Campfire Cookies (13 page)

For a moment, there was appropriately awestruck silence. Then Emma applauded, and Grace murmured, “Wow.”

Only Lucy seemed unimpressed. She began to giggle.

I put my hands on my hips and called her out. “How can you laugh? I deserve at least an Oscar for that!”

Lucy stifled her laughter. “You do deserve an Oscar,” she said. “But ‘extinct' made me think of dinosaurs, and then I pictured them with valentines and red bouquets of flowers.”

“Maybe dinosaurs are actually extinct because they lacked romance,” said Emma. “Maybe it wasn't a meteor at all.”

Lucy said, “Wait—it was a meteor that killed the dinosaurs?”

“Yes, Lucy,” Grace said patiently. “And how did you
not
know that?”

“I guess I missed that day,” Lucy said.

“We all did,” I said, “because it happened sixty-five million years ago.”

Emma started to explain. “Lucy doesn't mean
that
day—” But the explanation was cut short by the door opening.

“Hannah!” We all welcomed her.

“Hello, girls.” Hannah smiled, closed the door, and threw her keys on the desk. “This looks like a pretty active siesta you've got going on.”

“Not really,” I said. Then I closed my eyes, reached in front of me, and spoke in a robot monotone. “I am sound asleep and nap-walking.”

“Ri-i-i-ight,” said Hannah. “So nap-walk right back to your bunk, please, Olivia. I haven't been sleeping well lately, and I'm looking forward to closing my eyes for a few minutes.”

Afternoon riding starts right after siesta. That day, Grace and I walked to the horse barn together. On the way, I tried to convince her that she was, too, brave and totally capable of carrying out her new and improved PFHL assignment.

“Think of it as learning a skill,” I said. “Like a backflip or how to multiply fractions. In the end, you will be really, really, really proud of yourself!”

“Is breaking and entering a skill?” Grace asked.

“Absolutely,” I said. “And it could be you'll have so much fun you'll take up a life of crime. I hear the money's good.”

Grace rolled her eyes. “You're not funny, Olivia.”

“Yeah, I am,” I said. “Ask anybody. Ask Jenny. Only don't ask my brother. He doesn't think I'm funny either.”

We retrieved our horses' bridles from their hooks in the barn and started walking up the hill toward North Corral. We were almost to the gate when Grace said, “There's something I don't get. Why can't we just ask one of the other guys in Silver Spur Cabin to put the cookies on Lance's pillow?”

“Because we don't know them,” I said. “They would blab all over camp, and PFHL would be toast. Plus Hannah might be mad.”

“How do we know Vivek won't blab all over camp?” Grace asked.

“Because he's Vivek,” I said.
“Duh.”

“Okay,” said Grace, “if you say so.”

“Great!” I said. “So you'll do it?”

“I didn't say that,” Grace said. “I just guess you're right about Vivek not blabbing.”

“And also you guess you'll do it?” I repeated.

“I'll think about it,” Grace said.

•  •  •

You might remember that my horse that summer was named Shorty, and guess what? He
was
short—only fourteen hands high—and dusty white in color, with dirty speckles of gray and brown. Personality-wise, he possessed all the charm of Eeyore, the gloomy donkey friend of Winnie-the-Pooh. Also like Eeyore, his usual posture was head hanging, as if lifting it up required too much effort.

The first time I saw Shorty, I was disappointed. As far as I could tell, everybody else had prettier, happier horses.

But then I decided that Shorty was part of God's plan for Olivia Baron. Just as I was his burden to bear (get it?), he was mine—and I was going to live up to the challenge! I was going to improve that horse's attitude
if it was the last thing I did! I was going to boost his morale and raise his self-esteem!

So, along with a bridle and a saddle, Shorty always got a pep talk. “You're a handsome horse and a strong horse, too,” I told him. “And you're not even that short, I mean, compared to a pony. Compared to a pony, you are an equine giant!”

If this did anything for Shorty's attitude, morale, or self-esteem, he didn't show it. His head went on drooping as low as ever. And slow? As we moseyed down the trail, crawling ants on the ground overtook us.

Among the counselors in charge of afternoon riding was Jack, the one from Yucca Cabin and the man I especially wanted to talk to. Unfortunately, his horse was a long-legged chestnut, and no pep talk on earth could goad Shorty into catching up with a long-legged chestnut. It wasn't till we all dismounted for snacks and water at our destination for the day, Red Ridge, that I had the chance to tell him that the girls of Flowerpot Cabin really, really,
really
needed a favor.

Now, maybe I should back up a little. For example,
are you wondering why I had picked out Jack as the counselor most likely to assist?

Mostly it was a matter of my well-known
intuition.
Sometimes you just know something, you know?

But if I had to cite a reason, here it is: Because Jack was different. Just from the way he dressed (that old-man hat!) and the way he laughed and the stupid jokes he made, a person could see he didn't mind standing out or bending rules.

I mean, horse poop? Hell
o-o-o-o
? Tarantulas we had in abundance, but no other cabin put horse poop on their flag.

So I explained to Jack that we needed to make a double batch of cookies in the camp kitchen, and I was terribly,
terribly
sorry that I couldn't tell him just
exactly
why, but it was for a good cause, a noble cause, a cause any right-thinking person would wholeheartedly approve.

