Chapter 5 You Don’t Have to Do Everything on Your Own #2
By the end of practice, a blush colors my cheeks, both because of the workout and from how embarrassed I am to know so little about this sport. At least I’m a little less horrible at this whole thing now, but let’s just say that doesn’t mean a whole lot.
“Great work, everyone!” Gigi says, after which I internally grumble that she’s a liar. I ignore my thoughts and focus on what she says after that. “We’ll have lunch in thirty minutes, which means you get a little break!”
We walk back to the cabins, and I can already imagine what it would feel like to throw myself onto my mattress. It would sink a little, almost like a hug for my tired body. A hug that I really, really need right now.
Luckily there are only a few more steps separating me from my bed, I think.
But then Gigi walks up to me. “Hey, can we talk for a minute?”
I knew I wasn’t going to be good at this whole beach volleyball thing, but I didn’t think I’d be bad enough to need an intervention on the first day. I didn’t even know it was possible to be that bad at a summer camp, but I must’ve broken some kind of record for sucking at volleyball.
I’ll see it as an achievement, I guess.
“You can sit down if you want to,” Gigi tells me, shutting the door behind her. The inside of her cabin is pretty much the same as the one I share with Sierra, Sloane, and Veronica, except for the fact that Gigi has this room all to herself.
Still, I take it in. She has certainly made herself at home here.
The little shelf above the desk is filled with books, all their spines in different bright colors, and there are some pictures scattered through the room, too.
One of them catches my eye, showing a younger Gigi pressing a kiss to a freckled, redheaded girl’s cheek.
Behind them is a sign that reads, in huge block letters, Welcome to Summer Camp 2019!
I tear my gaze away, feeling like I’m intruding.
“So,” Gigi starts once we’re both seated, either not noticing or not caring what I was looking at. She leans toward me a little bit. “You go by Ellie, right?”
I try to ignore the way my heart hammers in my throat. Can she send someone home? “Yes, I do.”
She nods to herself. “Okay.” Then a smile. “How are you doing, Ellie?”
I can’t even hide my confusion. I blink, then blink again, and again, and again. I expected a lot of questions, but that was not one of them.
Before I get to think of a response, Gigi blinks back at me. “Wait,” she says, “you thought something bad was going on, didn’t you? I really tried my best to not give off that vibe, but I’m so sorry if I scared you anyway!”
A little weight falls off my shoulders…until I realize I don’t have a clue what else I could be here for. If there was bad news from back home, Gigi would’ve asked Noah to come with me, too, right?
I swallow. “It’s totally okay, but, um…why am I here, then?” I ask.
Gigi smiles at me. “To answer my question, of course,” she tells me, as if that clears anything up.
Luckily, after a beat, she adds, “I know we don’t know each other yet, so this might be considered weird, but I just wanted to check up on you.
You’re autistic, right? I was an autistic sixteen-year-old at summer camp once, too, so I get how overwhelming and lonely things can feel here, especially at the start. ”
My first thought is a panicked What gave away that I’m autistic? Does she think I’m weird? But then I realize it must be mentioned in my file or something.
I study Gigi for a second. I don’t mean this in the “she doesn’t look autistic” way, but I never would’ve guessed she is.
She appears so genuinely happy and confident.
Ever since I got diagnosed a year ago, I’ve been associating autism with having to be quiet and careful.
To me, autism is something that means I have to constantly walk on eggshells to still be considered worthy.
But Gigi looks like she’s just living her life, and she’s still autistic. I like her vibe, and so do other campers, it seems. So why do I keep letting being autistic hold me back when I can own it instead? Like her?
I shift in the chair I’m sitting on, straightening my back and trying the words out loud, this time with intent. “Um, yes, I’m autistic. It’s really nice of you to check in with me. I’ve…been better, to be completely honest.”
I haven’t stopped to think about how I’ve been handling things since the party, since the night everything blew up.
I let myself be upset and scared for a few seconds, and then as soon as I came up with my plan, I focused on that instead.
But now, I can feel it again. All those messy emotions.
The fear that Daniel was right. The anger directed at him for barely even apologizing to me.
The pain from holding the sharp shards of my heart together when all I want is to let myself fall apart just this once.
Instead of ranting about my life back home, the thing I tell Gigi is “I’m kind of scared I’m holding Sierra back. She’s really good at this whole thing, and I’m, well, not.”
Gigi nods to herself, considering what I’m saying. “I get why you feel that way—especially since Sierra has a lot more experience with this—but I think it will turn out just fine.” She grins. “After all, you were paired together for a reason.”
“Wait.” I lean a little closer to her, curiosity getting the best of me. “What’s the reason?”
“We think you’ll work well together.”
“Can you be a little less vague in your answer?”
Gigi’s smile grows again. “No, I cannot. But I’m sure you’ll see why we think you two will make such a good team soon enough.
” She leans back in her chair, studying me.
“If there’s something else you want to talk about, though, do let me know.
Like I said, SMASH! can feel lonely and overwhelming, but I promise you’ll find your place here soon.
So? Anything you still want to discuss?”
I shake my head, and she nods.
“I’ll see you at lunch, then?”
“Okay, see you in a bit,” I say, getting up from the chair, then turning my back to her. My hand is on the doorknob when I realize something.
“Actually, there might be one thing I want to ask you,” I tell Gigi, spinning around to look at her.
She nods again, so I go on. “You seem to be so confident in who you are. How do I do that?” I break our eye contact.
“I just mean…I’m having a hard time not caring about what other people think of me.
You know, with all my autistic traits. How do you stop caring so much that you start to suffocate yourself? ”
I kind of expect her to look at me like I asked her what the square root of 729 is, but Gigi doesn’t even have to think over her answer.
