I wanted to tell Emily that at nine weeks, a fetus can wrap his tiny fingers around his nose and toes. At fourteen weeks, which was about how far along Emily was, a fetus learns to suck his thumb.
“Shouldn’t we talk to your mom?” I asked.
“No!” she blurted. “No one can know.”
“What does Jacob think?”
She glanced up at me, her eyes watering. “He can’t know either.”
“But it’s his baby.”
“But it’s my body.”
I rubbed my chest, squeezing my T-shirt. “What happened? Didn’t you use a condom?”
She smiled sadly. “This one time it kind of slipped off and Jacob didn’t notice until we were finished.”
I paced around in circles until Emily told me to stop. My face felt stretched and stung from tears. I could tell I was getting on her nerves. I could tell she thought I was immature. But this was a living, soon-to-be breathing person we were talking about. A new life.
“Could you put the baby up for adoption?” I asked.
“Jacob wouldn’t go for that. That’s why he can’t know.”
“Why did you sleep with him?”
She lifted her hands. “Because I love him and wanted to be with him. Isn’t that obvious?”
The thought of saving myself for my future husband—the person who would love me and understand me better than anybody—thrilled me. I can’t wait to share myself with a guy someday.
“Don’t you think you’ll love the baby you made with him?”
She let out a sob. Cried for a minute straight. She loved the baby growing inside her.
She said, “I want my future. I want to compose music and play for the National Symphony. I want that.”
I sketch the flowerbeds and grass around Emily’s front porch.
That day, I silently prayed to God, asking for help. And right then, Emily picked a few white clovers out of the ground. She started tying them together, like when we were kids. She and I would sit outside for hours, singing songs while making flower bracelets and necklaces and rings.
I watched as she made a bracelet, and smiling a slight smile, she handed it to me. I slipped it over my hand, onto my wrist. I knew Emily was still the same ole Emily, even if she’d changed in D.C. She was my friend who I loved.
I sat beside her on the step and hooked my arm through hers. “Your secret’s safe. I’m here.”
Megan’s calling us back to training now, but before I put my pencils away, I draw the clover bracelet, looping it around my wrist.
never have i ever
friday, june 1 ~ week 1 of 7
After two hours of ethics, and in a very un-camping-like move, Megan announces we’re having pizza delivered for dinner.
“Really?” Eric says, throwing his hands in the air before going back to cleaning supplies in his tackle box. He must be pissed we’re not out hunting deer with bows and arrows and grilling it up. This isn’t Beowulf, Eric. It’s 2012!
“Everyone give Matt your topping preference,” Megan says.
With my hands in my back pockets, I approach the picnic table where he’s hovering over a sheet of paper with a laughing Andrea. She touches his elbow and whispers in his ear while I stand there.
He clicks his pen, edging away from her. “What’ll you have, King Crab Kate?”
“Pepperoni and mushrooms, Miniature Poodle Matt.”
Grinning, he writes my order down in shaky cursive. It’s cute.
“Anything else?” Andrea asks me. She moves so close to him she might as well sit on his lap.
“Nope.”
“We’ll tell you when the food gets here,” she replies, and goes back to acting like I don’t exist.
“Thanks,” Matt says to me, fumbling with his pen. He glances up at my face. “I’m sorry if I embarrassed you with that whole riding in your pouch thing.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “I have no idea what you meant, but it’s okay.”
“I have no idea what I meant either.” He smiles, pushing the pen behind his ear. He places his palms on the picnic table and leans toward me. “So you’re going to Belmont this fall—”
“Let’s start unpacking supplies,” Megan interrupts, so I smile at him before moving away. We all start sorting through big white boxes of camp T-shirts, games, spatulas, frying pans. I dig right into the new paints and crayons, and start surveying the arts and crafts closet in the open-air pavilion. I have to admit, I love being surrounded by fresh air and listening to crickets and other bugs making their noises. It’s relaxing and I can let my brain float away into a world of colors.
I love painting and sketching. My Uncle Steve is a cartoonist and has been drawing political comics for The Tennessean for the past twenty years, but it doesn’t pay much—Uncle Steve has borrowed money from Daddy on occasion. Grandpa Kelly always says that drawings don’t get you anywhere in life, really, and while I spend lots of rainy Saturday afternoons doing watercolors and sketching, it’s something I do to de-stress. My parents think I have the ability to become a lawyer, like Daddy and Aunt Missy and Grandpa Kelly.
The truth is, I have no idea what I want to major in. Architecture, a career that requires a lot of math, aka something I am truly terrible at? Art, a career where I’d make no money? Interior design, like Mom? Pre-law track, like Daddy? I should decide soon: college starts in three months, after all, and if I could figure out what to do with my life, I wouldn’t waste time taking classes that won’t count toward my major.
