Page 11 of Kiss and Tell
It was an empowering experience for them, but for the counselors, it was a shorthand where we joked about throwing in every small annoyance. Cook Marge snapped at you? Throw it into the fire. The one tween girl giving you enough attitude to choke a moose? Throw her into the fire. “I’ve got a few things I could burn,” I admit, grinning.
“Let’s do one after dinner for old times’ sake.”
“Sounds perfect.”
She fist pumps. “Now let’s go survey your new kingdom!”
Chapter 4
Ten Years Ago
Sawyermanagedtocatchhis flight for his second summer at Oak Crest. My sister, Grace, drove me to the Roanoke airport, where local counselors met up with the handful flying in to take the Rust Bucket to camp.
I spotted him standing at the Ground Transportation shuttle stop, the same old duffel bag by his feet, but he looked different now. He’d grown into his features more, and while his dark hair still swooped over his forehead, he’d tamed it.
He saw me at nearly the exact same moment, a grin breaking over his face, and it transformed the severe eyebrows and dark eyes, giving him an animation it had taken nearly our entire first summer to pull out of him.
Grace drew in a breath. “Nice,” she said. “Very nice. You think they could use more counselors this summer?”
The way she stared at Sawyer, unblinking, bugged me, and I opened my door to let myself out at the curb before she was technically at a complete stop. “Staff’s full,” I tossed over my shoulder.
“Hey, Tab,” Sawyer said, still grinning, and I ran to him for a hug, glad summer was officially underway.
He caught me easily, and for the few seconds our bodies pressed together, a tingle I hadn’t felt last year when we hugged goodbye danced along every point where we connected. Startled, I stepped back and hid my confusion by giving him a light punch on the arm.
“How are you, you old son of a gun?”
Sawyer laughed at Director Warren’s favorite phrase. “Same old, same old.”
“Uh, Tab?” Grace called from the car, and she sounded amused.
“Bye, Grace. I’m set. See you in August.”
She grinned and shook her head, pulling away from the curb.
“Was that your sister?” Sawyer asked. “She didn’t want to be a counselor too?”
“Nah. She liked being a camper, but she prefers working in my dad’s hardware store. She wants to go into mechanical engineering, so it’s a good job for that.”
I was still trying to catalog the differences in Sawyer. Did he smell different? I didn’t remember noticing his smell last year, but now it was tickling the inside of my nose even though it wasn’t strong. Just clean, warm cotton and a hint of spice, maybe from his deodorant or soap.
I felt hyperaware of him in an uncomfortable way. Goosebumpy. It made me nervous, so I turned to talk to the other counselors waiting for the shuttle, catching up on college or whatever else they’d had going on since last summer.
Whatever this weird feeling was, it would settle down by the time we got to camp, and we could go back to being Stretch and Tab. When I couldn’t avoid him anymore, I tried to shove us into more comfortable territory.
“Did you develop any game this year?” I asked.
“Game?”
“Pranks.” He’d been a sitting duck last year as I’d initiated him with all the camp classics: red Kool-Aid powder in his showerhead, frog in his bunk, Saran Wrapping the boys’ toilets.
He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a paperback, turning it to show me the cover.101 Pranks to Fool Your Friends.
I tsked and shook my head at him. “Aw, Sawyer. That’s sad.”
But he only gave me an unreadable smile. “We’ll see.”
I wanted to sit by him in the Rust Bucket when it rattled up to see if I could catch the light scent again. When the clunky van door slid open, I forced myself to sit with Merrilee instead, a counselor a year ahead of me, climbing into the far back with her where we ended up chatting about our summer goals.
