Summer was here, and for 12-year-old Cody, that initially meant 2 months of playing, relaxing, and being his own boss. Fate, it seems, had other plans for him. Now he has been sitting in a car for about 8 hours driving down-state to spend just about his entire summer at camp.
A lot of other kids would have been super pumped about this, as they would often imagine themselves living in tents, roasting marshmallows, climbing tree's, and swimming around in the lake whenever they felt like it. Cody however has been to camp before, so he knew better. When he was 10, he and his 4th Grade class went on a week-long camping trip. All he remembered was strict curfews, tight bathroom schedules, constant camp meetings, and endless pre-determined hiking trips that led nowhere. It may as well have been a military school in Vietnam. By the time he had finally returned home, he could have slept for 20 hours a day.
But as far as he could tell, this camp wasn't going to have hiking, tents, or marshmallows. This camp, was at a zoo, more specifically, the San Diego Zoo. He could picture it in his head, being forced to sleep in a custodians closet and spending hours going from exhibit to exhibit cleaning them out, as part of what they would call a "Team-Building Exercise".
Why anyone would want to go camping at a Zoo was beyond Cody, but apparently, It wasn't to his 8-year-old sister Jessie. She always loved animals, even the ones that could kill you in one bite. She spent much of her spare time researching them, and loved it whenever she got to spend some time near them. So for those reasons, She jumped at the idea of spending her Summer surrounded by animals of all sorts.
They probably wouldn't be on there way there right now if it wasn't for their teenage brother Franklin. When he was 10 years old, he wen't to the very camp that Cody was now being dragged against his will to. He liked it so much, that he spent many of his subsequent Summers there. Now that he is 19, he has taken a break from College and taken a Summer job as a camp counselor there. Ever since Cody was 8, (which is apperently the minimum required age to attend this camp) every Summer Franklin would try to convince him to come with him. He respected and looked up to his brother, but the problem was, Cody has always been a bit of a co-depednant boy. Other than school, Cody has felt uncomfortable with traveling a large distance from his home without his parents. Well, now his sister was finally old enough to attend this camp, and whether it's because his parents don't want him alone in the house while both his sibling were at camp downstate, or because they wanted him to have fun without them for once, he was coming with her, whether he wanted to or not.
Before he could finish whatever inner-monolouge was going on in his mind. he heard his mother say, "Alright, we're here!"
Almost instantly, Jessie pressed her face against the glass of her window in hopes of catching a first glance of the place.
"Ahem," said Cody, which made his sister turn her head to him.
Cody simply pointed his finger to his window, where the zoo was clearly visible through, and said, "It's that way."
Jessie slowly resettled herself into her car seat, kinda embarrassed of her act of impulsiveness, and looked out the window looking out in pure excitement.
After 30 minutes of trying to find a parking space, and Cody listening to the ear-numbing sound of his parents bickering about it, they finally got out of the car. Since he has only been out of the car twice this entire road trip for bathroom breaks, Cody saw this as the perfect moment to finally stretch his limbs out. It was such a relief, he could have sworn he felt a bone pop back into place in his arm. Once he was "loose enough" he grabbed his backpack (Franklin recommended that he pack very lightly) and just waited around for everyone else to do something.
