16. Miller
When Becca’s eyes go wide and she lets out a gasp, I forget what I was about to ask her. I follow her line of sight. I’m not fast enough to see how it happened, but it’s pretty clear from the aftermath.
The kickball bounces sadly on the field, while Maya sits on the ground, the other girls rushing to her as she holds her hand to her face. Even from this far away, I can see the blood seeping through her fingers.
My stomach drops. Maya is in one of the classes I’m teaching in the Nature department, and she’s the sweetest kid. She reminds me of my brother when he was younger.
“Maya!” Becca rushes toward her.
I run a hand down my face. This is not going well. I should have been out there with my campers. I could have blocked the ball, maybe.
My campers are all over the place, as are the girls. Two of the boys have followed Dave toward the injured camper. Five of them are shifting from foot to foot in their spots on the field, looking like they don’t know what to do with themselves, and Liam is still standing in his position between first and second base.
From the guilty look on his face, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that he must have been the one to throw the ball.
A few of Becca’s campers are still on the sidelines, staring at the scene and talking in hushed voices. The one blonde—Lena—who kicked the ball toward Liam is hesitantly making her way to first base, looking uncertain about whether she should finish her run or stop.
“Okay,” I say, putting my serious voice on and raising the volume. “Fireflies 2, Ladybugs 2, all you guys over here. Sit in a circle.” I point to the ground by my feet.
Dave gives me a nod and says something to the two boys closest to him. Caleb and Oliver come scampering back toward me.
“Did you see that?” Caleb asks, his eyes huge as he reaches us.
I shake my head. “I didn’t see the whole thing.” Because I was busy flirting instead of keeping you guys safe, I think.
“Liam threw the ball right into Maya’s face!”
I could have guessed that from the look on Liam’s face. He’s still frozen in place on the field. “You boys sit here. I’m going to see if Liam is okay. The other counselors are good with Maya for right now.”
The campers sit in a group, actually listening for a change as I make my way to the center of the field where most of the commotion is happening. Dave, Becca, and Vivien might be handling things, but they’re not exactly good with things for now, at least not all of them. There’s a lot of freaking out happening.
As I get closer, I can hear Vivien’s animated voice talking about stitches and emergency rooms. Dave is practically hyperventilating, pacing back and forth.
Becca, however, is the picture of calm. She’s focused solely on Maya and has managed to calm her down, too. The two are sitting cross-legged in the grass while Dave and Vivien pace around them.
I pass Lena, pausing to nod toward the seated campers. “Go ahead and sit with the other kids, okay? We’ll get back to the game in a bit.”
She scurries off without a word.
Liam looks to be on the verge of tears when I reach the spot between first and second base where he’s standing, his chin quivering. I sling an arm around his shoulders as I stop next to him.
“I didn’t mean to, honest,” he says in a small voice.
“I know you didn’t, bud.” I ruffle his hair. “You’re not in trouble. Accidents happen, and she’s going to be fine. I’m going to go help calm things down, okay? Are you good to go sit with your buddies?”
He gives me a nod, and I let him go. I’m sure we’ll have to talk more about this later; he strikes me as a sensitive kid who’ll feel bad about hitting another camper, even by accident.
“How’re you doing?” I crouch next to Becca, my hand on her shoulder as I size up the situation. Maya’s nose is bleeding pretty profusely, the red fluid dripping onto the grass.
“We’re fine,” Becca says, her tone clipped.
I ignore the attitude and pull off my t-shirt. “Here you go. Hold this against your nose, okay?” I ball it up and pass it to Maya.
“I said we’re fine,” Becca says, glaring, like I took off my shirt just to show off my abs.
I mean, my abs are pretty nice, if I do say so myself. I work hard for my six-pack. And if she wants to look, I’m not going to stop her. But this time I really did take my shirt off for altruistic reasons.
Maya needs something to absorb the bleeding, and it’s not like Becca can take her shirt off.
I mean, I wouldn’t complain if she did. I’ve seen her in a bathing suit, and it only has me itching to see more. She has the perfect round, soft body, her tits lush. I’d give anything to explore every inch of her with my fingers, my tongue, my—
“Are you going to do something or just pose?” Becca looks like she wants to murder me. Can she hear what I’m thinking?
I do my best to put thoughts of Becca’s body out of my head and focus on the situation we have here. “Dave, Vivien, can you guys get the campers involved in something? I’m going to help Becca take Maya to the infirmary.” I glance back at Becca, who still looks like she wants to incinerate me with her glare.
Unfortunately for her, I actually was paying attention during staff training. We’re not supposed to be one-on-one with campers. So, she needs someone else to go with her to take Maya to the nurse. And lucky for her, I’m ready and willing to help. Plus, I want my shirt back.
But then I look at the cloth that Maya’s clenching to her nose, blood already seeping through. On second thought, maybe we’ll just throw that in the trash.
* * *
“What’s going on?” The camp nurse, a motherly fifty-something named Deb, holds the door open for us to enter the infirmary, her brows creased in concern.
“Bloody nose,” Becca says, at the same time as I say, “Kickball injury.”
