Camden
Waking up this morning, I’m reminded of the events that took place last night.
I don’t know what the hell we got ourselves into by coming here, but social media didn’t lie.
Fourth of July night comes with some crazy events, so we know not to come here again during this time.
If we do, we need to take precautions because last night could’ve been bad.
I love how much Jess cares about others when she tried to help the person in the bonfire, but she also noticed shortly after that it wasn’t a smart idea. I truly don’t know what I would’ve done if she had been pulled in. I think my heart would have been shattered.
I start to shift in the bed to sit up, waking her up.
“Good morning, babe,” she says.
“Good morning. Did you sleep all right?”
I know that’s probably a dumb question with everything that happened, but I hope she was at least able to get a couple of good hours of sleep.
“I did. I think the sleep meds did it for me.”
“What do you want me to make for you, since you cooked yesterday?”
She seems to hesitate for a second.
“Can I skip eating right now? My stomach is still a little queasy from everything that happened last night.”
“Of course you can,” I say.
I maneuver behind her on the bed and begin to rub her shoulders to soothe her. I can feel how tense she is, but I don’t want to bring up everything that happened last night, or it will make matters worse for her.
“Today, they have the vision and purpose session. Is that something that you still want to do?”
“I don’t want to ruin this trip, but I still feel a little shaken up. I would prefer not to do it and have to sit in a room with others who might have gone crazy last night. Is it fine if we go swimming in the pool and just relax today?”
“Baby, you’re not ruining this trip at all. Just because the workshops are here doesn’t mean we have to do them. I want you to feel comfortable, so if you want to go swimming, then let’s do it.”
She heads into the bathroom, brushes her teeth, and puts on a new bathing suit from yesterday. Once she’s done in there, I do the same. When we’re back in the middle of the camper, I plant a kiss on her lips.
“If at any point you don’t want to be outside of the camper, let me know, and we can come back inside. I don’t want you to feel like you have to face any fears, or be in a setting if you’re uncomfortable with it,” I say as I kiss her forehead.
“Thank you, that means a lot to me. I’m sure I’ll be okay. Let’s go have some fun today.”
We head out of the camper, and everything seems to be clear from the night before.
I can’t see anything that’s out of place.
No shots lying anywhere, no bodies, and no stragglers.
I don’t know if the campground has someone on standby that cleans up after the festivities, but if they do, they did a damn good job of it.
As we make our way to the pool, we have to pass where the bonfire took place last night.
To my surprise, there’s nothing out of the norm here, either.
I don’t know what those people did to clean up so fast, but I guess they don’t want others to know what happened around here.
I look over to Jess, and she looks just as shocked as I am.
“This makes me feel like everything that happened last night was just a figment of my imagination,” she says.
“Trust me, what we saw was real. This campground must have this happen so often that they have people on standby to clean to make people feel that way. You’re not crazy, and it wasn’t your imagination.”
I can tell that makes her feel a little better because her shoulders get less tense.
When we get to the pool, it’s weird because there’s nobody out here.
It’s ten minutes to twelve, so this comes as a shock to us.
Even when we were walking to get here, we didn’t see anyone hanging outside of their campers.
I wonder if this is a sign that maybe we should get out of here and not stay the whole week. I want us both to feel comfortable about being here, but if it’s going to turn into a ghost town after the festivities last night, then maybe we need to go.
“Do you find it odd that there’s nobody out here but us?” I ask, looking over to her.
“Just a little. I don’t know what’s going on. Maybe we can head over to the main center and see if there are people in there? The session is supposed to start at twelve. If there’s nobody in there, then we have a problem,” she suggests.
I nod my head in agreement, and we head over in that direction. We peek inside and see the room is full of different couples and groups of people.
“Okay, that makes me feel better. Let’s hit the pool for a little while, then we can hang out back at the campsite and roast some s’mores.”
“Sounds like a plan,” she says.
A little while goes by before we find ourselves back at the campground cooking up some steaks over the fire.
This seems like a pretty good meal to eat, and it appears more couples are sitting out on their site, eating and fellowshipping.
When I go to sit back down in my chair, I hear voices come up.
“We’re sorry about last night,” Ciara says.
I turn to face her and see Brandon right next to her with his hand wrapped up. So him blowing off his arm was definitely a real thing.
“Yeah, I’m sorry too. I don’t know what happened, but it’s like a switch kicked off inside of me. It must have been the shot. I know my behavior wasn’t acceptable, though, so I hope you can forgive me.”
Jess and I look at one another, deciding if this is something we can just forgive because we definitely can’t forget it.
“Is your hand okay at least?” Jess questions.
“Well, it’s a goner,” Brandon lets out a laugh, causing us all to follow with one.
It’s pretty fucked up to be laughing right now, but if he finds humor in it, then I guess it’s okay if we do too.
“Shockingly, the camp doctors had everything they needed to stop the bleeding. They even had more blood to give, which seemed a bit odd considering where we’re at. The only bad part is the hand wasn’t able to be reattached, so I’m stuck with only having one hand from this point on,” he says.
"Well, no shit, Sherlock, you're the dumbass who decided to set off a firework when you had no reason to," Ciara says.
She has a point, but at the same time, she let him do it. I feel like they both have a role in that. We continue to hang out and talk throughout the rest of the night, and move past all of the craziness that happened the night before.