CHAPTER ONE
A mysterious and unwelcome plastic rose in a jar awaits me in my cabin as I take my fifteen minute break. I pick up the round jar and look at the cursed flower. Every summer camp without fail, whoever is gifted this rose, will go missing for a full day and night, only to reappear safely without memory. The silly story of this curse started to make the rounds when Anne Duncan went missing into the surrounding forest and was found murdered by sunrise. Her fate unraveled after being gifted this very rose glued into a jar, twenty-years ago. The rose remained, but I wonder if it's even true. If she really did receive this rose. Or if it's just a strange oddity that her story became connected to this inanimate object.
As I touch the fake petals, covered in a lick of silver glitter, I hear an accompanying scream from outside near the summer campfire, where kids run wild on a perfect summer night. It’s balmy, they won’t be sleeping until it cools off well into the night. And despite the chaos of summer camp, I enjoyed looking after them with the other camp counselors.
“Do you believe in the power that rose holds, Lexa?”
I nearly jump out of my skin when I glance up and see fellow counselor, Atticus, sitting on the side of my bed in the dark. But I'm not too scared, because he is my friend here.
“I don’t believe in magic,” I put the glass down, “Or curses.”
“You know that curse always come true in this Summer camp,” Atticus drawls with a thuggish smile, “The kids are telling scary stories till midnight, you don't want to share any horror stories you know with me while we're alone? Do you know anything R rated?”
“Nope, and who exactly keeps approving your fifteen minute break with me? You take every break with me, Attie,” and I had noticed his obsession with following me around. However, he is completely unfazed by my question.
“Why not? I enjoy your company, Lexa. And I know we've both kept quiet about our past, but believe it or not, I enjoy reminiscing about how we met at this very camp as teens, seven years ago,” Atticus stands up from the bed that still creaks the way I remember. He turns to it, showing me his back and emphasizing the sound the bed makes by putting his knee on the mattress and bouncing the springs under his weight, “Don’t you remember?” he looks over his shoulder, “You haven’t mentioned the fact I took your virginity. It's somewhat offensive to me. That night was special, wasn't it?”
Offensive to him? That I hadn't gushed about it to him?
“I don't mention it, Attie, because that’s all you took from me,” I cross my arms and try to be lighthearted about it, but my sweet tone fades with my growing bitterness, “You never asked for my number, you never asked to catch up, you had your way and then you just disappeared after camp was over. After I thought we had the best Summer of our lives together.”
“We were seventeen, why would commitment matter back then to either of us? The whole world was at our feet and I agree, it was the best year of our lives,” Atticus glares at me for no good reason, and his unusual hazel eyes, which seem to glow a brighter amberish-gold at night, now seem to strengthen with luminosity. It contrasts the messy and glossy black hair on his head, which still has a leaf that I snuck into the curls earlier, when we were 'eating' dinner side by side. I remember observing the way his clothes were becoming more and more scuffed on this camp. He always wore brown boots, a checkered red shirt and ripped jeans that ripped a little more each day. He didn't seem to have another set of clothes on this trip.
And another oddity about Attie; he ate nothing.
Over dinner he drank three large cups of strawberry lemonade.
Over the past week, we had been cordial since we met up as camp counselors. On that first meeting, we saw and recognized one another because of our brief fling, and then eventually we had a chat. We shared small talk and anything other than the connection we made back as teens.
I remember how Atticus said random, odd things; how he liked the beach, but chose to spend his entire summer in the forest.
Then he proceeded to be as charming and distant as ever, while constantly avoiding food.
I became hyper-fixated on him around snacks, around breakfast, lunch, dinner. Not once had he eaten in front of me.
And now, to amp up the weird, he reappears in this cabin of lost memories, with the cursed rose to spark what exactly, some kind of conversation about our past?
“I’m taking the rose back to the Assembly Hall,” I announce on the spot, to test his reaction.
“Why? If you don’t believe in the curse, just take it back in the morning, don’t waste your break taking it back there when you can spend your fifteen minutes with me,” Atticus now kicks back down onto the single bed, crushing the one pillow, his tall frame taking the whole width and the whole length of that creaky tiny bed.
He had almost doubled in size from what I remembered. It was all muscle and added height. Instead of being impressed, it honestly intimidated me.
Atticus puts his hands behind his head, smiling at me, “Come here and stop being sour.”
Is that an invitation to pick up where we left off seven years ago?
I’ve picked up the jar with the rose in defiance, but his eyes glow with that beautiful gold and then I almost remember what it was like.
To lose my virginity to Atticus.
The truth is... I barely remembered a thing on the smaller details. I only remembered that one moment. The way I felt like I was floating outside my body, as we both came.
But I don’t know how we got there, or how he evoked such a strong response from me. It was a blur of touching and stripping and colliding. All I know is that after that shared orgasm – my soul felt irrevocably changed. I couldn’t self-pleasure on my own, I couldn’t find any book that would scratch the itch, and I could find no man who could satisfy the urge.
Atticus had been my first and he’d been stuck on my brain ever since; not that I'd tell him that. He was the reason I came back to be a counselor at twenty-four, trying to get over this memory of our fling, by inserting new memories here, and the last thing I expected to see was him making the same decision too.
I had been shocked to see him.
But he wasn’t shocked to see me.
Even weirder.
He was exactly as I remembered but everything was enhanced. Not just a hot bad boy, but now he was arrogance personified, like he ruled the camp, but he never showed that to anyone verbally. It just oozed out of him like an aura he couldn’t shed.
A prince out of his comfort zone; yeah, that's exactly what he felt like to me as an observer. Out of place. Completely.
He didn't belong here.
I tried to stay away from him, to keep distance, but every break I had on the job, he joined me. It felt like taunting, but I finally get my answer.
He’s trying to get laid again. Especially by reclining back on the very bed we last had sex. Not very subtle.
“You want me to stay? Lay in your arms?” I ask him boldly, feeling myself constantly airing on the side of caution with Atticus. Because he just didn’t feel right, my gut kept telling me to linger back, “But what if I don’t want you to stay here, Attie? This is my cabin,” I add.
“What if the curse is true?” Atticus slowly leans up, his eyes falling on the rose, “…and you die tonight?” he flutters his bright eyes up to mine as my stomach twists with anxiety, “Either way, I’ll see you around... and one last thing... I’ve wanted to say this but I didn’t know how to without sounding like a total emo. But here goes nothing; it’s been a real blast having your company this week, Lexa. I often feel dead inside, but you bring me some light back into my life, like I remember,” he stands up and walks by me, heading to the door, not looking back once, “I’ll see myself out.”
I'm so shocked by what he's just said, that I forget to ask him why he feels dead inside.
And before I know it, he’s gone back to the fire to oversee the kids and the ghost stories with the others.
And I’m left with the rose and too many questions, including an unfurling in my gut that said he wasn’t joking or exaggerating anything.
He meant every word, and now I wonder if the curse is real.
I don't want to die or go missing, but I can't see how I would even if it was true.
There was no danger here? The only thing that felt off in this camp was Atticus.
He was the only worry for me; and I couldn't even verbalize why without sounding crazy.
It was just a feeling, a premonition of something more, and nothing good.