I unload a bag of my own supplies into the closet. I brought a painting I did when I was a camper: a watercolor painting of White Oak cabin. I tack it on the inside of the door, to remind myself of how much I loved Cumberland Creek as a kid.
“That’s beautiful,” I hear a voice say, and turn around to find Parker standing there with Will.
“Thanks. I did it a long time ago.”
Her eyes widen. “I didn’t know you’re into art.”
“My one true love.” I give her a smile.
“Really?” Brad says, striding up with hands in his pockets.
“I also love soccer. And coffee.”
Brad chuckles. “Do you need caffeine to survive? Because they don’t serve Coke at the cafeteria here.” He shudders, as Carlie walks over.
“I totally forgot about that,” Will whines. “I remember when I was little, how at the end of a week of camp, I always begged Mom to take me straight to McDonald’s for a Coke.”
“I did the same thing,” I say with a smile. “We’ll have to get a secret stash.”
“Don’t say that too loud,” Brad says quietly. “Megan’s a real stickler for us following the same rules campers do.”
“I’m surprised our lights-out time isn’t nine p.m. like the campers,” Ian says.
“I’ll have to get some of those Five-Hour Energy things,” Parker jokes.
“I don’t know what I’m gonna do without cigarettes,” Carlie groans. “Last summer I died without them. But some nights I was able to sneak away and smoke down by the lake.”
The Middle Tennessee regional conference is made up of six churches, and each nominates members to be counselors here every summer. I’ve never been to any of the other churches, but based on how Carlie and Andrea act, I can’t imagine those churches are anything like Forrest Sanctuary.
“People smoke here?” I whisper to Parker. She goes to my church, so she should understand what I’m thinking.
“So what?” she says quietly.
“So I didn’t think people would do that sort of thing here.”
“I don’t care one way or the other,” Parker replies, rolling her eyes. “It’s not my business.”
After hearing that, I edge away from the conversation and finish unpacking my art supplies. This is church camp. I don’t think it’s right for counselors to sneak away at night to go smoke. And since I sinned majorly, I need to show God that I’m still a good person.
The pizza comes, and after we say grace, we divvy it up. Andrea grabs a seat right next to Matt. I had been planning on trying to sit with him. He looks over at me and raises his shoulders, as if to say he’s sorry.
I sit down beside Brad and sip my water. “Is your arm okay?” I ask, checking out those bruises again.
He shoves his sleeve down, trying to cover them. “It’s fine.”
“Looks painful.”
Brad nods. “It was. A game of pick-up basketball got nasty.”
“Did you get into a fight or something?”
“Nah, I fell onto the asphalt,” he says, but I don’t believe him one bit. The bruises look like finger marks. He pulls down on his T-shirt again. “Do you have any brothers or sisters?” he asks.
“It’s just me,” I reply. I nibble at a pepperoni, then focus on Matt across the pavilion. He laughs at something Parker just said and scratches his cheek before folding a slice in half and taking a huge bite. He and I keep glancing at each other so much I guess it finally gets to Andrea.
She stands up and says, “We should play another introduction game. To get to know the new hires better.”
“Who’s up for a game of Never Have I Ever?” Carlie asks.
Ian says, “Yeah! I’ll get the pennies.”
“Let’s move it over here,” Matt says, coming to sit beside me on the bench. I’m sandwiched between him and Bumblebee Brad.
Everyone squeezes around my picnic table except for Megan and Eric, who’s going on and on about how his girlfriend dumped him.
“I’m sorry,” Megan says, not sounding sorry at all.
“Two years gone. That’s all,” Eric replies. He wipes his mouth with a napkin and taps his big brown combat boot on the concrete floor.
Matt leans over to my ear. “Megan wants Eric bad. And Eric wants Megan’s job bad. And Megan is trying to protect her job while trying to win Eric’s love.”
I cringe.
“Exactly the response I was looking for,” Matt says with a laugh. “Last summer I about put my name up for the director position just so I wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore.”
I shake my head at him, smiling. “Why didn’t you?”
“Because that would require me to be responsible. Now, are we ready to play?”
Everyone has a pile of pennies in front of them. The rules are this:
Someone says something they have never done. For instance, I have never gone deep sea fishing. If a player has gone deep sea fishing, he or she has to throw a penny in a bucket in the center of the table. The pennies don’t really mean anything except to show who’s done what. It’s like a game of Truth or Dare with cash but without the dare. I would rather have the dare than deal with truth after truth after truth.
Carlie goes first. She taps a penny on the picnic table. “Never have I ever gone skydiving.”
Ian is the only person who throws a penny in the bucket.
“That’s hot,” Carlie says to him. “You must be fearless.”