Where We Used to Roam

by Jenn Bishop

  “Your mom must be so bummed.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Now the only track star in the family is me.” I grimaced.

  “Hey, you’re better than me. How fast is your mile now?”

  “Just under nine minutes.” I left off the fact that I was one of the last finishers at every meet.

  “That’s amazing! Remember in gym class? I could barely finish it in twelve.”

  “On the plus side, I haven’t accidentally stabbed anyone with a javelin… yet.”

  “Good job, Emma. Good job.” Becca laughed.

  By that point we were at the edge of her driveway. The magnolia tree in front of her house was in full bloom. If there were a way to snap one of those blossoms off and keep it just like that forever, I would 100 percent put it in a box. But there’s something sad about dried flowers. At least to me. They only reminded me of the real thing.

  “Yikes—I’d better get my homework done. My mom’s taking me to Porter Square Books tonight for an author event.” Her eyes lit up when she said it.

  “Oh, cool. Well, have fun.” There was this little pang in my chest. Like part of me wanted to be invited even though I probably didn’t know the author, even though I probably hadn’t read any of their books. Was that how she felt when I made plans with Kennedy and Lucy?

  “See you tomorrow,” she said.

  As I turned back to head home, I noticed a blossom that had fallen off the tree. Pink and white. Not trampled by anyone. Not yet.

  I picked it up and carried it all the way home. Maybe it wasn’t going to last, but it was too beautiful to just leave there.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The day before the sixth-grade trip, the door to my brother’s room was ajar, for once, when I got home from track. “Hey, A? You have a sec?”

  The shades were drawn. When I stepped into his room, my foot crunched a half-eaten bag of… I didn’t even want to know what. The whole room had a sad smell to it, like wilted french fries and dirty laundry. I guessed that without a girlfriend stopping by, he had nobody to impress. But still.

  His laptop sat on the edge of his bed playing a movie, but when I got closer, I could see that Austin’s eyes were closed. What was he doing asleep at four in the afternoon? I nudged his shoulder and his eyes fluttered open.

  “Geez, you try knocking?” His words came out slowly.

  “Your door was open,” I said. “And I did.” I hated that the second part came out as a whisper. It didn’t used to be like this—never knowing when Austin might snap at me.

  He rubbed his eyes and reached over to pause his movie. “Guess I nodded off.”

  I pulled up a shade, thinking some sunlight might wake him up, never mind help with this whole man-cave situation, but all it did was shine a spotlight on what a dump this place had become. I knew Mom and Dad tried to stay out of our rooms, but there could have been a raccoon living in here and you wouldn’t even notice.

  “So, I leave for Camp McSweeney tomorrow.” I sat on the edge of his bed, pulling my knees up to my chest.

  “You do know what they say about Camp McSweeney.…”

  “What do they say?”

  “What happens at Camp McSweeney stays at Camp McSweeney.” Austin gave me a serious nod.

  “Really? No.” I couldn’t help scrunching my nose. “Ew. Gross.”

  “Lot of first kisses happen at Camp McSweeney. Just saying.” For a second it felt like we were back in the fall. Like his injury had never happened. But then I blinked and took in our surroundings and knew it was almost summer. That in a week we’d be out of school.

  Buh-bye, sixth grade. Hello, seventh. I wondered if Austin felt that way. If he was ready to put eleventh grade behind him, eager for a fresh start.

  I grabbed a stray pillow from the end of the bed and chucked it at him. “Stop it.”

  Austin cracked a smile.

  There was no boy in my grade that I wanted to kiss at the moment, that was for sure. None could even come close to Noah Sullivan. I hadn’t seen him since the band showcase, but in my head, I was pretty sure I would always see him. Especially those eyes.

  Though maybe there’d be someone at camp this summer. A cute artist boy in Rhode Island. Maybe?

  “Was your first kiss at Camp McSweeney?”

  “I’m not telling you about my first kiss, Em. That stuff is sacred.”

  “Sacred, huh? Sure. Was it before? After?”

  Austin kept shaking his head.

  “Oh, come on!”

  “You already know who my first kiss was.”

  “Wait, Savannah?”

  He shook his head.

