Mary Anne And Camp Bsc Part 6

Okay, I'm not the neat freak that my dad is. In fact, Dawn probably keeps her room just as neat as mine and maybe a little neater. With each pa.s.sing day, however, I noticed myself doing things more and more like my father, and saying things that he would say. Almost as if, by acting like him, he would seem to be around more.

The first night, the Chinese food night, was only the beginning. From there, it was takeout food every night: pizza, pizza, tex-mex, a vegetarian feast from the Tofu Express. tex-mex, a vegetarian feast from the Tofu Express.

Dawn or Sharon always told the people not to pack the food in Styrofoam, and not to send plastic forks.

But that didn't mean that the little foil containers that were supposed to be washed and recycled got washed and recycled. At best they made it as far as the sink where they were "put in to soak." Which meant they were filled up with water and left there.

No plastic utensils? We used up all the silverware. Then Sharon dug out the "good silver" and we started using that. It didn't take long for her to take out the "good plates," too.

And the kitchen bulletin board had disappeared under the collection of take-out menus. Sharon brought them home from work. We looked up new places that delivered food and ordered from them and they they brought more food. If Dawn hadn't been so caught up in Camp BSC, she might have scouted Stoneybrook for even more take-out menus. brought more food. If Dawn hadn't been so caught up in Camp BSC, she might have scouted Stoneybrook for even more take-out menus.

I didn't know there were so many places that delivered in the whole world, and especially not right here in Stoneybrook.

Do I sound cranky? I was. Partly because I'd gotten used to home-cooking, Schafer-Spier style. It sounds corny, I know, but I liked those evenings in the kitchen making dinner with Dawn or Sharon or my dad. I liked the times the menu planning was up to me and I could come up with whatever I wanted (except meat, of course). I liked seeing what new vegetarian delight Dawn was going to invent. If it hadn't been for Dawn, I might never have appreciated three-cheese macaroni, or tofu. (Although, like Kristy, I never could and never will appreciate sprouts. She's right when she says they look like green hair and they are are disgusting and embarra.s.sing when they get stuck in your teeth.) disgusting and embarra.s.sing when they get stuck in your teeth.) I tried cleaning up the house. I sorted junk mail and magazines and old newspapers into the recycling bins from the huge piles that Dawn and Sharon were letting collect in the mud room. I ran about a thousand loads of dishes in the dishwasher, trying to keep up. I wiped countertops. I put toilet paper on the toilet paper rolls' instead of letting it sit around on places like the edge of the bathtub where it was sure to fall in when someone was taking a shower. (It did. To me.) I'd been pulled into the role of Maid Mary Anne once before, and I hadn't liked it then. I didn't like it now, either. On the other hand, no one was asking me to clean up. No one even seemed to care.

As the week drew to an end, I felt tense, cranky, and if we'd been having a real circus, I would have been the people-eating tiger. I felt completely out of it. Dawn had turned into some kind of alien house-destroyer and takeout fiend. I missed my father, and the fact that he called every night didn't help. I'd asked him, casually, if there was any way that he could come home sooner.

He'd laughed. "I know my three girls are living a wild bachelor life. You can't fool me."

I'd laughed too. Weakly.

Dad had gone on, "I miss you. I'll get home as soon as possible."

"I miss you, too," I'd told him. After I'd hung up the phone, I scooped Tigger up and went to bed. Downstairs I heard Dawn and Sharon talking and laughing.

Tigger purred on the bed. At least he was happy, I thought.

I felt worse than ever. The next day couldn't come soon enough.

"What was I going to do? What..." Karen put her finger on her chin and tapped it thoughtfully. At any other time, I would have been amused. It was such an adult gesture, so clearly copied from someone else. I'd wondered if her father did it. Or her mother. Or her teacher.

Then she looked at me. "Oh, yes. Now I remember. I was going to do a real real circus trick. I'd like to work on my props, but I need someplace gigundoly private." circus trick. I'd like to work on my props, but I need someplace gigundoly private."

"I'll pull one of the smaller tables around to the other side of the big tree. How's that?" I asked.

"Fine, thank you," said Karen.

I got Karen settled. (She put her bulging backpack on the table in front of her, and waited pointedly until I walked away.) Then I rejoined Claudia. She and I were overseeing some of the campers who were putting finis.h.i.+ng touches on their costumes. The downs had tie-dyed and painted oversized old T-s.h.i.+rts and pants into gaudy, multicolored costumes. Some of them were painting old sneakers, too. The animal doctors and wild animals were securing tails on leotards and making lions' manes out of yarn and fabric sc.r.a.ps.

Out of the corner of my eye I could see Bobby and Chris practicing their high-board act with Kristy's help. From behind the barn I noticed Hannie sewing big white felt claws onto fuzzy fuzzy black gloves to make the paws of her bear costume. I heard Hannie say to Nancy, "It's too bad we can't have some real circus acts." black gloves to make the paws of her bear costume. I heard Hannie say to Nancy, "It's too bad we can't have some real circus acts."