“It’s really hard sometimes, but I guess that, for me, it started with letting in one person who didn’t judge me.
They saw so many parts of me I was ashamed of, and then they showed me that…
that maybe, it doesn’t really matter if some people think of me as wrong, undeserving, or broken.
Because I also have people who see me for who I really am—people including myself.
That’s what’s most important to me now.” She purses her lips for a second, thinking it over. “Does that answer your question?”
I nod slowly, still processing her words. “It does. Thanks.”
Her smile returns again, and I decide right then and there that if there were ever a movie in which the sun is played by a human, my dream casting would be Gigi. Lighting up a room sounded unrealistic until right now.
“Good,” she says. “Now get out of here! Go enjoy the rest of this break!”
“Will do,” I tell her right before I throw open the door to her cabin…and collide with a whole human being in the process. I only just manage to keep my balance by grabbing the person’s shoulder.
“I’m so sorry, I wasn’t—” I start to say, but then I realize it’s Sierra Levine steadying me and my apology becomes the last thing on my mind.
I let go of her, tensing. “Did you hear any of that?”
To my relief, she immediately shakes her head, frowning. “No, I wasn’t eavesdropping or anything. I was just waiting for you to come out.”
“Oh.” I clear my throat. “Well. Here I am.” I let out a nervous laugh, then follow Sierra as she starts walking. I rub some of the remaining sand off my arms, shivering at the sensation like I always do.
Sierra looks over at me. “You’re really not a fan of sand, are you?”
“Is anyone?” I ask with another laugh, thinking that I’ve asked a rhetorical question. But Sierra tilts her head slightly, studying me with suspicion.
“We’re at a beach volleyball camp,” she points out.
I press my lips together. “Right.”
For a moment, a silence stretches out between us. Then: “So…why are you here?”
I stop walking and turn to her, my mouth opening, but no sound comes out for a few seconds. “What? Sierra, you were literally waiting for me outside…” I manage to say eventually.
“No, I meant what are you doing here. At camp,” she explains calmly.
Patiently. No judgment for me misunderstanding her words.
“Most of the time, people are either here to play beach volleyball or to have a fun summer camp experience with friends. I assumed you’d be here for the friendship part, but you’re kind of…
hard to read. Anyway, if you’re actually here to play beach volleyball, I can help you practice,” she offers.
As helpful as extra practices would probably be, I don’t have time for them. I have to focus on my plan, after all.
“Thanks,” I tell Sierra, “but as you said, I kind of dislike sand. So yes, definitely here for the friends part.”
She takes me in then, considering. “Oh, okay. I just thought, since you’ve been pretty quiet…”
She trails off, and I stare at her, my lips parted a little as I’m at a loss for words. Did she…did she study me?
Upon seeing my expression, Sierra closes her eyes a second too long for me to consider it blinking. “Damn, I worded that awfully, sorry.”
I shrug. It might’ve been a very direct statement, but that doesn’t mean I see it as rude, especially not since she made a point with her observations, which I admit to her: “I guess I’m just not good at making friends.”
For a second, I think she’s going to sigh and say she knows what that feels like. Maybe Liam and Maya were wrong about her, I think. Maybe she really does want to make friends here, but she’s just scared or insecure or simply doesn’t know where to start.
For a second, I really do think Sierra is going to turn out to be just like me, but then she says, “Fair, I guess. I’m sure it’ll turn out fine. Anyway, I stayed back to ask if you’re open to doing those extra beach volleyball practices with me.”
I don’t even have to think about my answer to that. “Why would I willingly do that? Again, I don’t even like sand. Let alone rolling around in it in hopes of not allowing some silly ball to drop.”
“First of all, that’s not what beach volleyball is about.”
The corners of my mouth tug upward slightly. “Except it kind of is,” I tease her, which she decides to ignore.
“We’d be practicing extra so we can win the competition at the end of camp, which, no offense, wouldn’t be possible with your current…skills.”
“No offense taken,” I say, because it’s not mean, just true. But why do we want to win so bad? I almost ask her, but then I realize that maybe it’s a given for Sierra. She loves beach volleyball and wants to win this, so she’s going to find a way to make that happen. End of story.
“Okay. Sure. I’ll do it,” I let her know, and even though she doesn’t smile, her face lights up just a little bit. Like one cloud disappearing only to reveal it’s still too misty for the sun to shine through.
“But,” I add, “I would need you to do something for me, too.”
She shrugs. “Sure, I guess that’s fair. What do you want?”
I take a deep breath, thinking about what Gigi told me.
All I need is to find one person who definitely won’t judge me until I’m brave enough to open up to others, too.
One person who I know I can’t mess up around because there’s no actual friendship at stake—because we’re nothing more than two people helping each other out.
I meet Sierra Levine’s eyes. “I need you to teach me how to be myself again,” I say.
She looks at me like I’ve just demanded she kiss me on the mouth. “I barely know you, Eleanore.”
“I know, that’s why this is so perfect!” I exclaim, which only makes Sierra’s frown deepen.
I clear my throat, toning my enthusiasm down a bit.
“All you need to do is talk to me until I learn to stop caring about what others say or think of me. I have a step-by-step list of things I need to learn this summer,” I tell her.
“Oh. Um, yeah, I can definitely do that,” she assures me. “So…we have a deal then?” she asks, arms crossed over her chest.
Immediately I offer her my hand, and after looking at it for a few seconds, Sierra shakes it. Her hand is warm, softer than I expected. Excitement fills me as we stand there, our hands meeting in the middle—because now my plan could finally start working.
I smile without even thinking about it. “Deal.”