  Who was that girl he dated for a few months sophomore year? Her name started with an H. Hailey? Heather? Oh wait! “Hannah?”

  “Nope, nope, nope. I’ll give you a hint. She was your first kiss too.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense.…”

  “Mom.”

  I stuck out my tongue. “Ew, and you know that’s not what I mean.”

  “Oh, Emma. Don’t ever change, okay?” He leaned back in his bed and gave me this funny look, as if beneath his wisecracks was something like wisdom. As if he knew something I didn’t yet.

  “Yeah,” I said as I slipped off his bed. “Well, I better go pack. Enjoy your movie.”

  On my way out of his room, I walked right by his desk. A test with a 67 circled in red ink stuck out of one of his books. A knot tightened in my stomach. I couldn’t unsee it.

  * * *

  The following afternoon, as seventh and eighth graders were filing out of the middle school for their regularly scheduled weekend activities, we sixth graders piled onto school buses in the rear parking lot, our backpacks and duffels stuffed with everything we’d need to survive three days away from home.

  Lucy, Kennedy, and I squeezed ourselves into the same bus seat—it helped that Lucy was so tiny. Becca was somewhere up front with Fern.

  “I’m so excited!” Kennedy squeezed my shoulders.

  “Really? I couldn’t tell,” Lucy said, anxiously tapping her knees.

  One of the science teachers, Mrs. Ryan, stood at the front of the bus and blew a whistle. Quickly, everyone quieted down. “All right, I’ve got your cabin assignments here.” She tapped her iPad. “Please listen carefully so you’ll know your chaperone and cabin mates. Now, this is not a perfect science, and I’m sure some of you will be disappointed. But let’s remember: this is only for the next three days—not the rest of your lives. Okay?”

  “Okay,” we chorused.

  “Cabin number one, you’ll be with Coach Lipinski. Owen Peterson, Jose Sanchez, Ivan Hanigan…”

  As she read through the lists, Kennedy, Lucy, and I squeezed each other’s hands.

  “Kennedy Novak.” My ears perked up. “Grace Collins. Tilly Weathers. Olivia Vroman. Lucy Chan. Haven Mulligan. Emma O’Malley.” Yes! Yes, yes! “Becca Grossman.”

  My heart sank. Had she put my name down? Even after our chat? I thought we agreed it made the most sense for her to put down Fern. But I was 99 percent sure Mrs. Ryan didn’t say Fern was in our cabin.

  “We made it!” Kennedy danced in her seat. Lucy looked relieved too.

  But me? I was craning my neck, trying to see up to the front of the bus. And then suddenly Becca’s head popped up. She grinned at me, and somehow I smiled back, but for the whole ride to Cape Cod I could barely focus.

  What if she did something to embarrass me? In front of Kennedy and Lucy or, worse, in front of Haven Mulligan.

  * * *

  By the time we arrived at Camp McSweeney, my stomach was growling. Dinner still wasn’t for another half hour, so the chaperones led us to our cabins to get settled.

  “I call top bunk!” Kennedy yelled.

  Our chaperone, Grace Collins’s mom, chimed in. “Actually, Kennedy—”

  Kennedy flung open the cabin door and frowned. It turned out there weren’t bunks at all—more like army cots arranged in rows. And it smelled in there. Like some animal had
died over the winter.

  Mrs. Collins cracked a few windows to air the place out while we claimed our cots. Becca must’ve stopped to use the bathroom or something, because by the time she got to the cabin, there was only one cot left, in the back corner across from where Mrs. Collins would sleep.

  “It all happened so fast,” I said to Becca. It was a stupid excuse, but what I hated was that I even felt guilty in the first place.

  But she just shrugged. “I don’t mind,” she said, and it seemed like she really meant it. “The cabins are just for sleeping, anyway.”

  Behind her, Grace Collins giggled. “Clearly, someone’s never been to a sleepaway camp before.”

  She and Haven whispered back and forth, occasionally eyeing Becca, and I thought about what Austin said. What everyone else in our grade knew. But maybe not? Maybe Becca hadn’t picked up on it at all. That Camp McSweeney was totally about us sixth graders trying to pretend we were older. Sneaking out, getting into trouble, first kisses.