"Yeah," said Nancy. "But this isn't a real circus camp, Hannie. Just a, just a ... you know." She shrugged her shoulders.

Claudia looked up. I could tell she was annoyed. But before she could say anything, Carolyn said, "This is a real camp. We're even going to have a cookout tomorrow night. It's fun. I like it."

"Don't you like this camp?" asked Becca.

"Well, sure. I guess. I mean..." Hannie's voice trailed off. She looked confused.

"Why don't you like this camp?" persisted Becca. "Just because you're not at circus camp doesn't mean you can't have fun at this camp. It's just a different camp, that's all."

Hannie said, "Maybe." She quickly bent over her paws again.

Claudia said, "Thank you, Becca, Carolyn."

"For what?" asked Becca. Carolyn looked puzzled.

"For being cool kids," said Claudia. "In fact, you are all cool kids. And we are going to have a one hundred percent cool circus. Okay?"

Nancy and Hannie looked up and exchanged glances. Then Nancy smiled. "Okay," she said.

"How are you doing, Alicia?" I asked softly, resting my hand on her shoulder.

. "Okay." Alicia barely even looked up from the special "camel decorations" she was gluing together. As it turned out, Alicia already had a camel costume from Halloween. But she was making new and beautiful circus accessories for her camel to wear in the wild animal act. Andrew and Claire were going to be lions and Jamie was going to be a tiger, but Alicia had insisted on being a camel.

Feeling oddly rejected, I wandered back toward Karen.

Immediately she gasped dramatically and flung her body across the prop on which she was working. "You can't see it yet! Go away!" she said.

"Fine," I snapped. It was a good thing Camp BSC was almost over for the week. Because I was clearly a candidate for the crankiest camper award.

After Camp BSC was finished for the day, Dawn said, "Let's hang out on the steps for awhile."

I shook my head. "I'm kind of tired."

I went to my room (trying to ignore the chaos I pa.s.sed) and closed my door and lay on my bed. I stayed there until Sharon came home and it was time for dinner.

"Only one more day to go in the work week," she sang as I walked into the kitchen. "Let's do something extravagant."

"Clean the kitchen?" I muttered.

Dawn heard me and gave me a puzzled look, but Sharon didn't. "We'll order take-out and since we're using the good china and the good silver, we'll light candles and get out the fancy tablecloth and everything."

"Great idea," idea," said Dawn. "Can we have pizza again?" said Dawn. "Can we have pizza again?"

"Pizza it is - unless... Mary Anne, what' would you like?"

Q/l "Go on and order pizza," I pizza," I said. "Whatever." said. "Whatever."

I took some hamburger out of the freezer (my father called it the Spier emergency hamburger stash). I thawed it in the microwave. I made a salad.

The pizza arrived and Sharon dashed to the door and dashed back again, holding it aloft.

"Mmm," said Dawn. "This is great. Pizza twice in one week. A person can never have too much pizza." pizza."

"Maybe," I said.

Dawn looked at my hamburger and said, "Maybe so." She grinned. "I'll snag the ketchup and mustard out of the fridge and put it on the table for you."

When I carried my hamburger and salad into the dining room, the candles were lit and the tablecloth was spread and the good china and silver were set out. It looked very elegant - except for the large pizza with olives, mushrooms, green peppers, onions, eggplant, and garlic in the middle of the table.

Sharon and Dawn cut huge slices and then Sharon raised her slice up. "Here's to the bachelor girls," she said. "And to the magical question no bachelor girl should ever forget."

Then she and Dawn said in unison, "Do you deliver?"

They cracked up. I raised a forkful of salad in a sort of toast, too, so I wouldn't seem like a spoilsport.

But my heart wasn't in it.

Not that anyone noticed. Or cared.

Chapter 9.

The Camp BSC cookout for all campers ages seven and up was a success from the moment it was mentioned. Whether the kids were SMSers or SESers, "real" circus camp graduates or beginners, they all stayed on after five-thirty for the cookout. A temporary camper had also joined the group: Jackie Rodowsky (the walking disaster). His parents had called the BSC to see if they could take on a babysitting job that night (the Rodowskys had been away on vacation). Of course the BSC had said yes. Jackie's good for a disaster or two on almost any occasion, but he's a super kid.

So with Jackie's help, the campers pitched in.- They enthusiastically dug a.shallow s.p.a.ce in the ground and cleared away the gra.s.s and anything that might catch fire around it. They helped look for twigs and small branches so the fire would start. They helped haul logs to put on top of the fire so it would burn longer.

They helped carry the cookout food to the table Dawn and I had pulled up near to where the campfire was going to be (Jackie dropped the napkins in the dirt but no one seemed to mind).

And they cheered when Sharon arrived home, because that meant that now the camp-fire could be lit and the cookout could begin.