Deb nods, glancing down at Maya. “I see. And who do we have here?”
The little girl pulls the bloodied shirt away from her face, grinning. “I’m Maya. I’m okay.” A single drip of blood escapes from one nostril, rolling down her face.
As the shock of being hit in the face has worn off, she’s perked up, even laughing at my jokes on the way to the infirmary.
At least someone thinks I’m funny.
“Well, glad to hear that, Maya. Let’s come in here and I’ll get you an ice pack, okay? You two, stay here.” Deb ushers Maya into a back room and closes the door, effectively dismissing us.
I slide into a chair, while Becca crosses her arms over her chest and leans against a wall. I wait for her to say something, but all that fills the space are her sighs.
“Hey. She’s going to be fine,” I assure her. I’m not sure that’s what’s on Becca’s mind, but I have to say something. “And she’s going to come through this with a smile on her face. She’s like my brother. He has Down Syndrome, too, remember? Maya reminds me of him.”
Becca throws her hands in the air. “God, I can’t believe this happened. We’re off to such a bad start.”
“Nah. It’ll be a story the campers re-tell. I think they were having fun playing kickball, though. It worked out well to have you guys join us. Eight campers isn’t exactly enough for a real game.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “I feel like you planned this somehow.”
I chuckle. “I wish I was good enough to have planned this. Nope, just a happy coincidence.” I pat the seat next to me. “Sit, relax. It might be a bit.”
Becca runs her hands over her face as she lowers herself into the chair, staring at the ground. “Thank you for helping get the campers under control.”
I nudge her with my elbow. “Hey, that might be the first nice thing you’ve said to me.”
This earns me the tiniest smile. “Don’t get used to it.”
I drum my fingers on my thigh. Don’t fuck this up, Miller. “So. I’m sorry about last night.” I reach over and give her thigh a light squeeze.
She looks at me. She doesn’t respond, but her breath hitches, just enough for me to know she’s affected by my touch.
“All better,” Deb announces as she leads Maya back to the lobby, and I pull my hand back into my own lap. “Maya should take it easy for the next few hours, but she’ll be fine. What activity do you have first today, honey?” she asks Maya, who’s already starting to show signs of a black eye forming.
She thinks for a minute. “Canoeing is first after lunch.”
Deb nods. “That should be just fine. Lunch and rest time should give you a little time to recover, and canoeing is a nice, gentle activity.”
Becca laughs under her breath. “I’ll make sure they don’t do any canoe tipping today, okay? Maya, are you ready to head to lunch?” she asks.
I peer at the clock on the wall. Somehow the morning has flown by while I was busy showing reckless disregard for campers’ safety. It’s already 11:30. The younger kids will be lining up outside the dining hall for lunch already.
Becca focuses all of her attention on Maya while we walk toward the dining hall, asking her questions about anything and everything, which keeps her from focusing on her injury.
Deb handed my shirt back to me before we left. I hold it balled-up in my fist, taking a cue from Becca to keep Maya’s mind off the blood and, thus, off her injury. My shirt is completely covered with drying blood, and even a quick look makes it easy to see it’s a lost cause.
I toss it in the first trash can we pass, glad to be rid of it.
“Don’t you need a shirt to go to lunch?” Becca finally addresses me as we near the dining hall.
I look down at my bare chest, like I’m just now realizing I’m shirtless. “Huh. Look at that. Guess so.”
She rolls her eyes.
Someday. Someday she’s going to laugh at one of my jokes.
I switch gears. “Can you make sure there’s a second counselor at my table? I’m going to run back to the cabin. To get a shirt,” I clarify. “I might be a few minutes late.”
Becca gives me a wave that looks, frankly, like a dismissal.
“Bye, Miller!” Maya says, waving with a large smile on her face.
“Bye, Maya. You were super brave today.” I give her a high five, then detour onto a path through the woods to grab a shirt, my mind deep in thought.
I screwed up today. I get that, I really do. My job was to be watching the campers, and if I’d been out there on the field with my boys, I might have been able to block the ball, or yell a warning, or something.
I turn the corner, dodging the root that runs across the path as I try to figure out where to go next. The path to the cabin I’ve got. The path to winning Becca over? Not so much.
She doesn’t seem to like the usual laid-back, joking guy that everyone else loves. Trying to be sincere and ask her questions about herself that night on the beach somehow crashed and burned. And now the only real interaction she’s seen me have with the campers is where I got distracted and one of them got hurt.
I jog up the steps to the cabin and open the door. Maybe the problem is that Becca’s only getting to see these glimpses of me in small doses. Maybe if I had more time to spend with her—a whole day, or even a few solid hours—I could show her I’m not whoever she’s built up in her mind.
The more time I spend with her and pay attention to her, the more captivated I am by her.
At first, it was her looks. Her quiet confidence, her intelligence.
But there’s so much more to her that I need to know. I’m just getting glimpses so far. But every peek, every layer I peel back shows me something else that’s so uniquely Becca that I can’t just walk away.
I pull a shirt over my head. This started as a silly bet, this whole camp thing, and I figured I’d be gone in a week. But now, I’m here for as long as it takes to win her over.