Chapter Two
Crap. Crap, crap, crap.
“Whose car is that?” Kristen asks as she pulls into the end of my driveway. A hauntingly familiar yellow Fiat is parked behind my parents’ cars.
“Probably one of my parents’ friends,” I lie, not even having to think about it. There’s no way to twist or omit the truth about this car and everything that its presence here could mean. I snatch my purse and make sure I have my phone. “Thanks for the ride; I’m glad we got to catch up.”
I hop out of the front seat, not wanting to test my luck. I’ve never lied to Kristen before, nor kept secrets. But in this moment, I feel the tiny remnants of my composure slipping away.
Kristen waves before backing out onto the street. It isn’t until she drives off that I take a breath.
Mrs. Patricia, proprietor of Hauntingly Familiar Fiat, happens to be the director of Camp Refuge and a member of our church.
Until a few weeks ago, she was this figurehead who spent most of the day in the administrative office in the building at the camp’s entrance.
After Hannah and I were found together, Mrs. Patricia became someone I feared even more than God.
Our church is full of old people who treat you like you’re their own kid.
They yell at you when they catch you doing something wrong, grab you by your arm, and drag you over to your parents’ pew themselves, where they whisper-scream your crimes, even during the sermon.
And the worst part is that there is no age when you outgrow this…
well, maybe once you have children of your own or you’re so old that your parents are dead.
Either way, there was a precedent set by my church that Mrs. Patricia would call up my parents and tell them what I’d done, or was, or—whatever.
That she’d say I sinned and sensationalize what happened, which was just a kiss for Christ’s sake.
Somehow, the counselors who found us knew that our kiss was not the first, and it wasn’t a fluke.
Or maybe they assumed and started spreading rumors that were on the nose.
I mean, it would be my luck that the time someone spreads church gossip about me it’s actually true.
I was so scared. At first I was scared because I didn’t think I was gay.
I didn’t necessarily want to be gay—I mean, I’m not gay.
I just like—I mean, liked—Hannah. I also know that in my experience, Christians, especially old-school Baptists, don’t take so nicely to the idea of someone being gay, and I didn’t want my parents to know.
More than anything, I was embarrassed and had barely processed my own feelings, let alone thought about processing them with anyone other than Hannah.
But the situation got worse from there and the incident became the Incident.
I had to avoid Hannah for the last week of camp just to save face. I even blocked her number.
Usually when a piece of church gossip starts, it floats from pew to pew and everyone has some whispered-down-the-lane idea of what’s going on in someone else’s life that’s none of their business.
And then, since we all only see one another once a week, it takes a minute for all the details to circulate and for everyone to know the tea.
Now, imagine that, but among a bunch of high school seniors living in nearby cabins with nothing better to do after a day of watching children pray.
Seriously, though, it’s amazing how the counselors had one another’s backs when some of them were hooking up in the woods after night swimming; but the second two girls developed a deeper, meaningful relationship, it’s like they all turned into preschoolers with a tattling problem.
Most of the counselors avoided Hannah and me.
Yasmin, for some reason, took the news incredibly hard.
She’d rush her campers away whenever I came near.
She even cried and left our group session at the end of that week.
She told me she was sad that I was going to hell.
Not only that, but she couldn’t imagine me, the same four-year-old who used to color in angel pictures during Sunshine Saints with her, doing “unspeakable acts.” I mean, if the girl I used to share Eggo waffles with is so deeply affected by this, I don’t even want to begin to imagine how the truth might hurt my parents.
Plus, it’s not like anyone knew the whole truth. And still, the world imploded.
My world imploded.
Then, I had my one-on-one with Mrs. Patricia.
I tried to recover by telling her that I repented and recognized my sin and would change my ways, all the stuff I learned in Bible study.
I begged her not to tell my parents. I admit, in that moment, I don’t know if I believed everything I said.
I still don’t know. But I knew that I would do anything to make the mess go away, to have it not change my life at home the way it changed everything at camp.
Don’t get me wrong, lying at Christian summer camp was not my best move.
But, I guess, neither was kissing a girl.
Mrs. Patricia said she wasn’t going to call my parents; she said she would even manage the other counselors—whatever that meant.