  And just thinking that made me sad. Sad for Becca, and maybe even a little sad for me. Because now that we were in the same cabin, I knew I’d have to look out for her.

  * * *

  Later that night Mrs. Collins was called away with an “emergency” not long after we’d changed into our pajamas and gotten into our sleeping bags for lights-out. Some kid in another cabin had fallen off a huge rock, and since Mrs. Collins was an ER nurse, she was asked to help. She left Grace in charge until she returned, and Grace was taking full advantage of the situation.

  Grace piped up over our chatter. “Guys? Guys. I have an idea. We played this game at camp last summer all the time and it’s so fun. Want to play?”

  Over in her cot at the far end, Becca was already deep in a book. She barely looked up. Every other girl in the cabin, however, was game.

  “What’s it called?” Kennedy asked.

  “Never Have I Ever,” Grace said before explaining how it worked. We’d go around in a circle, and when it was your turn, you were supposed to say something you’d never done. But then anyone who actually had done that thing had to raise her hand. Basically, it was like truth or dare, minus the dare.

  “I’ll start,” Grace said. She sat cross-legged on her sleeping bag. Now that we’d already washed up, I noticed a cluster of tiny pimples on her forehead that she must have usually covered up with makeup. It made me feel better to see a glimpse of the real Grace Collins. To know even she wasn’t as perfect as she tried to be in school. “Never have I ever… kissed a boy. Yet.” Her eyes darted around at all of us. “Oh, come on! I know someone here has.” She stared down Haven until she meekly raised her hand.

  Across from me, Tilly Weathers’s face was going redder by the second, and she raised her hand too. Girls whispered back and forth.

  “Okay,” Grace said. “So, let’s keep going clockwise. That means… Olivia, you’re up next.”

  Olivia tapped on her chin.

  “This year, Olivia!”

  Gosh, Grace Collins was bossy. Glad I didn’t have to hang out with her every day.

  “Okay, okay. Just give me a sec, all right? Never have I ever… left the country?”

  Three hands shot up, including Becca’s. I guessed not every “Never have I ever” had to be super personal or juicy. That was a relief.

  As girls took turns confessing things about themselves they probably wouldn’t if not for bossy Grace Collins, I was stuck trying to figure out what to say when my turn came around. The truth was, I didn’t have something secretly cool to confess. And sure, I could say something I wished was true, like I’d met Beyoncé. But what I wanted was for the perfect, clever, funniest thing to be zapped down into my brain, and so far that wasn’t happening.

  “Kennnnnedy.” Grace’s voice was all singsongy. How long was her mom going to be gone, anyway?

  Kennedy’s eyes went large, and for a second I thought Grace had caught her off guard. The Kennedy I knew never got nervous. She chewed on the inside of her cheek. “Wait, I got one. Never do I ever… still sleep with my baby blanket.”

  For a moment I couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t have said that. Kennedy would never say that. Not here. Not to someone like Grace Collins. Not with Haven Mulligan in the room.

  But as Grace lifted her hand over her mouth to stifle a giggle, I knew it had happened. “Who would do that?” Her mouth opened wider, the light catching her braces. “We’re in sixth grade. Come on.”

  I knew better than to look at Becca, but somehow I couldn’t stop myself from glancing down the row of cots. Tears formed in Becca’s eyes, magnified by her glasses.

  I sucked a deep breath in through my nose. No one’s looking at Becca besides you, Emma. Just stay calm and pretend you don’t see. You can chew out Kennedy later.

  Haven reached out a pointer finger. “I think I can guess who does,” she said, her voice breaking into laughter as she pointed right at Becca.

  All at once, it was like something out of Mean Girls. Becca, climbing out of her sleeping bag, trying to flee to the bathroom, be anywhere but in this cabin. Haven shouting, “Oh my gosh, guys. She brought it.”

  Tilly Weathers. “She did! She did.”

  “Let’s see,” Haven Mulligan said.

  I couldn’t see who did it, who had shaken out her sleeping bag. Whether it was Haven or Grace. All I saw was Becca’s tattered kitty blanket on the dusty cabin floor and the girls pouncing on it. Waving it in the air like they were playing capture the flag. I was the worst kind of bystander, frozen in place on my cot.

