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  holding the trunk with one hand

  and me with the other.

  But still,

  he held my hand tight

  until the very last second.

  Then both my parents

  hugged me

  and kissed me

  and reminded me to wear sunscreen and bug spray.

  “Don’t forget to reapply!” my mom said,

  with her hands on my shoulders.

  “It wears off!”

  “I promise,” I told her.

  Suddenly, the head of the junior unit was shouting,

  “All aboard!”

  And Joplin was waiting beside me.

  My mom kissed my head

  one last time

  before letting me go.

  Then,

  feeling very small,

  I followed tall Joplin

  onto the humongous bus.

  Joplin let me sit by the window.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  She shrugged.

  “I like to stick my feet out in the aisle,” she said.

  She stuck them right out there, too,

  as soon as she could.

  Other girls settled in around us.

  The driver swished the door shut.

  I looked out the window

  and saw my parents.

  They were standing beside each other,

  shading their eyes with their hands,

  searching the bus windows for me.

  I waved and waved.

  Finally, they saw me

  and waved back.

  Then the bus rolled past,

  and they disappeared.

  I turned—I didn’t want to lose them.

  But they were gone.

  My body slid low in my seat.

  And I thought,

  Why am I going to this stupid camp?

  Why did Grandma Sadie send me?

  Why didn’t I just say no?

  “Are you going to vomit?” Joplin asked.

  I thought for a second she could see inside me.

  I thought she knew exactly how I was feeling.

  But when I turned to her,

  surprised,

  I realized she wasn’t talking to me at all.

  She was looking at the girl across the aisle.

  “Me?” that girl said, pointing at herself.

  She had braces and two braids.

  “Yes,” Joplin said. “You.”

  “Why would I vomit?”

  the braces girl said.

  Joplin shrugged.

  “Last year a girl got carsick

  and vomited in the aisle.

  I don’t want vomit on my ankles.”

  Braces Girl made a face.

  “That is disgusting,” she said.

  “I’m not going to vomit on your ankles.”

  “That’s good,” Joplin said.

  Braces Girl turned away from us then

  and said something to the girl sitting beside her,

  and they both laughed.

  I felt bad for Joplin.

  Because they must have been laughing about her.

  But Joplin didn’t seem to care.

  She just yawned.

  And yawned again.

  “My baby brother,” she said to me.

  “He has an ear infection.

  He screamed all night.

  I couldn’t sleep.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  She closed her eyes and tilted her head.

  “I need to rest for a second,” she said.

  And just like that,

  she fell asleep.

  I watched out my window for a while.

  Rows of brownstones changed

  to bigger buildings

  with signs painted on their sides.

  Like BEST HOT CHICKEN IN BROOKLYN.

  We s-l-o-w-l-y crossed a long bridge

  crowded with cars.

  Then we inched through even more traffic until,

  finally,

  we were zooming up an open highway.

  Buildings started disappearing

  and trees started appearing

  everywhere.

  At some point,

  Joplin’s head fell on my shoulder

  and stayed there,

  bouncing a little with the bus.

  No one had ever slept on my shoulder before.

  Not even Pearl.

  I thought about writing Pearl a letter,

  telling her that my strange new friend

  was bruising my shoulder.

  But I couldn’t get my stationery out of my backpack

  without waking Joplin.

  I kept watching out the window instead,

  as the world outside

  got greener and greener.

  Watching out that window

  got boring.

  So I slept, too.

  Eventually, Joplin shook me awake.

  “Look!” she said

  when I’d opened my eyes.

  She pointed out the window.

  A sign there read:

  WELCOME TO CAMP WALLUMWAHPUCK,

  A HAVEN FOR GIRLS SINCE 1958.

  The bus was bumping

  down a gravel road

  with bushes and trees and weeds all around.

  This isn’t beautiful,

  I thought.

  This is creepy.

  I missed sidewalks full of people

  checking their phones

  and walking their cute dogs.

  I missed paved roads, too,

  filled with taxis and bike riders.

  Finally, the bus turned

  and stopped in a dirt lot.

  “All right, girls!” the head of the junior unit shouted,

  walking down the aisle.

  “Step outside and find your counselors!”

  “But we don’t know who our counselors are,”

  I said to Joplin.

  “They’ll be holding signs,” she told me.

  Sure enough,

  when I stepped off the bus,

  I saw teenagers holding signs:

  GYPSY MOTH, DRAGONFLY, HONEYBEE, CICADA,

  DOODLEBUG, MONARCH, PRAYING MANTIS,

  HISSING COCKROACH.