The menu was pretty simple: hot dogs (tur- key dogs, actually, because Dawn wouldn't eat beef or pork hot dogs and the kids wouldn't notice the difference anyway), baked beans, coleslaw, and for dessert, s'mores.

"Do you tell good ghost stories?" Ricky asked Logan. Logan was sticking hot dogs onto skewers and showing the campers how to hold them over the fire.

"I do," said Logan. Then he wondered if the stories he was thinking of telling were maybe too scary. "Sort of," he added.

Ricky looked disappointed. "Do you believe in ghosts?"

"Wellll, not exactly," said Logan, not wanting to disappoint Ricky any further. "What about you?"

Ricky's eyes grew very big. "Yes!" he exclaimed.

"Ghosts are everywhere," everywhere," said Karen, taking a hot dog. She looked over her shoulder. "There are even ghosts who eat hot dogs!" said Karen, taking a hot dog. She looked over her shoulder. "There are even ghosts who eat hot dogs!"

"Not here there aren't," said Logan firmly. He'd encountered Karen's world-cla.s.s imagination before.

"But we are going to tell ghost stories, aren't we? You always tell ghost stories at camp," Jackie insisted. Jackie was slowly turning his hot dog into a blackened, bubbly mess that, to Logan's eyes, looked like something out of a ghost story. Or a horror film. Deciding that it might not not be a Jackie disaster in the making, Logan said, "Um, yeah, sure, Jackie." be a Jackie disaster in the making, Logan said, "Um, yeah, sure, Jackie."

"Of course we are," said Kristy. "We're a real camp. Real camps always have cookouts and they always have ghost stories at the cookout."

If Kristy was expecting a challenge from Karen or one of the other "real circus camp kids," she didn't get it. Everyone was busy concentrating on their hot dogs and not spilling too much coleslaw and baked beans around on the ground. Jackie ate his blackened hot dog and smacked his lips. "Mmmmm," he said. He gestured and baked beans flew off his plate.

"Too bad we couldn't bring Pow," said Nicky, looking at the coleslaw he'd just dumped off his own plate accidentally. "He's a great vacuum cleaner when you spill something."

"Noodle, too," said Hannie.

Charlotte shook her head. "Carrot won't eat anything until you tell him to."

"Shannon will steal food right off your plate when you aren't looking," David Michael told everyone proudly.

Kristy rolled her eyes.

Shannon (the person, not the dog) said, "Yes, Bernese mountain dogs are very smart.

That's why it's important to train them carefully."

Kristy rolled her eyes again, but she was grinning.

When all the campers had eaten their dinners and helped clear things away, it was time for games. It had been a long day and everyone had eaten a lot, so the games were easy, relatively quiet ones. Logan led a round of Simon Says. Then the campers and the counselors sat in a circle and played a game of Gossip. Claudia whispered a crazy sentence into Marilyn's ear, who was sitting next to her, who whispered it to the next person. When it came to Matt, Haley, who was sitting next to him, signed something quickly. Matt looked surprised, then laughed. He signed something to Jessi, who was sitting next to him on the other side.

"Really?" said Jessi. "Okay." She leaned over and whispered into David Michael's ear.

Of course, the sentence was completely twisted around by then. What Claudia had whispered was, "Hats are nice on sunny days." But the sentence ended up as "Cats like mice and bunnies, please."

Then Ricky said, "Ghost stories! Ghost stories!"

"It's not dark enough yet," objected Karen.

The longer summer day was still very bright. The sun was just beginning to go down.

Natalie looked nervously over her shoulder. "How dark is it supposed to be?"

"We'll tell the ghost stories in the barn," said Dawn, jumping up. "That way it will be dark, but it will still be light outside."

But first some of the campers insisted on putting on their pajamas which they had brought so they could pretend that the cook-out was a real real campout. They looked pretty cute, too. campout. They looked pretty cute, too.

As we headed for the barn, Karen cleared her throat loudly.

"What about the," Karen lowered her voice to a loud whisper, "Barn Ghost."

"It doesn't come out until after midnight," said Logan quickly. "That's hours from now. You'll be at home asleep. And," he added, antic.i.p.ating Karen's next comment, "the ghost can't follow you home. It can't leave the barn. It's only the ghost of a barn mouse, you see. A small mouse."

Giggling and talking, the campers went into the barn. Dawn and I had pulled out old blankets and sleeping bags and pillows to spread around on the hay in the barn, and the kids sat on those.

Logan sat next to me and nudged my shoul- der with his. I smiled. Having Logan near made me feel a little better, a little less lonely and left out. I knew he sensed that I wasn't feeling good about something. But I also knew he'd wait for me to tell him.

And I wasn't sure there was anything I could tell him.

Dawn lit a lantern and set it in the middle of the ring of campers while Kristy slid the barn door almost shut.

Immediately the barn grew much darker.