Chapter 5. In Which Seeing Visions of My Enemy Makes Me Debate Getting on Medication
IN WHICH SEEING VISIONS OF MY ENEMY MAKES ME DEBATE GETTING ON MEDICATION
Brassy staccato notes blast through the windows.
I jolt upright in my bed and flick a panicked look both ways. The sunrise peeks through the window curtains over my top bunk. I squint at the digital clock in my cubby.
“Rise and shine, it’s a brand-new day!” Felix sing-speaks over the obnoxious brass melody drifting from cabin to cabin.
There must be a real trumpet player out there.
Bugle? Either way, it’s playing “Reveille,” which should be reserved for Navy heroes.
Not us. “Time for morning announcements on the courts, hooray!”
“This is a daily thing?” I ask groggily, patting down my bed head. The second of Mom and Dad’s Seven Deadly Distractions is sleep deprivation. Already, that’s being challenged.
Felix slides open the privacy curtains dividing the boys’ and girls’ sides of the room, and he faces me.
His own freshly-slept-on ponytail sticks up like a badminton birdie, and he holds that round gold contraption again—definitely a pocket watch, inscribed with Old Haven on the clasp. “Of course. It’s camp.”
Moans of pain and suffering come from the other mattresses.
Last night, when I returned from the porch, only Felix was awake.
After I showered off the plane, he handed me a map and a schedule of our weekly labs, study hours, and camp-approved events.
Felix claimed these events are “fun-filled activities” that the mentors organize, like canoeing in Lake River or eating s’mores and drinking apple cider around bonfires.
More distractions I will not be touching.
He also took my phone, which mentors indeed keep locked away, and replaced it with a gold Old Haven watch.
It’s not like I need social media. It’s one of Mom and Dad’s non-permitted distractions.
When the news discovered I was transitioning at sixteen, we gained more than we lost, thanks to the free publicity and those who came in droves to support us.
Now most customers don’t know or remember.
But back then, the comments on our company’s official social media pages were a disaster.
If I’d had my own accounts, I could’ve seen things I didn’t need to.
But no messages from Mom and Dad for weeks on an isolated island? I won’t know how my video impacts Prince List. How it changes my future.
Exhaustion begs me to close my eyes at the reminder. I finally slept last night, but not nearly enough after the last few days I’ve endured.
Still, I push through, sliding off my top bunk, and wait for instructions. The brAIN Wars are intensive, and we can’t afford one second of slowness if we want to win. I look to my cabinmates, expecting them to be up as well.
Christiana pulls a pillow over her head. Jade still snores. The boy beneath me is turned toward the wall, covered in sheets, too.
How? Don’t they know what’s at stake?
One by one, Felix shakes each body-shaped lump. “Stretch your arms and feel your toes,” he sings. “A brand-new day is here, let’s go!”
As the three start to get up, albeit like zombies, I use the time to grab one of the pre-folded outfits I stacked inside my cubby last night. Then I head to the sinks and stalls at the back.
“Ro-ry,” Felix sings. He’s by the door now. “Time to go.”
The rest of my cabinmates join him. They’re still in their pajamas.
“Without getting dressed?” I ask, almost in shock.
“It’s not like you’re naked.”
I feel like I am. In fact, I would rather be naked than wear this bright orange Bay Academy spirit day shirt in public.
Which is not color-palette approved. Mom tried to convince Madeline Corrêa-Sparling to toss it back when she replaced my wardrobe with the men’s section, but I had too much pride over being accepted into one of the most competitive middle schools in New York City.
Now I have no pride. Negative pride.
“Coming,” I say, but I still reach for my contacts case. Maybe I don’t have time for one of my approved outfits, but there’s no way I’m revealing my backup glasses that turn my eyes into beady little dots to a whole camp. I pop in the first lens.
“Rory,” Felix calls again. Less melodic this time. More forceful.
Groaning, I set down the case and begrudgingly join them. Being legally blind in one eye is better than the alternative. Felix keeps serenading us about today being brand-new and beautiful as he leads us out the door for announcements.
As we step out onto the porch, we come to an abrupt stop.
A bunk bed is balanced precariously atop Cabin Delta, three doors down from our own. A camper sits on the mattress in plaid pajama pants and a T-shirt. He beholds the woods with an equal amount of confusion.
The other campers encircling the cabin whisper and laugh.
I squint with my one usable eye. Despite its flat wood base, the bed balances upon the triangular roof.
Physics dictates that if two individual forces are of equal magnitude and moving in opposite directions, then the forces are balanced.
But pulling that off would take days’ worth of force equations.
Add the challenge of keeping a camper asleep until the bed’s on the roof, and this becomes nearly impossible.
Unless the person doing the work was Luca. His genius brain could figure it out.
The person I saw in the bushes. He was heading toward Cabin Delta.
“Campers,” a voice booms farther down the path. A young Black man with deep brown skin, showing us a firm frown. His megaphone labels him as someone with much more power than us. “Report to announcements. Now.”
With that, we’re all shuffled into “the courts,” as Felix puts it—three rows of tennis courts that reside deeper in the woods.
Each cabin stands in an assigned spot marked by a sign, forcing us to line up like cadets within it.
Being woken up by a bugle every morning at 5:45 a.m. is more fitting than I thought.
Mentors and administrative staff in brAIN-branded sweatshirts and windbreakers stand before us, arms crossed and frowns prominent. A chilly breeze blows from the lake, and the overcast sky threatens to break into a drizzle any moment.
