A Lifetime Made for Two

Ch. 2 : First Day

After an eventful weekend of preparations for camp, the first day had arrived, and Piper was overflowing with nervous energy and excitement. Today she would begin eight weeks of teaching pre-teens and teens about painting. It was raining outside so she wore long jeans and a wool infinity scarf that matched her purple long sleeve shirt. Her purple converse really tied the outfit together.
    
By now the rest of the staff had arrived at camp. Only one more girl had arrived, Annie, but three more young men had joined. Piper hadn't met the guys yet, but she knew that two of them were going to be counselors. Annie was also a counselor.
    
No one else in Piper's cabin was awake yet, but Piper wanted to prepare for her class. And she wanted to eat breakfast.
    
One of the perks of having a cabin way up in the woods was that when it rained the trees blocked most of the raindrops. One of the cons was that as raindrops built up on the leaves, you had a greater chance of getting drenched if you walked under the wrong tree at the right time. So by the time Piper made it to the dining hall, her hair was completely soaked. It looked even more orange when it was wet. Piper put her wet hair up into a loose messy bun and got in line to get her breakfast.
    
Class started thirty minutes after breakfast ended and Piper was ready. She was in her classroom fifteen minutes early setting up, when she thought she saw someone she knew walk past the door.
  
"Anthony?" she said in surprise as she rushed into the hallway.
    
The nineteen-year-old turned around upon hearing the familiar voice.
  
"Piper! I wasn't expecting to see you here." He grinned as he stepped towards Piper, his arms open for a hug.
    
Anthony and Piper had known each other since third grade when Anthony had pulled Piper's pigtails their first day of class. Although they started out as enemies, they had become friends when they joined forces against the class bully, Trent Jackson. But they still teased each other all the time. They had been such close friends in high school that new classmates that didn't know them thought that they were either dating or related. Piper never understood how people thought they could be siblings; Anthony's brown eyes, dirty-blonde hair, and Russian look were far different from Piper's orange-auburn hair and blue eyes.
  
"Me neither! Why are you here? Surely you aren't a camper," she teased as she got lost in his arms. He was several inches taller than she was and their hugs were always awkward, but she loved them.
  
"Haha. Very funny. Actually, I'm a counselor for the seven to nine year-olds. What are you doing here?"
  
"I'm the art teacher."
  
"Ooh. That doesn't sound like a very easel job." Anthony grinned at his own pun.
  
"I see your puns are as terrible as ever," Piper said while suppressing a smile.
  
"Terrible?! Oh, come on. You know they always make you laugh."
    
Piper giggled as she answered, "I guess you're right."
  
"Well I hate to brake up our happy reunion, but I have to get to class. We'll have to catch up later though."
  
"Definitely."
    
Anthony walked down the hall and turned the corner as Piper reentered her classroom.
   

