It has not changed, I think. Unlike me.
The lake is very deep, and campers used to freak out during their annual swim test when the water turned from blue to black once they reached the middle. Friday the 13th had come out in 1980, and it changed the way we all thought about summer camps. Watch out for Jason! some of the older campers would yell during the middle of a swim, scaring us young girls.
The camp sits on a hill, with Lake Birchwood set down a bit from the main grounds. On the opposite side of the big lake sat the boys’ camp, which I heard is still going strong.
“I still remember your name: Billy Collins,” I say to the breeze. “I still dream about you asking me to dance.”
Beyond that was what we called The Lookout: steep dunes led to a view from the top that was spectacular, Lake Michigan spread out before you. We would sprint down the dunes, our legs churning, and run directly into the water.
I take a seat on the sandy shore at the edge of Lake Birchwood.
The camp is located on the forty-fifth parallel, a line designating the latitude halfway between the earth’s equator and the North Pole. Many Michiganders believe there is an invisible force—a migrational pull, if you will—that draws people here not only to vacation but also to settle. That pull has created a mecca for artists and photographers. Many are drawn here by the forty-fifth’s magical light.
I look over the woods and water as the late afternoon sun illuminates the cattails and reeds, the loons and birds, the sand and the birch. It is a soft light, almost ethereal, and everything looks draped in golden gauze.
I shut my eyes. I can see all of us together, in our too-big camp T-shirts and too-big hair for our little bodies, gathered on the dock for our first camp photo. I can still hear the campers and counselors yelling, Birchwood forever! I can still remember the day we all met, Em finding that four-leaf clover, which began a legend and a downfall as fiery as any from Greek mythology. I can still hear us singing our camp song.
“So now I come to you...”
I jump out of my skin, screaming, but then I stop just as quickly and know immediately who it is.
“With broken arms...”
I stand and wipe the sand off my rear. I turn. V!
“I still sing that Journey song exactly the same way after all these years.”
“Me, too.”
“Same with ‘Hold Me Closer, Tony Danza.’”
In the past, I would have held out my arms, and V would have come running into them. We would have swayed back and forth in the fading sunshine, as bullfrogs moaned a dramatic accompaniment.
Instead, we just stare at each other for the longest time, the bullfrogs’ moans a noisy soundtrack to our uncomfortable silence.
“How long’s it been?” she finally asks.
I don’t know if she’s asking about the last time we were here or the last time we talked, so I take the easy route.
“Over thirty years since I’ve been back,” I say. “I can’t believe I’m here.”
“Me either. It’s surreal.”
“When did you get in?”
“A few hours ago. Flew into Traverse City,” V says. “The traffic was terrible. This area is booming.”
“Yeah, northern Michigan has become a famous tourist destination now.” I look around. “I guess we knew something.”
V tilts her head as if my words have knocked her off-center. “Maybe we did,” she says, her voice soft as the breeze.
I stare at my old friend as she scans our former camp. To be honest, I don’t know if I would recognize her if I stumbled across her on the street. She’s gained weight as the decades have advanced. Her leonine body is now more Rubenesque, her angular face more shadowed. And her signature red hair is still red, but in a harsher, salon-made way. But she is still beautiful, and the photos in those tabloids did not do her justice.
She is a lot like me, I realize: still hanging on gamely, although the game has changed dramatically, say from Centipede to...well...Words with Friends.
“You look great,” she says. “Still a fashion icon. I should have you start dressing me again. I feel like I’ve lost my mojo.” V smiles, and her eyes sparkle.
I look into those gorgeous eyes, the ones that gazed off the covers of endless magazines. Everyone talked about her tiger pose and red hair, but I always believed it was her hazel eyes that made her famous. Grass green with flecks of gold that could seemingly match any color she wore or product package she pitched: blue, green, yellow, gold.
“I never had the opportunity to dress you after camp,” I say. “I would’ve liked that.”
Her face falls, and her eyes lose their sparkle. She looks toward the lake. I have swatted away her attempt to be nice like an irritating mosquito.
I start to apologize, but I stop.
“How’s your mom?” she asks. “And your kids?”
“The same,” I say.
“That sounds ominous,” V says.
“It is.”
There is an awkward pause.
“My mom is dying,” I say.
“I’m so sorry, Liz.”
“I probably shouldn’t have even left her. I shouldn’t be here. I just came for Em.”
She nods. “Me, too.”
There is a long silence.
“How’s your family?” I ask to fill it.
“Busy,” she says.
“That sounds ominous, too.”
“It is.”
We stand awkwardly for a few more moments, pretending to look at the lake, before heading back to the camp, both of us avoiding walking through the field of clover to take the dirt path that is still worn but weedy.
“Have you found Em?” V asks when we make it up the hill.
“I haven’t looked,” I say. “I’m a little freaked out.”
“I feel the same way,” V says. She lowers her voice as if she’s telling me a secret. “About seeing Rach, too.”