“Already?” the man with the megaphone says, standing at the center of the other mentors, next to Felix. His hair is short—a twist out and a grown-out fade—and his jean jacket has an interior rainbow flag print, only visible due to his collar being popped.
The campers around me remain still in their charged silence. Gazes guiltily point downward. As if they understand what this means.
I should search for more answers in their body language—learn as much as I can about brAIN and how it operates to gain an upper hand—but I’m wearing pajamas in public for the first time.
Specifically, an orange shirt that clashes with my cool winter palette and must be making my personal stylist sense a shift in the wind.
How can I care about anything else? The need to hastily depart each morning without a properly coordinated outfit was not mentioned in Dad’s spiel.
Even a few millimeters of deviation could reflect poorly on Prince List.
Then, of course, there’s the other issue invading my mind.
Shutting my blurry contact-less eye, I scan the heads around me and swipe over anyone who doesn’t have dark brown hair or a strong hockey-player build. If I am going to spot Luca, now would be the time.
“Since brAIN’s founding in 1974, we’ve endured an annually recurring issue of our students sabotaging one another,” the man goes on into his megaphone.
“Still, we are shocked and disappointed today. This year, we’ve accepted some of the most impressive minds in the nation to date.
Yet you still succumb to this behavior?”
“He doesn’t even know about what happened in Cabin Iota,” someone whispers behind me. “Imagine if he did.”
I glance over my shoulder.
A girl and a boy from the Cabin Epsilon section, who are both tall and sculpted in the way kids with notoriety typically are. Neither is Luca.
“What happened?” the girl asks.
“Bucket over the door,” the boy says. “Someone wrote Dihydrogen monoxide, from Sir Isaac Newton, with love on the side. Knocked Theodore Roosevelt’s great-great-great-grandson unconscious.”
The girl shakes her head. “I’d rather be on a roof than get a concussion.”
“Things will only get worse. We have the whole Shared Instrumentation Facility at our disposal.”
Tension settles in my chest. I already knew brAIN was referred to as a war. But I assumed that was solely due to the intensive studying and fierce academic competition. Are campers harming one another? Just for slightly better odds at winning the Medal?
“Going forward, anyone who is caught engaging in this behavior may be sent home at our discretion,” the mentor says into his megaphone, his voice deep and severe. “Understand?”
The courts stay silent.
“Good.” Like a switch has been flipped, the man’s frown transforms into a smile.
He pulls out a sheet of scrap paper from his front jacket pocket.
“With that, good morning,” he reads off the paper.
“As a reminder, I’m Jameson, the leader of the mentor committee.
We’re eager for the forty-eight of you, experts representing your related fields, to start your first of four laboratory weeks conducted with faculty.
This research will contribute to objectives spanning nearly all science, technology, engineering, and math. ”
A few other mentors nod in supportive agreement.
“The laboratories you will attend and be tested on will change. Each Monday, you will be sent that week’s laboratory topic to circumvent precursory preparation.
It is your responsibility to check it. As for the tests, you will compete against one another in a no-elimination bracket.
In an elimination bracket, one loss would expel you from the competition.
In this case, however, your total wins and losses will be cumulated to determine a final score. ”
A bracket. As if this is a sports game. If Luca is here, then I bet he feels right at home.
I absolutely do not.
“Those who belong to the two top-scoring cabins will go head-to-head as individuals in our Medal of Victory contest in week five,” Jameson says.
“They will apply the knowledge that was gained here to create proposals that could change the world. The winner will receive acceptance and a full ride to an Ivy League of their choice along with the renowned Medal.”
Jade lets out a woo beside me.
Others follow suit.
All I can think about is Luca. If he’s here, and if I’ll have to go up against him, and if the panic that’s invading my soul is based in reality.
Fighting the blurry vision from my contact-less eye, I squint into the crowd again. I still don’t spot him.
“Tomorrow is test one,” Jameson continues.
“It covers the fundamentals that campers should know as experts in their fields. Calculus one and two, physics one and two, organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, general biochemistry, and differential equations. Today, it is imperative that cabins study and learn more about one another’s strengths so that you can seamlessly divide up the questions.
” He looks up from his paper. I think. “Otherwise, you will not have enough time to complete the test, and you will fail.”
My mouth twists. Is one day enough for me and my cabinmates to figure out how to work together?
“You will all report to the Commons to take the test at the same time,” Jameson continues.
“Your scores, however, will only be placed against those in your bracket. This week’s bracket is as follows: Gamma versus Delta versus Beta.
Alpha versus Epsilon versus Kappa. Chi versus Zeta versus Lambda.
Lastly, Iota versus Theta versus Omega.”
Iota and Theta. Those are the two teams I’m up against.
I glance around the courts. Where and who could they be?
Jameson points down the path leading back to the cabins. “During your study hours, facilities are off-limits, as this test aims to test your current knowledge. You will meet in your cabins under the guidance of your mentors.” He shoves away his paper. “Questions?”
“What if we feel confident already?” asks someone who must be far away because I barely hear it. “Do we still have to study?”
I follow the voice toward the opposite side of the courts, where one boy raises his hand.
A hand covered in gold rings.
My heart stops. My gaze drifts down to the face.
The boy I’ve been searching for, with those millions of freckles dotting his tan skin. His round apple cheeks that contrast so starkly with his prominent, strong jawline.
His overconfident, wide-and-bright grin that I could pick out in the darkest of nights.