  “What on earth is going on in here?” Mrs. Collins stared at us, bewildered. “Girls! Please. Calm yourselves.”

  As the commotion came to a stop, I locked eyes with Kennedy. I didn’t mean to, she mouthed.

  “That’s about enough. We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow, and we’re well into quiet hour. Now, I’m going to turn off the lights. Let’s hope that tonight was an anomaly or it’s going to be a long three days. Okay, ladies?”

  “Yes,” half the girls murmured.

  “Now, back into your sleeping bags.”

  In the far corner of the room, Becca’s cot was empty, her sleeping bag all bunched up on the floor. The tiny remains of her kitty blanket, trampled.

  Had she managed to slip out when all of that was going on? She must have, because she wasn’t here now. Had she run into Mrs. Collins outside? Had she told on everyone? Or had she only escaped to the bathroom to wait it out?

  Mrs. Collins flicked the light switch and then we were in the dark. Cots creaked as girls tried to get comfortable. A few of them still whispered, but Mrs. Collins shushed them sharply and they shut up. I buried my face in my pillow. There was no way I could fall asleep after what had happened. This was going to be the longest night of my life.

  I hated myself for ever saying anything to Kennedy and Lucy. And even more, for all the feelings I had about Becca that I couldn’t stop. Why had every little thing about Becca started to bother me so much? It never had before.

  She was my friend. My oldest friend.

  Was.

  Was that all in the past now? The Becca-and-Emma days? Maybe it was. And realizing that felt worst of all.

  In the dark, as the girls around me drifted off to sleep, I lost all sense of time. But eventually there was a tap at the door and Mrs. Collins stepped outside. Soon after, Becca came in and climbed onto her cot.

  One of the girls whispered in the softest voice, “Meow.” Another giggled.

  “Hey!” Mrs. Collins was using that voice Mom and Dad used occasionally, one step below absolutely losing it. “That’s enough. Quiet means quiet. I want to be able to hear a pin drop.”

  “Mo-om.” Grace drew it out into two syllables.

  “Even you, Grace. Pin. Drop.”

  What happens at Camp McSweeney stays at Camp McSweeney.

  I wanted Austin to be right, but I had the worst feeling that this time he was so, so wrong.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

&nb
sp; By the time I stepped off the bus on Monday, my duffel might as well have been filled with bricks. That’s how heavy it felt as I dragged it across the parking lot.

  “Meow!” some boy shouted through a bus window.

  “Mroooooowl.”

  “Hey!” Coach Lipinski shouted. “That’s enough.” He turned to Mrs. Haney, the social studies teacher, and in his thick Boston accent said, “I know it’s always somethin’ with kids this age, but I swear tah God, feels like we spent the weekend in an animal sheltah fulla stray cats.”

  I glanced back, searching for Becca. When I finally spotted her, she was looking down at the pavement, probably counting the seconds until she was safely home with her parents and away from all of us.

  Up ahead, Mom and Dad stood beside Dad’s Audi. Wait—why was Dad here? He was supposed to be on TV doing the six o’clock weather, not standing there in shorts and an old Red Sox T-shirt. I picked up my pace.

  “Hey, Em. Did you have a good time?” Dad popped open the trunk.

  “Why aren’t you at the station?”

  He pushed aside some sports equipment, ignoring my question as he made room for my bag. “How was the Cape?”

  “Fine.”

  I took my place in the back seat, trying to figure it all out. Dad didn’t get fired, did he? They wouldn’t fire the most popular weather guy… right? As Dad navigated us out of the parking lot, I kept a close eye on Mom in the rearview mirror. She wasn’t wearing any makeup—not that she did often—and her eyes looked tired. And she kept doing this thing with her jaw, like she was tightening and loosening it, maybe even grinding her teeth.

  Did they already know what happened at Camp McSweeney? Had Becca’s mom called and told them? Or did Dr. Grossman not even know yet? Camp McSweeney was a “cell phone–free environment” after all.

  “So,” Dad said while we waited at a stoplight, “did you bring home any free potato chips?”

  At the end of the factory tour, everyone had gotten a free bag of Cape Cod–brand potato chips. Some kids were saving them, others tore right in, but then once the boys started popping the bags on the bus, Coach Lipinski had to collect them.