Of Radiant Summer Skys

Chapter 10

After breakfast, instead of going to his cabin like he would have liked to, Jaxx went up to the counter.

"Excuse me-" Jaxx tried.

The counselor behind the counter took a look at the wristband around his arm.

"Oh. Come on in," he said, seeming annoyed as he swung the counter door open.

Jaxx stepped behind the counter.

"Through that door and to the left, you can't miss it," he spoke in a condescending tone.

Anger flared up in Jaxx. Why was he being treated like an idiot? Angrily, he opened the door and stepped into the kitchen.

When he began to make his way left, another camp counselor stopped him.

"Oh no you don't! Where do you think you're going?" she asked.

Jaxx tried to be polite, but these counselors were starting to get on his nerves, "I'm going to do the dishes."

"Follow me," she said, walking in the direction Jaxx was already going. He was getting tired of this.

She opened a door for him and he almost choked on the strong smell of bleach. Impatiently, the camp counselor shoved him into the room before closing the door. His nose wrinkled as he tried not to breathe.

"Pretty strong isn't it?" Luca asked, already making his way towards him.

"Yeah, but at least it's away from the counselors, they acted like I was gonna bail or something," Jaxx said.

"Actually, there is a camp counselor here," Sora said as he entered the room.

Jaxx sighed, he should have expected that.

"Apparently, he's in charge of the dishes, me and Light call him the Dish Daddy, we've been trying to get everyone else to call him that too" Sora continued.

"You can keep trying, but I am not calling him that," Luca said, "and for someone in charge of the dishes, he sure doesn't do 'em."

"That's because he's actually in charge of us," Alex said, appearing in the doorway, "and we should probably get back to work before he gets angry."

Everyone nodded in agreement, beginning to disperse when Levi burst through the door.

"God! Why does this room smell like it's made of bleach!?" he exclaimed.

Everyone had a little giggle at that.

"I'm sure we'll get used to it," Sora shrugged before walking off.

"Levi, come help me stack the plates!" Alex said, leading Levi away.

"So, uhh... What exactly do I do?" Jaxx asked.

"Come with me," Luca said, "You can help me grab the dirty dishes."

Jaxx's stomach turned. Whether it was disgust from having to handle dirty dishes or excitement from getting to hang out with Luca more he wasn't sure.

Noticing his twisted expression, they said, "The sooner we get this over with, the sooner they'll let us leave."

Jaxx followed them to a separate side room, where multiple large stacks of dirty dishes waited for them. Luca took a few dishes off of the top of a stack so they were holding a smaller stack. Wanting to be done with the task as soon as possible, Jaxx took half of a large stack of dishes.

"Woah, that's a pretty big stack of dishes," Luca remarked.

"Yeah, I was thinking we wrap this up quickly so we can do something else."

Something together, Jaxx thought, though he didn't dare say it out loud.

"Are you sure you can carry all of that? I mean, can you even see around it?" Luca asked.

"It'll be fine," Jaxx assured.

In truth, Jaxx could hardly see around the large stack of dishes he was holding, but he enjoyed the impressed look on Luca's face, who had turned around to grab more dishes and was now holding a quarter stack.

"Lets walk and talk," Jaxx suggested as he walked towards what he assumed was the door.

"Oh! Jaxx the door is this way," Luca called from the other side of the room.

"Right! I knew that!" Jaxx replied, embarrassed.

Jaxx followed Luca, who seemed to know where he was going, trying to hold a conversation with him. Luckily for him, Luca seemed to be more talkative than his brother.

Jaxx felt the stack of dishes wobble as he walked and began walking irregularly to keep it from falling.

"Are you sure you've got it?" Luca asked, trying to hold back laughter, "I can take some if you want."

"No, It's okay," Jaxx said, now determined to make it with the full stack of dishes in his arms. Maybe if he did, he'd impress Luca.

"This would be much easier with a cart," he muttered, struggling to keep the dishes stable.

"We'll ask for one next time," Luca said.

They continued walking. Luca would frequently offer to carry some of the load, but Jaxx would always decline, determined to impress him.

"Why is it so far away?" Jaxx complained, "It doesn't make any sense."

"It's probably to keep everyone away from the bleach smell," Luca replied.

He was right, the farther away they got, the stronger the smell of bleach got.

As Jaxx continued walking, he felt the stack of dishes wobble once again and quickly tried to adjust his position to keep it balanced.

"Jaxx be careful!" Luca warned.

His warning came too late as Jaxx tripped on an unseen object and both he and the stack of trays came crashing down. The sound of the trays shattering resounded through the hallway.

So quick dilemma, I have run out of prewritten chapters. This wasn't a problem before because I had the time to write a chapter a week, but with school starting again I'll be pretty busy for a while (Which is why this chapter is a bit shorter than I would have liked). So I can either a) go on a hiatus for a while to write more chapters in order to stick to a weekly schedule, or b) update whenever I finish a chapter. Which one do you guys prefer?