Chapter 19
The two aspirins I popped before I went to sleep didn’t help the next morning.
My head throbbed as I wobbled down the hall to the bathroom, only to discover that I had my period.
Ugh! It was trip day, and I would spend it at a water park with menstrual cramps when all I wanted was to crawl back in my bed and lie there in the fetal position for the next twenty-four hours, blinds drawn, oscillating fan on full blast. Instead, I’d be in a damp bathing suit, trying not to heave while taking care of other people’s children.
I heard a light tap on the door.
“Come in, I’m up.”
“You’re not dressed yet. Wait, you don’t look so good,” Abby said.
“I just got my period, and I’m moving kind of slow. Give me a couple of minutes.”
“That’s bad timing. I’ll go hang out with Maggie until you’re ready. We can skip our morning walk. We’ll do plenty of walking around the amusement park,” Abby said.
“Wow, Abs wasn’t exaggerating—you do look like crap,” Maggie said as I walked into arts it made me wince, then smile.
A few minutes later Zelda walked out of the stall, and I hugged her before she pushed me away.
“Let’s go find Tara.”
By the time I got back to the lounge chair, it was surrounded by heaps of green Woodlands knapsacks. My foot got caught in a strap, and I fell onto a seat.
“How’s Zelda feeling?” Abby asked.
“She got her first period today,” I said.
Abby laughed. “Like mother, like daughter. How old were you when you got yours?”
“Just about the same age as Zelda.”
“It’s a rite of passage, getting your period at sleepaway camp. Zelda was lucky that you were here with her,” Bethany said.
I felt tears well up and tried to hold them back but couldn’t.
“What’s wrong?” Abby asked.
I couldn’t catch my breath. I tugged at the Hello Kitty towel I was sitting on to wipe my face, but the tears were unrelenting. “I have no one to call.”
“What does that mean?” Bethany asked.
“Oh, I know. You can’t call your mother,” Abby said.
I nodded. “My mother left me sitting on the toilet moaning to call my grandmother. There’s no one for me to call.”
“I didn’t even tell my mother—my sister helped me,” Bethany said. “I remember one day about a year later my mother told me she was taking me to the doctor because I hadn’t gotten my period yet. She was so angry when I told her I had.”
“It was like a coming out party in my house,” Abby said. “My grandmother, mother, aunt, and sister were all there. My aunt went and bought a cake from Carvel to celebrate. Because, you know, nothing says ‘welcome to monthly cramps’ like Fudgie the Whale.”
I smiled, listening to their anecdotes as the tears continued streaming down my face.
“Why do you think it’s hitting you so hard?” Abby asked.
I took a deep breath. “Zelda getting her period made me realize how much I miss my mother. Today was the first time in ages that I wanted her, and well, the reality of not being able to share this moment . . .”
“I understand. I’d give anything to share a bran muffin and a cup of coffee with my mom so I could catch her up on my life,” Abby said.
“You guys are making me miss mine, even though we argued all the time. It’d be wonderful to hear her hollering at me once more,” Bethany said.
“I’m sorry. I don’t want to bring you all down with me.
I feel like I’m crying more now than when my mom died.
” I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand.
“When she was diagnosed with lung cancer, I was pregnant with Hazel, and Zelda was only two. Hazel was born less than a month after Mom died. I was juggling so much, I guess I didn’t have the time to properly grieve, and now look at me. ”
“Go figure, all of us lost our mothers when we were young. Do you think that’s why we followed our kids to camp?” Abby asked as she leaned over and hugged me.
The four of us sat together on cheap plastic lounge chairs, surrounded by knapsacks, on a sweltering Monday afternoon in July, at a waterpark, as sisters.
Abby and I waited outside the dining pavilion.
Sitting in the hot sun the entire day was both relaxing and exhausting, and I still wasn’t feeling well.
We’d decided to hold onto the meal tickets instead of handing them out to the counselors.
If they lost the tickets, there’d be no dinner for them at the park or at camp.
Slowly, all of Woodlands made their way to the pavilion in various stages of disarray. Some were sopping wet from the splashdown ride, others carried seedy-looking stuffed animals. Hair was flat against heads, and everyone dragged their feet.
Hazel approached, smiling and walking arm in arm with her camp BFF, Jenna.
“How was your day?” I asked.
“Great, we went on every roller coaster twice!” She grinned from ear to ear.
“What made your mouth blue?”
Hazel stuck her tongue out. “Dippin’ Dots.”
I counted off each meal ticket as my groups slowly trickled in. Jasmine, my least reliable counselor, showed up with three campers.
“Who are you missing?” I asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You had four campers at the start of the day.” When she looked at me blankly, my voice became shrill. “Who are you missing?”
Alexis, one of the campers, said, “I haven’t seen Kaylee since we went on the Loop-de-Loop.”
“Jasmine, where’s Kaylee?” I tried not to sound panicked.
“I don’t know.” She didn’t seem concerned at all.