Finders Keepers

Chapter Five

Bailey
July 8th, 2014

     Wednesday was my favorite day. By then, it's wasn't hard to get out of bed early in the morning. My Antlers girls and I felt more comfortable talking to people and making friends. Wednesday was the day that I started being myself.

     I remember nothing about practice that day. Not a thing. It was the hottest day of the week and I'm almost positive I blocked practice from my memory to keep myself from being traumatized. But here's what I do remember and how I remember it.

     Waking up was actually not horrible.

     We got kool-aid at lunch and it wasn't watered down. Everyone flipped out about it, as it was a rare occurrence.

     When we got back to our cabin to clean ourselves up before dinner, Katie started playing music with the speaker she brought and it turned into an all out dance party that almost made us late getting back down the hill. I think Taylor might still have videos somewhere..

     After dinner that night, we actually spoke to people we didn't know. Trust me, it was a big deal for us. We were hanging out with some upperclassmen from our school that were there for Drum Major and Drumline (aka Kacee, Caleb, and James...Yes, James from last chapter. We'll get around to more about him later) and they introduced us to some of their friends. I only remember Adam from Oklahoma City (and that's only because I saw him at a competition the next year)

     The lawn game that night was a tug-of-war. The counselors changed the teams every so often. Drums vs Guard, Boys vs Girls, Freshmen vs Seniors, and so on.

     Now, before I go further, remember this. At this point in my life I was NOT a joiner. I was awkward, short, scared, and baby faced. I was not a social person at all. I was comfortable approaching something with a group..but all alone? Nope. Nopitynope.

     So when the game of truth or dare I was playing with my cabin girls came to my turn and I picked dare, of course I'm dared to join something.

     "Oklahoma vs Texas!" The tug-of-war announcer's voice boomed over the speakers.

     "Go play the lawn game this round! It'll be fun!" Katie said excitedly. She was probably proud of herself for making use of the surroundings for our game.

     My protests were cut short by Katie and McKinley literally lifting me off the ground and shoving me into the pile of people playing for the Oklahoma side. I was sandwiched between a tall kid and another tall kid. That's all I can tell you because, well, that's all I knew about them at the time. Everyone was a stranger in that moment and I remember thinking "Huh. Never thought I'd die like this, but here I am."

     When the air horn blared, signaling everyone to start pulling, I had made up my mind that if I was going to be there I might as well be useful. I pulled with the entire 95 pounds of my body weight. Maybe I made a difference, maybe I didn't.. But we won anyway.

     The knowledge of winning was exciting until the inevitable domino effect started and the people on the winning side came crashing down on one another.

     One second I was filled with joy over being apart of the winning team, the next I was flat on my back with one of the the aforementioned tall kids on top of me. I'm not sure which one of us started laughing first, but we burst into a fit of giggles as he rolled off of me.

     "I'm so sorry!" He managed between laughs. "I'm Chris..from Oklahoma..but you probably already knew that from the game." He helped me onto my feet.

     If I'm being honest, he was adorable, but the awkwardness rolled off of him in waves. And if I'm still being honest, I had never felt more comfortable with a stranger. He had braces and brown eyes. Not flat brown eyes, but the kind that don't let you decide if they're gold or red or chocolate because they can't decide themselves. It was the first time I had ever immediately wanted to describe a boy as pretty, but it fit.

     "I'm Bailey. I'm from Oklahoma too." I giggled, trying to shoot his fumble of words back at him as a joke. A kind of signal to say /hey, I'm awkward too!/. We talked for a minute, mostly apologizing about the previous mishap. I had to get back to my girls to tell them what had happened, and he thought his friends would be looking for him, so we left to our respective groups. Though not before promising to talk again sometime soon.

     My snoopy cabin was watching the whole exchange from a distance and bombarded me with questions as soon as I sat back down. Er- well- except for Taylor. She has always minded her own business. That's why I got along with her better. She was nice and funny, but not intrusive. I spilled the story to the girls and they "ooh"-ed and "aww"-ed in all the right places, but I don't think I did it justice. Even as I type this, I don't think I give our origin story the credit it deserves.

     That night after we had all lied down to go to sleep, I couldn't stop myself from thinking about Chris "from Oklahoma" and wondering if he told his friends about me too. If he was thinking about me too. If he remembered the color of my eyes the way I remembered his.

     Wednesday was my favorite day.