Pranked (5 page)

Evening programs were always fun. All the Middlers were together, and we always did something like skits or games. Tonight none of the counselors were inside. The doors to the porch were closed and we could hear them rustling around out there.

Finally the doors opened, and Gloria Mendoza, a counselor in Cabin 4, came out and announced, “Presenting ‘The Twelve Years of Pine Haven'!” Then a counselor named Jamie came through the doors. She and Tis were best friends. Her hair was in pigtails, and she was holding a teddy bear. To the tune of “The Twelve Days of Christmas,” she sang, “My first year at Pine Haven my mother said to me, ‘Don't wet the bed!' ”

Reb, Jennifer, and I burst out laughing. We weren't actually laughing
at
Melissa. It was just the bed-wetting joke that made us laugh.

The whole skit was really funny. The counselors made complete fools of themselves, but you could tell they were having a great time. Rachel's line was “Don't eat a newt!” Every time she sang it, she held up a jar with a squiggly orange salamander inside. Tis had one of the funniest lines. She came out with only a towel on and sang, “Don't go skinny-dipping!” Reb kept whistling on her line. She could whistle with two fingers in her mouth. She tried to show me how, but I couldn't do it.

After the skit we were out on the porch, sitting on the upper railing with Alex and some other counselors. She'd been Reb and Jennifer's counselor last year.

“So, my little Evil Twins are in the same cabin again this year, huh?” asked Alex. “At least
I
don't have to deal with you. You can drive Rachel crazy this summer.”

“You know you miss us. You know you love us,” said Reb. She stood in front of Alex and pretended to box with her.

Alex grinned. “I'm glad I don't have to put up with your evilness.”

“What's evil about them?” I asked as casually as I could.

“Oh, Alex always called us that last summer.
The Evil Twins!
” Reb said in a voice like someone possessed.

“Because you were. You were always together and you were both troublemakers. Always talking too loud. Always the last two out of bed in the mornings. Always laughing and never being serious about anything,” said Alex, smiling at them.

“Hey, it's camp. Why should we be serious?” Reb said.

So that was it?
That was all there was to the “Evil Twins” nickname? Their counselor called them evil because they slept late and talked too much? I felt like a complete idiot. Why had I been so worried?

“So, are you two going to sign up for my Guard Start class?” asked Alex.

Reb glanced at me. “Maybe we'll all three sign up. What is it?”

“It's the first step toward being a lifeguard. You guys are too young to take a lifeguard class, but you can take this class.”

Jennifer winced. “Do we have to swim laps? You know I hate that.”

“Of course you have to swim laps, Bird Legs. It's a swimming class,” said Alex.

“Don't call me Bird Legs. You're mean, Alex.” Jennifer frowned and looked down at her long, skinny legs.

“Yeah, don't call my twin names, you Evil Counselor,” said Reb. “
Maybe
we'll take your class. But maybe we won't.”

Alex just laughed. It was obvious Reb was her favorite.

After evening program we were all walking along, just talking and stuff, when I realized Melissa was right beside us. I hadn't even known she was there.

“Gosh, there are so many stars out tonight,” she said. She tilted her head back and gazed up at the sky. I looked up too.

“Wow, there are. There's a ton of them.” I'd actually never seen that many stars. The sky was so black in the mountains, and you could see the stars so much better because there weren't many lights around.

“They're bee-yoo-tee-ful,” said Reb.

“Yes, simply loverly,” agreed Jennifer.

Now I had to say something funny. So I leaned over to Reb and sang softly, “Tinkle, tinkle little star, how I wonder what you are.” Reb snorted and poked me in the ribs. Jennifer started singing it too, but louder.

Okay, it was a little mean. But I didn't think Melissa heard the “tinkle, tinkle” part.

It was crazy in the cabin before lights out, as usual. On Side B, Brittany screamed when a spider crawled down the wall. Tis picked up one of Jordan's riding boots to kill it, but Jordan shouted that she didn't want squashed spider guts all over her boots. Erin got it into the dustpan and threw it out the door. If there was ever a problem, Erin was always the one to take care of it.

All of us on Side A had stopped to watch the drama. Molly said maybe the spider had laid eggs, and pretty soon a zillion little spiders would hatch out and infest our trunks. That made everyone scream again, especially Jordan, who now had something new to stress about.

Then Rachel flashed the lights on and off as a warning. “Lights out in two minutes. Everybody in bed.” It was her serious counselor voice.

“I just have one quick announcement to make,” Reb said, leaping up on her cot so everybody on Side B could see her too. “Please don't anyone leave any wet swimsuits on my cot. I hate it when that happens.” She bounced down on her knees like you do on a trampoline.

Jennifer and I both laughed. Everybody else looked confused.

Rachel gave her this long look like she suspected Reb was up to something. “Good point, Reb. Let's all be
courteous
and
kind
to one another. It'll make for a more pleasant camping experience.”

“Rachel, with you as our counselor, how could our camping experience be anything but pleasant?” Reb said sweetly.

“Uh-huh.” Rachel flipped off the lights.

Reb started singing very softly, “Tinkle, tinkle, little camper, can your sheets get any damper. . . .”

“Reb!” Rachel's voice had a warning in it.

“Hey, I'm singing myself a lullaby. It's hard to fall asleep without my mommy.”

“I'm gonna write your mommy and tell her you're an ‘obnoxious, disruptive influence in the cabin.' ”

“She'll be so proud.”

“Just tone it down.”

“You betcha, Raych. Hey, can I have a night-night kiss?”

“You mean from my newt?”

“Of course! You didn't think I meant
you
, did you?”

I couldn't help laughing. Wow, what a great day. I'd met a bunch of new people, and I'd had so much fun with them. Amazingly, my mom had been right. I did just sort of make friends without even knowing it was happening.