Hannah's afternoon off was Sunday. Was Jack available? Would he help us?

“Also, it's a total secret,” I concluded. “So you can't tell
anyone
.”

All this time, Jack had listened attentively to my plea. He hadn't asked a single question. His face had registered no hint of surprise. Maybe people were always asking him for secret favors.

At last I was out of words and waiting for him to reply. It seemed to take forever, but probably it was closer to five seconds. Then he nodded. “Mystery and intrigue,” he mused. “I like it! And did you also say there would be cookies?”

When we first started whispering about PFHL, we expected it to take a week or two, and after that we would all high-five and admire the good we' d done in the universe. Then we would get on with our lives.

But it didn't end up being that way. Each step took longer than expected; new steps had to be added. What should we write on the cards that would go with the cookies? How was Grace going to wake up without
a phone to put on vibrate? What kind of cookies did Lance like?

He might be one of those people who hates chocolate.

He might be allergic to nuts.

It would have been bad if, after so much trouble, Lance had refused to eat the cookies, not to mention embarrassing (and sad) if they had killed him by mistake.

So Lucy asked Jamil, who had been following her around like a puppy, and Jamil reported back that oatmeal cookies were Lance's favorite—but this piece of spy work took two days because Jamil first asked what was Lance's favorite kind of cake (carrot) and then what was Lance's favorite kind of candy (red jelly beans).

“Jamil must not be the brightest bulb in the chandelier,” I said when Lucy reported this. It was after siesta on the fourth Saturday of camp, and the four of us were sitting on the side of the pool with our legs in the water, which came from a spring and felt wonderful. To protect us from the sun, we were wearing hats on our heads and T-shirts over our bathing suits. Even with my legs in
the water, I could feel lines of sweat along my backbone.

“When can we go in, Annie?” Olivia wanted to know.

Annie was the CIC (counselor in charge) of the pool that day.

“Hang on. We're still short a lifeguard,” she said. “It's times like this I really wish we all had phones.”

“It's times like
always
when I wish I had mine,” Olivia said.

“I don't think Jamil is dumb exactly,” Lucy said. “He claims that talking to me confuses him.”

Grace said, “That's fair.”

Lucy looked at Grace. “Is it? Why?”

I was afraid of how Grace might answer—sometimes she is not totally sensitive—so I helped her out. “Because you're gorgeous-gorgeous-gorgeous, Lucy! That's how my great-grandmother would say it. You drive all the boys wild.”

“You drive Jamil wild at least,” said Olivia.

“That's gross,” said Lucy.

“Watch out, or Olivia will make another speech,” I said.

“Too hot for speeches,” Olivia said.

“I'm not sure gorgeous is the problem,” Grace said. “Sometimes talking to Lucy confuses me, too.”

Shoot—I was afraid she might say something like that. I leaned forward and looked over in case Lucy's feelings were hurt, but from what I could see, she wasn't listening. Her eyes were on a water bug doing laps in the pool.

I was looking at the water bug too, when all of a sudden there was a commotion behind me. It sounded like someone was neighing. . . .
Neighing?

I turned my head and, yup, that was what it was exactly:
Jack
neighing. Also whinnying, snorting, and braying as he galloped up the path toward the pool, left hand in the air as if it held reins, right hand slapping his own butt.

“Whoa there, Silver!” He burst through the gate, reached the edge of the pool, lurched forward as if he might fall in, then leaned back, teetering, to save himself. “Did somebody 'round here call a
lifeguard
?”

Most of us campers were laughing, but Annie didn't crack a smile. “You're late,” she said. “You've kept all these campers waiting.”

“Hi-i-i-i, kids!” Jack waved in an expansive arc. “You're not mad, are you?” He put his hands over his heart. “
Please
tell me you're not.”

“We're not! We are! We're hot!” came the answers.

“Where were you?” Annie asked.

“Little lady, I would love to tell you,” Jack said, “but if I did, I'd have to kill you.”

Annie scowled and pointed at the lifeguard stand.

Jack looked stricken. “No, not that!” He got down on his knees. “I'll do anything, anything you say, Annie, but please! Not that!”

Annie ignored him. “Okay, guys, get in the water. But don't any of you go and drown on this guy's shift. He might be too busy cracking jokes to save you.”

“Hey,” said Jack, getting awkwardly to his feet, “I resemble that remark.”

Again, Annie pointed to the lifeguard stand. “Go!”

•  •  •

By this time, even though PFHL was nowhere near full implementation, Hannah was getting better. She no longer had circles under her eyes. Sometimes she even
laughed with us. Still, she wasn't the same old Hannah from last year. Like, when she announced, “Lights-out!” or “Hurry up and get to breakfast!” and we argued—because sometimes it is the job of campers to argue with counselors, just as it's the job of kids to argue with parents—she would give in with a sigh that meant, “Whatever. Why do I think I know any better than a ten-to-eleven-year-old anyway?”

Also, a lot of times when we came in from an activity, she was there already, lying on her bunk.

“You should get out and socialize more,” I told her one day when I was the first one back from lunch.

“That's what Jane says too,” she said.

“Are you okay?” I asked. “Do you think you got sunburned?”