Page 69 of Until Next Summer

“More like a hundred million dollars,” I say, exaggerating slightly.

“If a hundred former campers each had a million bucks, we could buy it.”

I laugh and up the ante. “Or if a million former campers each threw in a hundred bucks.”

Cooper sits up straighter. “Hang on—the sale’s not final yet, is it?”

I shake my head and twirl cold spaghetti around my fork. “No, but it doesn’t matter since I don’t have millions of dollars lying around. Do you?”

“No,” he says. “But how many adult campers are coming through here this summer?”

I do a quick calculation in my head: about three hundred campers a week for eight weeks…“More than two thousand.”

Cooper’s eyes light up. “There’s this restaurant in Boston,” he says. “It’s one of the oldest in the city, and the family couldn’t afford to keep it running. The community didn’t want to let it go, so a bunch of locals invested.”

“A co-op.” As I speak, I feel that tingle in my belly, the one that comes along with an idea—theidea—that could save a business.

Cooper nods. “Exactly.”

“Benjamin Cooper, you are brilliant!” I drop my fork and bring my hands up to either side of his face, kiss his smiling lips, then hop off the counter. “I’m going to find Jessie.”

“Can’t it wait till morning?”

As much as I’d love to sneak back up to his room at the Lodge and spend the rest of the night wrapped in his arms, rules are rules. No sleepovers. And I can’t wait to talk to Jessie.

I have to tell her now.

Cooper must see this written all over my face, because he sighs and stands, putting his feet on the floor. “Hand me my shorts,” he says. “We’re going to sanitize this counter real quick, and then I’m going with you.”

eighteen

Jessie

I wake in the dark to a knock on my door. It’s been so long since this happened that it takes a moment to orient myself. Maybe I dreamed the knock? Maybe I’m nostalgic for the old days, when people needed me in the night. When I knew my role.

On my nightstand sits a copy of Luke’s first novel—I found it in the camp library. It’s a YA dystopian, with all the elements we both loved as teenagers: adventure, political intrigue, a love triangle. I’m six chapters in and would have read more, but I was so exhausted and sad after the canoe parade that I passed out.

I’m drifting off again when the knock repeats, then a voice: “Jessie?”

Shaking myself, I step out of bed and stumble to the door. The night is so dark and I’m so tired, it takes a moment for everything to sink in.

First, I notice something strung across my porch, through the trees, and around my cabin: white streamers, fluttering in the breeze. Toilet paper. Someone pranked me.

My heart sinks—I’m too tired for this shit.

Then I see two people in the darkness, five feet from my door.

“Hillary?” I say, shocked. “Cooper? What are you…”

I look at the toilet paper, and it clicks. All the emotions I’ve been struggling to contain come bubbling up, all at once. “Why would you do this to me? It’s not enough to blame me for losing my favorite place in the world? You have to pull a stupid prank on me, too?”

I move to close the door, but Hillary takes a step forward, looking alarmed.

“Jessie, wait—we didn’t TP you. This was already here.”

I pause. “You didn’t?”

“Of course not,” Cooper says. He’s holding his cap in his hands, like he’s beseeching me.

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