  “I’m glad we’re not in Hissing Cockroach!”

  I told Joplin.

  “That one’s fake,”

  she said.

  “The counselors make up a cabin name every year.

  Last year it was Seed Head Weevil.

  I still think they should use Seed Head Weevil

  instead of Doodlebug.

  Doodlebug is stupid.”

  I thought about that.

  Doodlebug was babyish.

  But still.

  I wouldn’t ever want to be

  in Seed Head Weevil.

  “Come on,” Joplin said.

  She started walking toward the Gypsy Moth sign.

  I followed her.

  We kicked up dust with every step.

  And flattened weeds, too.

  It seemed too quiet on that lot,

  even with the sound of girls talking and laughing.

  After a second,

  I realized why:

  no cars honking,

  no sirens wailing,

  no truck brakes squealing.

  Just girls.

  And a whole lot of birds,

  chirping.

  I didn’t like it.

  The Gypsy Moth counselor started waving

  as soon as she realized we were walking toward her.

  “Hello!”

  she called.

  “I’m Hope!”

  She was wearing sunglasses

  and red sneakers.

  “I don’t remember her from last year,”

  Joplin muttered.

  “She must be new.”

  “You’re the Gypsy Moths

  from Brooklyn!” Hope said

  when we stood in
front of her.

  “So, one of you is Joplin,

  and one is Eleanor.”

  We told her who was who.

  “I am so excited to be

  your counselor!”

  she said, grinning.

  She had a swinging ponytail

  and freckles

  and a pretty smile.

  “I love Wallumwahpuck,”

  she said.

  “I was a camper here for seven years!

  Then I spent a summer in Vietnam,

  and last summer I went to Thailand.

  Now I’m back!”

  I looked around that dirty, weedy, too-quiet lot

  and figured there must be a different,

  more spectacular part of camp.

  The part Hope and Mom both loved so much.

  “Come on!” Hope said, smiling her pretty smile.

  “Don’t worry about your trunks;

  someone will drive them over soon.

  Let’s get you both settled!”

  The walk

  to our cabin

  was horrible.

  Hope,

  very bouncy and happy,

  led us down a steep path

  through tall trees

  that let in small patches of light.

  “We’ll see the lake in a minute!” she said.

  She moved fast down that path.

  It was hard to keep up.

  I had to wave swarms and swarms of gnats away, too.

  They hovered in groups on the path,

  not scared of me at all.

  Like pigeons.

  One even got on my tongue.

  I was trying to pick it off

  while I was hurrying to keep up with Hope,

  so I wasn’t paying attention

  and I didn’t see a tree root

  that popped up out of the ground.

  I tripped on it

  and

  flew.

  When I finally landed,

  skin had scraped off my hands

  and my knees

  and the bottom of my chin.

  I just lay there,

  sprawled on the ground

  like dirty underwear.

  And stinging all over.

  “Eleanor!” Joplin shouted from behind me.

  In a flash, Hope ran back up that steep path

  and kneeled beside me.

  “I’m so sorry!” she said.

  “I was moving too fast!

  I’m used to the roots now.

  They’re tricky, aren’t they?

  Everybody trips;

  I don’t want you to be embarrassed.

  Come on up—

  we’ll take you right to the infirmary.”

  “No!” I said

  as she helped me up.

  I looked at my dirty red scrapes.

  I didn’t want to go the infirmary.

  I wanted to go home.

  I wanted my mom to sit me down in my bathroom

  and wet one of our washcloths

  with cold water

  and dab it gently on my knees

  and hands

  and chin

  until they were cool and clean.

  Thinking about her—

  I couldn’t help it—

  I started to cry.

  “I’m fine,” I said,

  turning away from Joplin and Hope.

  But I sniffled when I said it.

  Hope reached to take my hands,

  carefully,

  and inspected the scrapes.

  “It could’ve been worse,”

  Joplin said.

  “Last summer a Cicada fell out of a tree

  and broke her leg.

  She had to go home.”

  “Oh,” I said,

  still sniffling a little.

  I didn’t think I’d broken anything,

  which was good.

  But—to get to go home! How lucky!

  “Can you walk?” Hope asked me.

  “Yes,” I said, wiping my face on my sleeve.

  “There’s a bathroom nearby,”

  Hope said,

  “with a first-aid kit.

  Let’s go clean you up.

  Then, if we need to,

  we’ll take you to the nurse.”

  “OK,” I said.

  “We’ll move very slowly,” Hope said.

  “Sounds good to me,” Joplin said.