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   "How was class?"
     Piper slowed down for Anthony to catch up to her as she answered, "Not as easy as I was hoping. But I think the kids enjoyed it; some of them enjoyed being disruptive. But I dealt with them and I think tomorrows class will be easier. You?"
   "My class was great! The kids love me and they listened pretty well. No major catastrophes."
   "Rub it in why don't you."
   "Sorry," Anthony apologized in his Canadian accent.
     Piper smiled as she looked at the floor.
   "What?"
   "Your accent, Tony. It cracks me up every time."
     Anthony had to get back to class so the two said goodbye once again. Since Piper had the rest of the morning off, she went to the office to see if Ruth had anything for her to do. Ruth didn't, but she suggested that Piper check in with the kitchen staff. They were usually glad to have extra help. And sure enough, they were. Margret and Terrance (another of the new guys) were working very hard in the kitchen and put Piper right to work.
     Finally, it was lunch time. Piper laughed as she watched Anthony try to contain the flood of young children who came rushing in for lunch. She almost got knocked over as they crowded in line behind her. All children under thirteen years old were served from behind the food counter by the cooks. Piper was glad she had the choice of what to have and how much.
     "Hey, Tony!" Piper called as she saw Anthony searching for a table that hadn't been taken over by little kids. Anthony gladly sat across from Piper at her table.
   "Now we have a chance to catch up. How have you been? How was college?" Piper asked.
   "College," Anthony said with a sigh. "It wasn't too bad. I passed all my classes and am well on my way to being a certified geek."
   "That's great! I'm so glad that all of your dodging of calls paid off."
   "What?"
   "You never once answered any of my calls. I called you throughout the whole school year."
   "Oh. I'm so sorry, but I hardly talked to anyone outside of college."
   "I get it. I'm just glad we're both working here; otherwise, we may never have seen each other again."
   "I'm sure that's not true."
   "Well maybe not."
     The two were interrupted by Bryce, Annie, and Jennifer joining their table. Piper noticed that Calvin was sitting at a table three away from her table, and he was surrounded by a group of the fourteen and fifteen year-olds, most of them girls. Tim soon joined her table and she continued socializing with those at her table. Throughout the meal, Piper watched for Michael to come in. When at last he arrived, he took his meal straight into the dish-room. Fortunately, no one noticed Piper's disappointed sigh. After the meal, everyone either went to work or to their class. Anthony walked Piper to her classroom and then continued down the hall to where the seven to nine year-olds were eagerly awaiting him. A lot of noise was coming from the other side of the door to Piper's classroom: screaming, laughing, running, crashing. Piper sighed and prepared herself for another class-time, only this time she would be teaching the thirteen to fifteen year-olds as opposed to the ten to twelve year-olds she had taught that morning. Although her first group had been uncooperative enough, from what she had seen throughout the day and heard from the other side of the door, she expected this group to be even less obedient and cooperative. 'You can do this,' she told herself as she gripped the handle and turned it. The cacophony of noise seemed to increase tenfold as she opened the door and stepped inside. No one seemed to notice that she had arrived. She closed the door rather loudly to get everyone's attention: no one even looked over at her. She walked to the front of the classroom, head held high so as to appear confident. Still no one noticed or cared. She cleared her throat. One or two students took their seats and were quiet. By now Piper's patience was wearing thin. She took a deep breath to calm down and had to shout to ask everyone to take their seat, but no one listened. She took the ruler from off the white board and slammed it down on the podium with a loud 'crack!'. That got everyone's attention.
   In a stern and angry voice, she said, "Please take your seats, everyone. We are already seven minutes late so I would like to get started right away with the lesson. Pay attention because I will ask questions after the class."
     The group of four girls that had been gossiping in the corner sat together at one of the tables. The three guys that had been whispering and glancing at the four girly-girls tried to look like they weren't intimidated, but they sat down as soon as they found a group of three seats. The other nondescript students found open seats very quickly.
     When everyone was seated, Piper, with a smug, self-pleased look on her face, started class by introducing herself.
   "My name is Piper Coenen," she said as she pulled her art supplies out of her bag. "We'll start class today by learning the basics of drawing a person."
     One of the girly-girls spoke up, "My little brother was in your class this morning and he said he got to paint... stuff."
   "That's because he was in the ten to twelve class and unless any of those kids end up in my advanced class, they won't have to learn anything very intense; that's not to say that you will either. Oh, and next time raise your hand and wait to be called on." Piper looked down at the podium and continued to unpack and organize her supplies. Then she passed out papers, pencils, and erasers to each student.
     No more trouble was had from the students. The class actually went surprisingly well after the initial problem. Several of the students even showed great art potential. Still, Piper was glad when the class finally ended at 2:00. By 2:15 she had packed up all of her stuff and decided to walk to the beach to see who was there.
     Still several yards from the beach and before she could even see the beach, Piper could hear what was going on. She could hear people laughing, the splashing of the water as someone jumped off the dock, and several kids playing Marco-Polo. When she came over the hill she discovered that her assumptions were correct. As she scanned the beach and grassy area, Piper spotted a group of the young staff sitting around the fire-pit and debated whether or not to join them. As she was debating, she felt an arm around her shoulder and someone urging her downs the hill. She turned her head to the right to discover it was Calvin.
   "Come join the party," he said as he ushered her toward the group of young adults.
     All of the young people smiled at her and welcomed her to join. Michael didn't say a word to Piper or even look at her. His mother, one of the counselors, called him over to help her with something for her group of children. By the time he rejoined the group, Jenny had already asked to see Piper's paintings and the few that she had with her were being passed around.
  "Hey! This one is of the pond. It even feels like the pond," Bryce commented.
   "What do you mean?" Piper wondered.
   "It's a bit damp."
     Piper chuckled under her breath and looked at Michael. He met her gaze and winked at her, a sly smile on his face.
     Everyone continued to fawn over Piper's art, and Piper's face got redder and redder. She didn't like all of the attention and Michael could tell. Calvin noticed too, and he was the one to act.
   "Hey, everybody, why don't we play a game?" Calvin suggested.
     Jenny jumped at the suggestion, "We should play truth or dare so we get to know each other better!"
   "I don't know. You guys can be pretty weird sometimes," Michael worried.
   "What are you, scared? What's the harm?" Anthony piped up.
   "I guess I'll play. What about you, Piper?"
   "I'll play."
   "Then I guess it's settled," Jenny said.
     They all decided to sit at a picnic table and play spin the bottle, but instead of the traditional version, whoever the bottle landed pointing at had to pick truth or dare. Most of the guys picked dare when it was there turn so Jenny made an executive decision to make the game just truth. Nothing too serious was asked of anyone; Piper guessed that this was because everyone pretty much knew everyone else. Then the bottle landed on Piper.
   "Do you have a boyfriend?" Bryce asked.
     Michael shot him a quick death glare.
   Piper looked a bit uncomfortable when she answered, "No. Not currently."
     She looked down at her feet and Michael deduced that her last relationship must have ended badly from how saddened she looked. No one else seemed to notice for the game went on as before.
     Before anyone knew it, it was 4:15 and the kitchen staff had to return to work. Piper was planning on walking next to Michael so they could talk, but her plans were interrupted by Bryce and Calvin. Calvin called her name and they both jogged up to where she was. She made an effort to turn her attention away from Michael so she could listen to what Bryce was saying.
   "You like music, right?"
   "Yeah," Piper answered.
   "What kind?"
   "Umm. I don't really have one particular type of music that I prefer. I like just about anything, except for screamo, opera, and most instrumental."
   "Great," Bryce practically interrupted. "Cause Calvin, Lily, and I are going to a concert Friday night and we were wondering if you wanted to come."
   "What concert?"
   "The Treasures."
  "I love them! I'll go. So just the three of you?"
   "Unless you know of anyone else who wants to go. I'll buy you a ticket and you can pay me back later," Bryce offered.
   "Ok. I'm planning to go into town on Wednesday so I'll get money from the bank then."
   "Sounds good. See you later!" Bryce and Calvin called as they split off the path and headed up to the back of the kitchen.
   'So much for talking to Michael. I don't really even know what I wanted to say to him.' Piper said aloud to herself.
   "Talking to yourself? You know, they say that's a sign that you're crazy," Michael said as he fell in step with Piper.
     Piper couldn't suppress the giant grin on her face.
   "Don't you have to work?"
   "Nah. I already put everything away after lunch so all that's left is a few dishes. They only need two people to put stuff through the dishwasher so we decided that I could leave." 
   "Oh. What are you planning to do now?"
   "I don't know. Are you busy?"
   "No. I only have two art classes a day and I already did them. I was going to see if the kitchen needed help but you just saved me a trip."
   "Great. Do you mind if I just hang with you for a while?"
   "Not at all. Was there something you wanted to talk about?"
     Michael tried to hide his nervousness as he replied, "Actually, yeah. I was wondering, are you doing anything Friday night? There's a good movie that's coming out in theaters on Friday and I was wondering if you wanted to go see it."
   "Friday night? I actually just made plans. But I could cancel them."
   "No. No. That's fine."
   "We could go Saturday. You don't work then, right?"
   "Sure. That's sounds great."
   "And I don't know if you like to shop, or window shop like me, but if you do then we could walk around the mall before or after, depending on when we go."
   "And we could eat somewhere. The mall has pretty good food but if you wanted to go somewhere else..."
   "I love mall food! So we can keep thinking about this and decide what showing we want to go to. Unless you know right now."
   "Well, I kind of prefer seeing a movie first; that way you don't have to rush to get back to it in time. That ok?"
   "That's great. By the way, what is the movie?"
     They both laughed. Michael told her what movie he was thinking of seeing and how much tickets were, and it was set. They would leave after lunch on Saturday and get back sometime before the twelve o'clock curfew.
     Some of the staff was already lined up waiting for the dinner bell when Piper and Michael walked in together. Bryce, Nick, Calvin, and Morgan whispered and quietly laughed together when they noticed that Michael held the door for Piper.
   "Did you see that?" Nick gossiped.
   "Yeah. And did you see the smile on Piper's face?!" Morgan commented.
   "Awww. He must have made a joke," Bryce said.
   "Knowing my brother it probably wasn't all that good. She's probably just laughing to be nice."
   "I think she's twitter-pated. That was a genuine laugh, but not the kind where you actually think something is funny," Nick said.
   "Hey everybody. What are you talking about?" Michael asked as he and Piper joined the line.
   "Nothing. What have you two been up to?" Nick quickly changed the subject.
   "Just hanging out," Piper replied nonchalantly.
     Bryce and Calvin shot each other a 'yeah-right' look.

