Chapter Thirty-Three
I force myself to swallow the cold cereal. To show everyone that I’m fine. That I’m eating. At the dining hall. That things are back to their new normal.
Not like the staff really believed that I had the stomach flu for four days, but whatever. They still stayed away. Left me to myself and the leftover crappy wine Paul and I had shared. Left me alone to puke out my emotions and bad decisions.
He said goodbye to everyone while I lay on the bathroom floor. In the dark. Blocking out the wall I’d pressed him against when I’d wanted him so badly I couldn’t stay away. The counter that had dug into my back. The bathtub where I knew I wasn’t getting out of this cleanly. Where I knew I could wash him off my body, but that I was stained within.
I heard them singing that night. Him playing guitar. The song we’d danced to under the stars. I was still awake when Laurie’s minivan pulled away. The front door slid up my back as my ass hit the floor, back against the door. Blocking myself from going after him. From repeating history.
“Morning.” Britt’s voice cuts through the dull roar of the dining hall.
My spoon clatters into my bowl. Soggy cereal splashes onto the table. “Crap. Hi, Britt. What can I do for you?”
She slides onto the bench next to me. “Oh, nothing. I just wanted to sit. Sorry for the scare, though. Looks like you were off in space there for a minute.”
I pull my mouth into something resembling a smile. “If only we could actually travel through time and space.”
“Yeah?” Britt cuts her pancakes. “Where would you go?”
I rest my chin in my hand. Last week, when time sped up and slowed down to the pace of our hearts and breaths. Twelve years ago, when I left us both hurt and incomplete. I shake my head and sit up straight. “Six years ago,” I say.
“What would you do back then?”
My hands grip my coffee cup. I could refuse to answer. Pull the boss card. Keep my distance. But these are the people Paul chose. The people he wanted to spend his summer with. The people who kept camp running while I forced him to leave. When I ran from him while staying in place.
My stomach knots. “Six years ago, I’d tell the guy I was seeing that he was an asshole. Or I’d tell myself, anyway.” I swing my legs over the bench and pick up my bowl. “Nice to see you, Britt.”
I scrape the rest of my cereal into the compost. Press the spatula against the curve of the bowl. Get every bit of grain that tries to cling onto the plastic. Clear the bowl of what I no longer want in the way I wish I would cleanse myself of the past that sticks inside my curves.
But I’m not plastic. I’m not metal, or glass. I can’t be wiped clean. The past lingers in me. Influences me. Drives me forward and holds me back.
Warm morning air rushes into my lungs when I close the door behind me. Lean my head against the old wood. Breathe deeply. I see Paul’s face behind my eyelids. Smiling at me. Encouraging me. Laughing at me. I bite into my lip and swallow my cereal again.
Justine apologized. Yesterday, when I rejoined camp for the full day. After a few days of showing my face in the morning—eyes bloodshot and lips cracked—and at night. Singing under my breath while the staff took over campfire duties, bringing an energy I lost under Paul’s laughter.
I know he wasn’t laughing at me. Logically, I know that. But logic is weak against experience. And experience has taught me that alone, I’m strong. I can trust myself. Make others trust me.
But I’m helpless in love. A version of myself so watered down that I fade into nothing.
My fists press into my stomach. Knead the tightness in my diaphragm. The discomfort whispering that I’m here. That I exist. That even though I ripped out my heart, handed it to Paul, and sent him away with it, I didn’t disappear.
A crash sounds from the far end of the dining hall and my head snaps toward the noise. The bottom of a garbage can is just visible. On its side. Rolling gently back and forth. I leave the entryway and take a few steps toward the commotion, but freeze when the bin moves again, shoved against the wall of the old building with inhuman force.
I hear the grunt at the same time that the door opens. My hands shoot out on instinct, one rising in a stop motion, the other bringing a finger to my lips. The bear’s snout rounds the bin and my mouth goes dry.
“Amy,” an urgent little voice says. “I have to get to the bathroom.”
I don’t reply. My hands stay frozen in place as I back slowly toward the dining hall. I force the camper back inside before she can protest. The door snaps closed behind me and I lock it. “Sorry, kiddo. You’re going to have to hold it for a minute.”
My feet carry me into the kitchen without hesitation. The cook is at the griddle, earbuds in, pancakes bubbling before him. I double-check that the kitchen door is locked and leave without saying a word. There’s no time to waste.
Cam has taken my place next to Britt. Their heads are angled towards each other. Voices are low. They’re probably talking about me. Wouldn’t be the first time. But I don’t give them the chance to notice my approach. To abruptly cut off conversation and plaster on smiles. “Bear shakers,” I say. “Are there shakers in here?”
