Playing Detective

I stared out of the car window, leaning my forehead against the windowpane. A cabin slowly came into view, and soon enough I saw the entire camp. A large, dark green flag stood in the centre, waving lazily in the wind. The cabins had colour-coordinated roofs, probably to represent different groups. The sun glared down, making the roofs seem brighter. It also made the car’s temperature unbearably high.

Crossing my arms tightly, I turned from the window to the back of the driver’s seat. There was an uncomfortable silence throughout the car trip, but I wasn’t the one about to break it. Instead, I fiddled with the locket dangling from my neck. My brother parked the car and turned in his seat towards me. “Come on, Thea, help me take out your stuff,” he opened the door and climbed out. I begrudgingly followed suit and dragged out my bag. We walked along the dusty path towards the centre of camp. A woman rushed to greet us almost immediately, as if she could sense us.

“Hi there, I’m Jessica!” she greeted us ecstatically. I wrinkled my nose; the smell of hairspray reeked from this woman’s massive perm. She beamed at me widely, flashing every one of her brilliantly white teeth. “Welcome to Camp Curiosity, where we encourage our campers to be creative, resourceful and... Well, curious!” she giggled at her unfunny joke.

I kept my face blank while my brother forced out a laugh. “This is my sister, Thea. Sorry she’s late, we had some issues,” he explained, glancing at me in annoyance. It was obvious I was the issue he was referring to. I did not want to go to camp at all. I had made that clear since he told me. But of course, I had no say in this.

“Don’t you worry,” Jessica assured me, “You’re going to have a totally tubular time!” Yep, this lady struck me as the type to use slang because she thinks it’ll make her cool to the teens here. “Come on, I’ll bring you to your cabin,” she strode off, leaving me with my brother. He put a hand on my shoulder and said, “See you in August, little sis. You’ll love it here.”

“Leon, I don’t want to be here,” I retorted, “I wanna go home.” Leon narrowed his eyes and sighed deeply. “Thea, not this again. I’m not letting you rot away in your room this summer. You need this.” I turned my head and snorted. This wasn’t about rotting away. This was a distraction, a way to forget.

As he made his way back into the car, I heard Jessica coming towards me. She put her hand on my shoulder and steered me away from the departing car to the cabins. “Let me give you a tour, since you weren’t here earlier,” she said. We came towards a wooden building bigger than the cabins. It didn’t have a colourful roof or flags. The building was constructed from pinewood that had scratches carved into it. As I looked closer, the scratches looked more like curses, initials and other random words.

“Here is the cafeteria,” Jessica announced, and then, without a moment to waste, she brought me towards an area with giant targets that looked like they were carved from wood and hand painted. “This is the archery area, where we’ll teach you how to use a bow and arrow to hit those targets without putting an arrow into anyone’s chest!” she chuckled. Jessica then showed me the lake. There were a few canoes tied to the dock. Each one had different colours that were like the roofs of the cabins. “Here we’ll have boating trips and teaching you guys how to fish!” Jessica gestured to the lake and then to a shed near the dock, where I presumed they kept fishing rods.

After what felt like hours of walking and listening to Jessica ramble about what a great time I’ll have here, she finally brought me to a cabin. The roof was a soft shade of green, with a flag hanging above the entrance. On the flag, there was a cartoon girl smiling widely. She held a stick with a marshmallow on it and her other hand was giving a thumbs up. I shuddered and looked away – that flag was creepy. Inside the cabin, the walls were lined with six bunk beds, three on each side. The sheets were plain white – except for one bed, which had a weird looking stain on the blanket. “The other girls should be here soon,” Jessica turned to leave as I dropped my bags on a bottom bunk.

Finally, she had left me alone. The sun was starting to set outside, casting a golden glow through the open door. I started looking through my bag to prepare an outfit for tomorrow. I always liked to be prepared, to be organised. I folded my clothes neatly at the bottom of the bed – jean shorts and a brightly coloured t-shirt.

I wandered around the cabin, wondering where the bathroom was. Then, in the far corner, I saw a door that had a sign on it. It read “bathroom.” Couldn’t be more obvious. I opened the door and stepped in. As I tied my dark hair into a braid, I stared at myself in the mirror, watching myself struggling with my hair tie.

There was the sound of chatter outside of the bathroom. The other campers were getting ready for bed. The door handle turned and a girl with black hair stared at me. Her eyebrows raised in surprise as we made eye contact. “Oh my goodness,” she gasped, “I am so sorry, I didn’t know you were in here!” The poor girl looked extremely embarrassed and she quickly closed the door, scurrying away. I couldn’t help laughing, despite myself. I walked out of the bathroom and to my bed. The girl was sitting on the top bunk. She looked down at me and looked away quickly. “Hey, it’s okay,” I climbed the ladder slightly to talk to her. She was lying face down on the pillow, refusing to look at me.

Another girl looked over at us and scoffed. She was tying her brown hair into a ponytail as she snapped, “Don’t be so dramatic. It’s literally not that big of a deal.” She had ghostly pale skin, with an irritated expression like she had better things to do than to watch someone cry over an embarrassing encounter. I rolled my eyes and climbed down the ladder. “Has anyone seen my toothbrush?” A girl demanded, pushing people off their beds as she searched. When she approached me, her dark eyes glared as they searched for any signs of guilt on my face.

“Well?” her tone was commanding, “did you take my toothbrush?” “Um, no,” I replied, clinging onto my bed in fear she might throw me off to search my bedsheets.

“Ugh,” the girl stormed off and started digging through her bag. “Oh,” she suddenly said, “I found it.” She now sounded abashed and quickly shuffled to the bathroom. I slipped my locket off my neck and opened it. A grey picture of a man with a relaxed expression was inside. “Goodnight Dad,” I whispered, feeling a lump growing in my throat. I swallowed and placed the locket in my bag. I crawled under the blankets, feeling myself slip into sleep.