Tips for Taking Over Summer Camp Chapter 17: Are We Bordering On a Pun? [WORKING TITLE]

Chapter Seventeen: Are We Bordering on a Pun?!

We got organized quickly. Cora was hesitant about letting us form groups of two and going into the forest without supervision, but Silvia somehow convinced her. So it was decided that Rowan and I would search the forest where I was captured during capture the flag, Silvia and Christian would take this side of the forest, and Cora and Griffin would take the main part of camp.

“Alright,” Cora said, “If you find any lead to where Link is, bring him to me immediately. We have to find him by supper which is in,” she pulled her phone out of her pocket and checked it, “Two-ish hours. If we don’t get him back by then, we’re going to have to tell Bethany and I’ll probably lose my job. And knowing her, we’d probably all get kicked out of camp. Ok, let’s go!”

With that, we all broke off.

I was a bit afraid of going with Rowan because I wasn’t sure if she was still mad at me or not, but I made sure that I wouldn’t talk to her unless I had to.

Unfortunately, that didn’t last very long because the music campers were strumming their beige guitars around the fire pit. They each hit a different chord and it created a very distracting noise, though it was a little good.

“Well, if it isn’t a couple of those theater turds,” Trent said, now standing.

What’s with everyone calling me a turd lately?

“Go back to your stupid stage so we don’t have t’a look at y’a,” another sneered.

“What do we do?” I whispered to Rowan. We were both just standing there, letting those rotten kids take a beating on us.

“If I was Silvia, I would suggest yelling at them,” she replied, “Or I’d be yelling at them already and not listening to you. If I was Christian, I’d probably suggest devising a clever plan or try to get them to stop disrespecting us. If I was Griffin, I’d suggest running away in tears. If I was Link, I’d probably whine about all of my problems. If I were Cora, I’d just keep moving on. If I was you, I’d be standing around in a confused da—“

“I don’t want to know what everyone else would do,” I interrupted. “I want to know what Rowan would do!”

There was a pause before she answered. “Backflip away, trying to appear cooler than I actually am?”

I uttered a tiny scoff under my breath.

“Don’t like that answer?” Rowan asked innocently.

To that, I just rolled my eyes and continued to walk towards the forest.

“What’s the matter?” Trent asked in a baby talk voice. “Did I upset you?”

To that, the other campers let out a huge roar of laughter that irritated my ears. I clenched my fists and tried not to shout at them or growl. I wasn’t Silvia and I didn’t like starting fights. My steps did get choppy though and I started to stomp the ground.

“Yeah, yeah,” I could hear their councillor, Julia, say, “Go back to the forest like the whiny brats you are! Ha ha!”

How rude! How dare a councillor let her campers treat us like that? How dare the councillor herself treat us like that! It’s one thing for Bethany to do it, but Julia? Really?

“Calm, Molly,” Rowan whispered as we disappeared into the trees. “Don’t let them get to you.”

Though I didn’t want to admit it at the time, that made me calm down a little, but not a lot.

After a few minutes of marching through the trees and ferns, Rowan touched my shoulder. I whirled around to face her, my face scrunched up into a scowl. I wanted to bark, yell, or scream at her, but something held me back. Common sense? A half-decent sense of loyalty? I didn’t know, but it was pretty annoying.

“Molly,” Rowan said, now appearing to notice my silent outrage, “You do realise that we have barely two hours to cover this whole forest, right?”

I wanted to say, “Your point?” But the reality of it all struck me. We didn’t have much time to cover this whole forest and Link could be moving. We could get kicked out of camp if we didn’t find him and I wouldn’t get to spend my summer here.

I sunk to my knees and buried my head in my hands. Why did life have to be so hard?