  They both stayed beside me

  as I limped down the path

  ignoring the gnats

  and avoiding the roots.

  At the bottom

  I saw a big, sparkling lake with wooden docks.

  And,

  off the end of one of the docks,

  a floating trampoline.

  I tried to imagine jumping

  high and happy

  on that trampoline.

  But my knees screamed

  when I thought about the landings.

  So I ignored the trampoline, too.

  And focused on the path beneath my feet.

  After cleaning me up

  and covering me in Band-Aids

  and telling me not to worry about

  the three scary spiders I saw

  dangling and crawling around me,

  Hope took us to our cabin.

  It was small and painted white on the outside.

  Just like my mom’s, in her camp picture.

  Do not think about that picture,

  I told myself

  very seriously.

  Because it was too sad

  to think about my happy mom.

  I focused on Hope’s red sneakers instead

  as I followed her up the cabin steps.

  Those red sneakers saved me

  from crying again.

  The screen door creaked when we opened it

  and banged behind us when we got inside.

  “Home sweet home!” Hope said.

  It didn’t look like home.

  No rugs, no curtains, no lamps.

  No couches, no armchairs, no tables.

  No television, no stereo, no computer.

  No colors on the walls.

  Just brown wood, from floor to ceiling.

  And four bunk beds, one in each corner.

  And a few shelves and cubbies along the walls

  under the windows.

  Only my trunk was familiar.

  It sat next to Joplin’s, in the middle of the floor.

  I wanted to curl up inside it.

  “You both have top bunks!”

  Hope said.

  “Eleanor, you’re there.”

  She pointed to a bunk bed on the left.

  “And Joplin, that one’s yours.”

  She pointed to the right.

  Then she said,

  “I have to meet our other campers.

  Can you start unpacking without me?”

  Joplin and I nodded,

  and the screen door banged shut again

  behind Hope.

  Great,

  I thought,

  looking up at my bed.

  Another way to fall.

  My hands started burning again

  just thinking about it.

  Meanwhile,

  Joplin had opened her trunk.

  She was shoving clothes and towels

  into the cubby by her bed.

  I did the same thing.

  Then she took out her sheets and sleeping bag

  and stood on the edge of the bunk below hers

  and started making her bed.

  I tried to, too.

  But I’d never made a top bunk before.

  It was impossible.

  Whenever I got one corner of the sheet

  around that thin mattress,

  the other corner popped off.

  And I couldn’t even reach the far side.

  Finally, I climbed up on top

  and crawled around
r />   until I’d tucked everything in.

  Then I climbed back down

  and checked my bed

  and saw

  a disaster.

  “Have bears been fighting up there?”

  Joplin asked me.

  I looked over at her bed.

  It was beautiful,

  smooth and tight.

  Just like my mom’s, at home.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Joplin said.

  “I got good at it last year.

  Besides, it gets messed up anyway.”

  I knew that.

  But still.

  That bed was my only space in the whole cabin.

  In the whole world,

  until I got home.

  I wanted to like it.

  Joplin looked at my face.

  “Hold on a sec,” she said.

  Then she stood on the bunk beneath mine

  and, with her long arms,

  pulled and reached and tucked

  until my bed was beautiful, too.

  My heart felt funny,

  watching her be so nice.

  “Thank you,” I said

  when she was done.

  She shrugged.

  “Don’t tell anybody,” she said.

  Very serious.

  “I don’t want to be making everyone’s bed.”

  “I won’t,” I said.

  “I promise.”

  I pulled the Band-Aid off my chin

  as soon as I heard the other girls

  coming up the steps of our cabin.

  Because that Band-Aid looked ridiculous.

  It turned out all those other girls

  were friends from the summer before.

  Dylan, Montana, Kylie, Amelia, and Gwen.

  “Look!” one of them said,

  pointing out the window

  as the rest were walking in.

  “You can see our cabin from last year!”

  “Where?” the others said.

  They all leaned over my cubby

  and knocked over my bottles of

  sunscreen.

  And talked over one another:

  “Yes! I see it! There!”

  “That was the best cabin.”

  “Didn’t you love that cabin?”

  I wanted to make them pick up my sunscreen.

  Because that sunscreen

  was important to my mom.

  But I’d only just met them.

  I didn’t want to be bossy.

  They probably wouldn’t have heard me anyway.

  They were still talking.

  “Remember,”

  one of them said,

  “when Dylan was standing on that rock?”

  And then

  for some reason

  they all started singing.

  Something about a desperado

  from the wild and woolly West.