“What happened to her? I actually turn the channel whenever she comes on.”
“Me, too!” V says.
For an instant, I feel better, but I know V’s game: turn everyone against Rachel before we realize it. And I know what happened to Rachel: we happened to Rachel.
We both begin to wave our hands around our faces and slap our arms and legs.
“Mosquitoes!” I cry.
We race to our cars, grab some water and our jackets. “Bug spray?” I ask.
“No,” she says. “I didn’t really give this much thought. I just came.”
“Me, too. Where are you staying?” I ask.
“Hotel on the bay in Traverse City,” V says. “Thought it might be nice to spend a few days on the water with just me. I haven’t been away from my family in ages.”
“Same here. I booked a little B and B in Glen Arbor.” I stop, and guilt pings again. I’m staying in a cute B and B while my mother dies alone.
“Oh,” I say, attempting to remain light and airy. “Look what I bought for Em at The Cottage Book Store.” I grab the copy of Flowers in the Attic.
“Is that for me?”
V and I yelp at the same time. Rachel appears out of nowhere. We didn’t hear her car pull in. She is holding an armful of birch bark.
Neither of us reach out to greet her immediately.
“I take it you both want to lock me in the attic, just like in the book?” she asks, trying to make a joke to cut the tension.
No, I want to say. You’re more like the horrible grandmother.
Instead, we all play nice like adults do. V and I finally extend our hands, and Rachel sets down the wood and shakes them politely as if we’re new business colleagues she’s meeting for the first time. Kids are honest. They tell you the truth. It’s grown women who play the games. We all learned that firsthand. We went from sharing secrets to hidin
g them here.
There is silence, long enough for us to hear the whoops of boys at Camp Taneycomo. Long enough for the first fireflies to appear as dusk settles on the camp. I watch Rachel watch V as fireflies dance around her. Her face is pained, as it was so long ago. The irony—and memories—are still too much.
“None of us came here to fight,” I finally say, before taking a very deep breath. “We came here to say goodbye to Em. So, let’s do that and move on with our lives.”
“Agreed,” V says.
Three decades later, and we still can’t reach out to hug a friend when they’re in pain.
“I actually came bearing gifts,” Rachel says. She nods down at the birch bark. “Remember how my mom loved to collect this?”
I look at Rachel. I truly see just how vulnerable she is.
Still.
“How is your mom?” I ask.
“Not speaking,” she says. “Thanks for asking.”
Silence falls again.
“Listen,” Rachel says. “We may not like one another anymore, but we all liked Em. She was our mom. She was our glue. And I think it says something that we all took time to honor her memory and what she meant to us.” She pauses. “She asked us to scatter her ashes, but I thought of something that would mean even more to her. Remember how at the end of every camp we’d all gather for the Candles on the Lake ceremony? And we’d place them all on little birch canoes.
“Em loved that ceremony,” Rachel continues. “She’d always cry.”
“Yeah,” I say, smiling.
“Candles on the Lake represented what was best about Camp Birchwood,” Rachel says. “That we all grew closer over the years.”
“That’s lovely, Rach,” V says. “Really.” She extends her hand and touches Rachel’s arm tentatively.
Rachel flinches at her touch, moving back like when you encounter a snake while hiking. She then looks at V for the longest time as if to say, I knew you’d remember Candles on the Lake.
“What’d you bring?” I ask, trying to avoid an incident.
“I bought candles and have them in a bag. I thought we could light one for each of us, put them on these little makeshift birch canoes and float them into the lake.”
“Beautiful,” I say. “Let’s do it before it gets too dark.”
“And we need to get her ashes,” V says, making a face.
We head to camp and walk as if on instinct to our old bunkhouse. I open the screen door and there, sitting on the bottom left bunk in the far corner where Em always slept, is a large box. It is wrapped, like a Christmas present, but in vintage paper, with old writing on it. And that’s when I notice that there is an indention in the old pillow on the rickety bunk, a camp blanket tossed haphazardly at the end. I grab the box and nearly fall running out of the door and down the stoop.
“I think she was in there!” I squeal.
“What? Now? Her ghost?” V half screams.
“No, no. I mean, she was in there, in there. Like, not too long ago. There’s a pillow and a blanket.” I look at them. “She was waiting for us, just like she said.”
We all jog to the lake. I set the box down. Rach hands out candles, and we each place one into a little birch canoe and set it at the edge of the water. Rach adds one for Em, and then she lights each one. We give them a push into the water and take a seat on the sand. The sun tilts behind the dune, and the world is cast into sudden darkness. The candles catch the current and float into the lake, spreading out as if they are going their separate ways. I remember what we used to say at the ceremony: the lights, like each camper, shine individually, brightly on their own. But as they move farther away from the shore, they swim together, getting closer and closer. Finally, in the distance, they become one unified light, shining even more brightly together as a beacon, a sign of hope, a symbol of the fact—as we used to recite—that we all may be individuals who arrive alone but we end up coming together. As a result, we are stronger, brighter, better, even more beautiful.