Was I mean to Melissa? Well, we did ask her to go to the climbing tower with us. She chose not to. We couldn't force her to go along. The tinkle, tinkle stuff was a little mean, but it was just a joke. I doubted she'd even heard it.

Anyway, what was I supposed to do? Turn down Reb and Jennifer and spend the afternoon trying to drag a conversation out of Melissa? She'd be okay. She could find her own friends. That's what I'd done. It just took me a few days to do it.

“Run! Here it comes!” Reb yelled. We raced down Middler Line, trying to beat the rain. We got to the screen door just when the first raindrops started falling.

“Wow, listen to it,” I said. The cabin had a tin roof, and it sounded like BBs hitting a pie pan.

“I can't believe we're the only ones here,” said Jennifer. “You'd think everyone would be cabin-sitting in this rain.”

“Probably most people got caught some place like the lodge,” Reb speculated. She and Jennifer both sat on their trunks, and I was on my bottom bunk. It was fun always having a big group to hang around with, being part of the fan club, but I liked it best when it was just the three of us.

Jennifer looked at us both. “What should we do?”

Reb's eyes widened. “Let's tell ghost stories!”

“I'm not in the mood.” Jennifer shook her head.

“You mean you're scared.”

“How could I be scared? You haven't said anything yet.”

“Okay, good. I'll start. This is a true story, Kelly. Alex told it to us last summer. Have you ever heard of the Bell Witch?”

“No, Reb! Shut up!” Jennifer jumped up and grabbed her pillow from the top bunk. “You know how much that one scared me!” She stuck her fingers in her ears, buried her face in the pillow, and started humming. “I'm not listening!”

Reb burst out laughing. “I was just teasing. You know I wouldn't really tell it.”

Jennifer hugged her pillow. “Still, you reminded me of it, and that's bad enough.”

“Okay, sorry. Let's do something to take your mind off it.”

“How about cards?”

“Bor-ing. Kelly, what do you want to do?”

I kind of smiled. “Why don't you read us the e-mail you got today?”

I could tell Reb was glad I'd brought it up. Everyone in the cabin knew she'd gotten an e-mail from her boyfriend back home. “Well, okay.” She jumped up and opened her trunk to get the paper. Mail came every day after lunch. Whenever anyone got an e-mail, the counselors printed the message and put it in the camper's mailbox. But we could only get e-mails, not send them, because campers weren't allowed to use the computer in the camp office.

Reb read, “ ‘Yo, Reb! What up, chica? Hope you're having fun at camp, 'cause it's sure boring round here. So what have you been doing? I went to Big Surf with Mikey on Tuesday. We saw Lindz and Brittney. Got to go. Have fun, but not too much. Try not to miss me too much. Later. Bye. Wes.' ”

Reb looked up and grinned. Okay, it wasn't wildly romantic, but at least he wrote her, and first.

Jennifer got up and stood in front of the mirror. “Pretty good letter.”

“I guess,” Reb agreed. “But he's trying to make me jealous, mentioning Lindsay. She's always liked Wes. She's probably chasing him while I'm at camp.”

“Really?” Jennifer squinted at her reflection. “You oughta write her and tell her to keep her hands off your boyfriend.”

Reb shrugged. “Well, if Wes and I break up, I'll start going out with Daniel Cook. He's liked me since fifth grade. I thought Wes would want to break up since I was going to camp, but he didn't. He must really like me. Wanna see his picture?” She grabbed her school annual from the shelf by her bed.

Then she showed us every place Wes Mitchell appeared in the annual. He and Reb were in there a lot—they were both on the soccer and swim teams, plus Reb was on the tennis team. Reb was the class president and Wes was the treasurer. And they were both on the annual staff, except her school called it the yearbook staff. There was a picture of the two of them sitting at a table together. It looked like they were making vital decisions about which pictures to put where.

Wes was drop-dead gorgeous—the kind of guy who always made me speechless. Of course Reb would have a bf like that.

“You've got so many cute guys in your school,” Jennifer said, looking at all the pictures. “I hate going to a girls' school. And wearing a uniform. And going to Mass.”

“My parents thought about sending me to a girls' school too, but we decided Country Day was giving me the best preparation for college.”

Jennifer rolled her eyes. “Reb, shut up. You're only going into seventh grade. I can't believe how obsessed you and your parents are with college already. They can't even leave you alone at camp.”

It was true. Reb's parents e-mailed her math problems to work on and vocabulary words to study. Every rest hour, she sat on her cot with a pad of paper in her lap and a pencil clenched between her teeth. I thought it was weird, but Reb didn't seem to mind.

“We're not obsessed with it. We're just preparing, that's all. And why are you always criticizing my parents? If it weren't for them . . .”

“I know, I know. If it weren't for them riding you all the time, you wouldn't be perfect. But you are perfect, so you'd think they'd get off your back and just let you be a kid. I thought
my
parents were tough.”

Reb slammed her annual shut and threw it at the shelf. It banged against the wall and fell to the floor. We all stared at it, like we didn't know how it got there. None of us moved. The rain drummed against the roof.

I don't know how I knew what to say, but somehow I did. I looked at Reb and said, “Wow. Nice serve.”

Reb looked at me and burst out laughing. “Thanks. Fifteen-love. Your service.”

Jennifer and I were both laughing now too. “I can't serve like that!” I said.

“Well, of course you can't, because you're not
perfect
like me, now are you?” asked Reb, laughing. She screwed up her face and snarled at Jennifer, who snarled back.

I let out a shuddering laugh. “Well, if we're not going to play tennis, what are we going to do? We have the whole cabin to ourselves.” I was so relieved we were laughing now. It could've gotten ugly.