     Everyone went back to their respective jobs after dinner. Piper walked to the beach and was grateful to find it void of people. She sat on the edge of the dock with her feet in the water. One of the reasons Piper loved lakes was that they were so peaceful on a "perfect" weather day, but could be so turbulent on a stormy day.

     As she was watching the placid water sparkle, Piper noticed a small dark figure in the water. She looked closer and discovered it was a turtle. It swam fairly close to the dock and poked its head out of the water to look at Piper. She was admiring it's beauty and complexity when someone ran on to the dock, inadvertently scaring away the turtle.

   "Shhh! There's a turtle!" Piper whispered to Calvin.

   "Really! Where? I love turtle's." Calvin sat down on the dock beside Piper and stared into the water. Unfortunately, the turtle did not make another appearance.

     More staff arrived at the beach until finally almost all of the young staff was there. After losing to Nick in a game of tether-ball, Calvin helped Michael start a fire in the fire-pit and the young people gathered around it. Piper noticed Michael talking to Nick, but she purposely put them out of her mind and tried to enjoy her time with the other young people. She ended talking with Jenny, Lily, and Margret. Everyone enjoyed the evening. Towards the end, Bryce got out his guitar and everyone joined him in singing all sorts of songs. They didn't leave the beach until it had gotten to dark to see.