Did our lights dim over time because we swam apart, didn’t come together?
There was a day when we were the candles, when we were brighter together.
“We better do this now,” I say, gesturing at the box. I grab my cell and turn on the flashlight. I begin to open the box, when I do a hammy double take, my bad eyes finally realizing in the light that it is not wrapped in gift paper, it’s covered in a letter.
In Em’s handwriting.
“Oh, my God,” I say. “This is a letter from her! Hold the flashlight.”
I peel the letter off the box. It is four pages long, in her cursive, and taped onto each side of the box. Once I have it in hand, I look inside and pull out a little vase.
“Holy crap!” Rach says. “That’s the pot she made our first summer here. Remember?”
“You’re right,” V says. “It’s all coiled and lumpy. She rolled all those pieces of clay like little snakes and then just laid them on top of each other without ever smoothing it out. We all made fun of her.”
There’s a tiny lid on her vase. I remove it and tilt the vase toward the flashlight. Em’s ashes, gray and sad, sit inside.
“Read the letter,” V says. Her voice is trembling.
I look out over the lake. Our candles are a single light. My eyes fill with tears.
“Okay,” I say, “but first we need to scatter her ashes.”
I tilt the vase and pour some ashes into our hands.
“To Em!” I say, tossing her ashes onto the lake.
“To Em!” V and Rachel repeat.
Some of her ashes catch in the breeze and float toward the dunes. The rest float into the lake, and I watch until they disappear, become one with the light.
And then I start to read the letter, but it’s as though Em is sitting right here, reading it to us in her own voice. I can hear her, clear as day, feel her spirit next to me.
Emily
My Dear Clover Girls:
If you’re reading this, we’re together again! FINALLY! AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! Thank you!
How does it feel to be back at camp? I know that one leaf—me!—is now missing from our good luck clover, but I’m hoping there’s still some magic left in our group.
As I wrote to each of you, I spent a few weeks here early this summer, when I was having a few of my last good days. I knew it was my last summer, so I wanted it to feel like my best summer. And that was always here. I slept in my old bunk in our cabin. No one was here, just me, but I felt like I was still surrounded by all of you.
Remember that pact we made a long time ago, that very first summer at camp? We promised that we would all retire here together one day. Did you know we were way ahead of our time? Everyone these days is talking about what we planned so long ago. People in their forties and fifties want to ensure that their lives down the road are lived on their own terms: privacy and space of their own while being surrounded by their friends and enjoying shared and communal spaces like dining rooms, kitchens, fitness rooms, gardens, TV rooms and libraries. What kind of place does that sound like to you?
Camp!
Why am I telling you all of this?
As you know, I didn’t have children, and I don’t have any next of kin, so I’ve been wondering what I would do with my estate. And this is it.
I bought Camp Birchwood before I died. And I’m giving it to all of you.
What better place—and memories—to leave as my legacy, right?
In short, the camp is paid in full, and I’ve also established a small endowment (invested, so it will grow) to pay for future capital projects as well as help with the taxes. Like you, the camp needs a lot of love: roofs need to be repaired, cabins need mortar, there’s no AC or heat, plumbing is a mess, all the appliances are from the ’80s, there are virtually no modern conveniences. But I did turn on the water and power in The Lodge an
d stocked it with some necessities. I also invested wisely and lived modestly. My only children were books. I didn’t know what I was saving for...until I returned here.
I was saving for this. I was saving for you!
You’re all lost. Face it. You are.
Since I can only imagine how awkward it is to be together again after everything we went through, let me ask each of you some questions so you can remember how fragile, human and desperately in need of friendship each of you are.
V, you gave up your career for your husband’s and lost your self-confidence as a result. And your kids are so incredible, but are they happy? Are you?
Liz, you’ve given your entire life for everyone else, but you’ve lost your own dreams. You are such a talented designer. When are you going to fashion a life for yourself?
And Rach, our superstar, you’re the most lost of all. You’re still acting, but it’s a role I know you no longer want to play. It’s not about politics. It’s about being true to yourself. What do you believe in anymore? Anything? What about us?
I know, I know, you all have families, careers and busy lives, and I know we’ve each hurt one another so deeply, but I ask you this: Why can’t this be the paradise it once was? Why can’t this be the place where you find out who you once were? Why can’t this be the place where you come together, forgive and brighten one another’s lives again? It’s all up to you. Because it’s yours.
But, there’s a catch.
In order to inherit the camp, you must all spend a week together here at Camp Birchwood. The only stipulation is that by the end of the week you must commit to the camp TOGETHER. It can’t just be one or two of you. The only goal is that you have fun and reconnect. There can no longer be any secrets, pacts, petty jealousies or grudges. This is a week for you to decide whether you want to do something better and more important with your lives as friends. Sounds simple, right? At one point in time, this would have sounded like a dream. I bet you’re not thinking that right now.
The Clover Girls Page 7
