Camp Young

_Chapter Two_

CAMP YOUNG!

THE PERFECT PLACE TO SEND TEENS WITH BEHAVIORAL ISSUES!

100% TURN AROUND RATE

CAMP ACTIVITIES INCLUDE HIKING, FISHING, HORSE BACK RIDING, AND MUCH MORE!

PARENTS WEEKEND HELD ON THE SECOND WEEKEND OF EACH MONTH

NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND!
ALL ARE WELCOME!

After the first page, I stopped reading. It seemed to be a normal summer camp doing normal summer-camp-like activities.

I am not going to be turned into a whole new person just because I went to camp and rode a horse.

The best way to describe the feeling I felt in the back seat of that shiny car would probably be the same feeling a new inmate gets before arriving to their designated prison for the first time. I did not want to go to this camp. I did, however, text my friend and let him know where I was going. I wish with all my might that I could go back in time and not say anything to Lina’s stupid face.  If only I could bite my tongue sometimes. Camp Young sounded to me like the type of place where they never leave the kids alone and has you get up at seven a.m. just to go eat breakfast.

Aunt Kat, as she so claimed to be, was driving silently, only looking at me every few minutes in the rear-view mirror. After a while of this, she pulled off of the main road.

“Do you want something to eat?” Her voice was much calmer now. “I am starving.”

I didn’t want to spoil the moment, so I did the best I could to form a smile and answered, “Sure, I could eat.”

I wasn’t actually hungry, but I wasn’t trying to make this trip any more awkward than it already had been. I just wanted to go home, but I wouldn’t have known how to get back home if I tried. Kat pulled up to the drive through window of a taco stand on the corner between two store entrances, both of whom were closed at this time.

Jamari texted me back at around that time, telling me that his parents had agreed to let him go to camp as a show of solidarity for my struggle to become a better person.

Kat ordered us a couple of tacos and sodas and by the time I texted Jamari saying “yay,” we had our food and drinks and were back on the road. Pulling back into the highway she said, “We only have about a three hour drive left. Try to get some sleep soon. It’s getting pretty late now.

”How am I supposed to sleep when I don’t even know what’s going on right now?”

She didn’t answer me. We continued to travel in silence for the rest of the three hour drive. I don’t trust people driving. It’s not because of some traumatic car accident in my past, I just don’t trust people to drive with me in their car. I don’t think I ever even trusted my own parents driving. And it’s not necessarily the person driving that bothers me. I imagine all of those cars holding apathetic drivers who are paying more attention to their cellphones than the road.

With about an hour left of the drive, which I only knew because I paid attention to the digital clock in the middle section of the dashboard, the realization hit me that I wasn’t going to see my parents for a very long time, and judging by the way everyone was so hush about it all, meant there must be something seriously wrong going on. I began to worry not for myself, but for them, because in my mind, there had to be some kind of accident or something, and they both died, and they are all lying to me to keep me calm until I get to wherever I’m really going.

This woman may not even be my aunt… what should I do?

Before I could answer my own question in my head, my alleged aunt Kat hit the brakes hard and I didn’t see a reason why she would have needed to. She didn’t say a word, and kept driving as if nothing happened.

Something is so very off about this woman but I just can’t figure out exactly what is wrong with her.

I looked out the window, seeing nothing but trees now, no matter what way she turned.

This must be why she fed me earlier. Where the fuck is she taking me?

I almost spoke the question to myself out loud, but luckily I caught myself before any sound actually came out. I look to the rear view mirror to see her looking intently at me. She quickly positioned her eyes back toward the road and I pretended not to notice. Kat pulled the car into a gas station that looked as if it hadn’t been open in years. The whole thing was very retro.

“Maybe 70’s-ish?”

I thought if I could just get her talking, maybe she would tell me something of value. Maybe if she didn’t see me as a chore she would see me as more of a friend.

Or a niece. Either way, it can’t hurt for me to try to get on her good side.

“Yeah, good guess kid.” She sounded slightly impressed by the accuracy of my guestimate. She got out of the car and went inside.

I took a few deep breaths while Kat was busy pumping gas at the surprisingly open gas station with the 'free love, dude” vibe. It took her about three minutes. After taking deep breaths and physically calming my body down, I actively focused my thoughts on ways to make Kat like me, or at least, dislike me less.

It would be better to pretend that I trust her so that she can feel like she has real control over me. Then I can do like a double-agent thing on her. A mind fuck. Hopefully….

The only thing I had on my mind when Kat got back in the driver’s seat was what I could possibly say to start a conversation with her that wouldn’t make her think I was purposely being a smart-ass. She was such an off-putting person. Her face looked pretty, but hardened, like the lead business woman in a romantic comedy before she meets her soul-mate.

“The moon is waxing.”

Kat's eyes darted to the mirror to meet mine.

“Well, aren’t you a smart girl?” her lips cracked into a smile, but only for a second, after which it returned to the unkind expression it was making before.

“I like to think so.” I felt confident in my retort.

“That’s the problem with you teenagers. You are right in this instance but the fact that you think you are smart inevitably will become an impediment to your education as a whole.”

I felt hesitant about responding, mostly because she hadn’t spoken that many words to me during the entire trip, and now here she was lecturing me on education and ego. Still, I couldn’t let the conversation die.

“Just trying to make conversation.”

I used this line many times before with my parents. It was about a fifty-fifty shot. Either it would backfire completely or I would come out of the disagreement as the underdog, the victor against all odds. The anxiety running through me proved relentless. I couldn’t stop tapping my heel, which I had just become aware of, and I had no idea how long I had been doing so.

After a long pause, Kat finally blessed me again with her authoritative voice.

“I wasn’t trying to be mean. I know you are most likely scared. Not knowing what is happening can be stressful. However I can promise you that your parents are just fine. Nobody is going to take you away from them. You only have to stay with me for a few weeks. Then you get to go to camp and afterwards I will take you home.”

She sounded reassuring but I still didn’t fully believe her. At least she spoke for more than two seconds.

“It’s okay. I should’ve been nice earlier today. I just don’t know what to do or how to act since all of this happened so fast. I know I get in trouble a lot but this time, I wasn’t really in the wrong.”

Yes I was. I was so wrong. But so was that twat-faced bitch, Lina.