She figured that since I’m nearly an adult, the situation ought to be handled as such.
But now that she’s at my house, I realize she didn’t promise anything.
She said she wouldn’t call, but she didn’t say anything about paying us a lovely visit.
And on the same freaking day that we all came home!
I knew that she and my parents would face each other at some point; I was just hoping it would happen on a Sunday morning at church and—Lord willing—when I was out of sight and out of mind.
As I walk up my driveway, I try to predict the different ways this is going to go.
It hurts to think Mrs. Patricia would do this to me.
Am I going to walk in with everyone in the living room waiting to have an intervention and ship me off to Christian “therapy” camp?
Mom is crying, Dad turns to face the wall because he’s so disgusted with me, and Mrs. Patricia just looks me in the eye, shaking her head with disapproval?
Or worse, I walk inside and immediately have to turn around because I’m being disowned?
That already happened to someone at our church, back when I was in middle school.
I would rather my parents think something was wrong with me than get rid of me. Well, I mean, I would rather it not matter at all, but I figure that might be too much to ask for.
I skirt along the side of the house, noting that the front door is open and once I step into the frame, they will see me from almost anywhere on the first floor.
I decide to go in through the garage and stop to press my ear to the door to make sure they aren’t in the living room.
I brace myself, taking a deep breath, before twisting the knob as slowly and quietly as I can.
Inside, I hear voices echoing from the other side of the house, our kitchen. There isn’t any crying or yelling, no gasps of disbelief. They’re laughing, Dad’s full-belly cackle making the walls vibrate.
“Hello?” I call, not wanting to startle anyone.
I peer around the kitchen doorway and see Mom and Mrs. Patricia sitting at the kitchen table. Mom is still dressed in the clothes she had on when they picked me up from camp earlier. Dad has changed into basketball shorts and a T-shirt and is sporting his World’s Greatest Dad apron.
Even though the smells of coriander and clove are intoxicating, a knot of fear twists in my stomach.
“Oh, my eyes can see, now that I have my sweet Clarity,” Dad sings, raising his spatula like a sword. His little chant makes me cringe every time, but I can’t live without it.
“Hey, guys,” I say, trying not to stare too hard at Mrs. Patricia’s face. I don’t see guilt, or disapproval. At least, not yet.
“Hey, sweetie, how are you? Did you have fun with Kristen?” Mom asks. She reaches around to pull out the chair next to her.
I tentatively take a seat, trying to act natural. “It was cool. We caught up and got ice cream,” I say, reminding myself to smile.
That “Don’t Be Suspicious, Don’t Be Suspicious” TikTok plays over and over in my head.
“Great,” Mom says, beaming. The gloss on her lips shimmers under the kitchen lights, making her smile seem almost unreal. “Tomorrow is the start of senior year,” she tells Mrs. Patricia.
“You can’t tell,” Dad teases, using the end of his apron to dab sweat off his brow. “Sometimes I think we are more excited than Clarity is.”
“I’m excited,” I assure them. It just might not show because I’m painfully nervous right now.
“Well that’s good, and hopefully my proposition only makes this year even better,” Mrs. Patricia says, looking at Mom first and then me.
“A proposition?” I search Mrs. Patricia’s brown eyes for a hint. She too is still wearing her clothes from this morning: a pink Camp Refuge T-shirt and jean shorts, or jorts, as Kristen calls them. She looks too casual to ruin someone’s entire life.
“Yes,” Dad says, holding up his spatula again, only this time it’s signaling to hold on. He puts a lid on the cast-iron skillet, stopping the steady flow of fragrant steam, and comes over to sit down next to Mrs. Patricia.
“I’m here to offer you a position as my assistant Sunday school teacher,” Mrs. Patricia says. She stares at me while I try to sus out what’s going on in her head.
She wants me, the girl all the other counselors exiled, to come teach the Sunshine Saints with her?
“Really?” I ask, instead of saying the first thought that comes to mind.
Which is NO.
“Yes, Patricia was telling us how well Camp Refuge went this summer. She said it was one of the best years yet,” Mom explains, her pride practically flowing out of her like a windstorm.