Britt’s eyebrows shoot up. “What?”
“An air horn,” I say. “Stereo. Something.”
Cam shakes his head. “Don’t think so.”
“Wildlife plan, guys. What’s the wildlife plan?”
Britt glances at Cam. “Umm...”
I suck a breath through my teeth. “Why the fuck does Paul have an air horn in his house and not in the fucking dining hall?” The camper I pushed inside crosses her legs and I pull down my shoulders. Stand in the aisle between the rows of tables. And yell. “This is a repeat-after-me song!”
A confused hush falls over the dining hall. Campers and counselors dart looks across tables, and I know how I must look. The new camp director. The person who isn’t their beloved Paul, yelling campfire songs at breakfast. But their perfect Paul didn’t have a goddamned wildlife plan for the place most likely to be hit by hungry, majestic, claw-carrying forest creatures.
“Get up,” I mutter to Cam and Britt. “Help me. There’s a bear in the garbage.”
“Shit.” Cam wipes milk from his beard.
“This a repeat-after-me song!” I shout.
Cam and Britt stand. “This is a repeat-after-me song,” they parrot.
I take a deep breath. “I said, ‘This is a repeat-after-me song.’” I cup my hand around my ear. Willing the kids to join in. To use their voices and bodies when they least expect it, for something they don’t quite understand.
A handful of counselors stand and I force my breath out. Clear my throat and feed them the next line. We shout at the tops of our lungs. The camp follows my lead. Building in number and in volume with each line. We stomp our feet until the windows rattle. Clap and pound on tables until hands turn red. We yell and move. Our entire beings telling the bear that we’re here. That we’re not afraid, even while the size of the snout and the hurt it could cause replays in my mind.
I raise my eyebrows to Cam as the second song enters its last lines. He rolls his eyes upward. Takes a breath. Picks up a bowl and spoon and sneaks outside while the campers are distracted, stomping and spinning in place.
Any noise he could make by banging cutlery on dishes wouldn’t be enough. I know that. He knows that. But I get the need for protection, even if it won’t work. The need to tell himself he can keep himself safe, even if he can’t.
I keep my eyes trained on the door. Ears perked. Each second lasts a year until he gets back in. Relaxes against the door. Gives me a nod.
“Amy.” The camper by the door shifts on her feet. “The dancing just jiggled my pee around. I have to go!”
Cam opens the door and she runs out.
The pinpricks of a hundred pairs of eyes on my skin keeps me on my feet even though my knees want to give out. “So,” I say. “Who can tell me what to do if you come across a bear?”
I make it through the impromptu survival lesson without falling. Or tripping over my words. Or telling them a fellow camper came within feet of showing us all that even with all the safeguards, the unexpected still happens. I sink onto the bench next to Britt. Drop my head into my hands. “Holy shit.”
She rubs my back. Her touch is too light. Too fast. Too not-Paul. And it’s just a very PG circle of my shoulder blades. But still. I wish her hands were his.
I shrug her off. Squeeze my eyes closed. Take a shaky breath.
“You okay?” she asks. “Need us to rearrange the schedule? Cover your activities so you can have a well-deserved shot of something strong?”
“I’m the one who needs the shot.” Cam drops onto the bench. “A bowl. I took a fucking bowl to fight a bear.”
I laugh. Once. Then twice. Until the three of us are overcome by giggles. Foreheads on the table. Our adrenaline finding an outlet. Tears leak from my eyes. I let them fall.
Britt gets control of herself first. Runs her palms across her own damp cheeks. “You’re on one match fires, Amy. Want me to take those kids swimming instead?”
I shake my head. Dab my eyes on a napkin. Force my breath out to the count of ten. “No, I can do it.”
“Might want to reconsider,” Cam says. “The bear went up the mountain behind your house, but maybe he has friends.”
“All the more reason to teach the kids survival skills.” I fold my napkin into my palm. “We’ll bring bear shakers. And spray. And maybe whatever explosives campers tried to smuggle in, but we’re going to do it. I don’t want these campers scared of anything.”
She shoots Cam a look. “Explosives?”
“Paul was showing me how things work and he said that a kid was so scared of bears that he... Long story,” I say. And it is. The story of me and Paul. Of fire and fear. I bite into my cheek and count the dents on the table.
“Well,” she says. “You do what works for you. I checked supplies yesterday and we’re getting low on matches, but there should be enough there if you actually stick to one per group.”
I nod but say nothing. There’s nothing to say when even one match is too many. When my body was fuel and Paul was oxygen and we burned hot. Bright. And no matter how many times I try to douse the fire we lit, the flames keep licking at me.