb. I tiptoe to my bed.

  My eyes are on D. J. all the time. Strangely enough from the other side she looks like she’s sucking her thumb too. What a thought. I tuck it in the back of my mind. It would make great ammunition.

  Each one of us ties a paper
onto the next bed just as planned. It’s really going perfectly.

  I love doing things like this. It’s so exciting. I love an adventure because it’s so dangerous. Can you imagine what would happen if Madame Katzoff or Dr. Davis found out?

  I’m safely in bed when I hear D. J. move in her bed. I carefully turn around and there she is, thumb out of her mouth, eyes open, staring at me.

  “I can’t sleep,” I say.

  She doesn’t say anything. Then, after a couple of seconds, she closes her eyes.

  She probably wasn’t even really awake. That’s what I have to think or I’m finished. We’re all finished.

  I decide I’m simply not going to worry. So for the next hour I stay awake purposely forcing myself not to worry. It doesn’t work.

  But I must have finally fallen asleep because the next thing I know I hear voices, not close by, but outside the bunk.

  Lots of voices, crowds. What’s going on? And then I remember and jump up out of bed. Boy, do I remember.

  I’m the first one up, but a minute later the twins get up. Right at the same time, too. And the first thing they notice is the crepe paper and in two seconds they put the whole thing together.

  “It’s Color War!” Enid shouts. At least the twin in Enid’s bed.

  “Fantabulous!” Ellen says, jumping out of bed, and then everyone is up.

  “Hey, wow!” Steffi says. Boy is she a lousy actress.

  And so is Alexandra who overdoes it horrendously by jumping up and running around the bunk grabbing at the ties on everyone’s bunk.

  Even though it’s fake we still made the teams just the way we want them. Al, Steffi, and I on one team, and the rest of them on the other.

  I watch Dena Joyce closely. She doesn’t seem so excited. In fact, she doesn’t seem excited at all, but then again, she’s always pretty cool.

  “Fabulous,” I join in the excitement, my eyes still peeled on D. J. She’s looking funny. It’s like she’s observing us. “Who’s on the green team?” I say, waving my crepe paper. “How about you, D. J.?”