Tips for Taking Over Summer Camp Chapter 25: A Sleepy Daze Can Cause Strange Reactions

Chapter Twenty-Five: A Sleepy Daze Can Cause Strange Reactions

As soon as Cora checked to see if we were ok, she hurried us over to our cabin where we were urged into bed. I was exhausted, but there were so many things I needed to ay.

“I’ll be back to check on you,” Cora promised as she was about to leave. “I’m going to text the others that you guys came back. We will talk about what has happened in the morning. For now, you need some sleep.” She turned to Rowan, who had been trailing behind her the entire time. “Rowan, keep an eye on Molly. If anything happens, call or text me.”

With that, she left.

Soundlessly, Rowan pulled out her suitcase from under her bed and brought out a ham sandwich, an apple, a grilled cheese sandwich, and a cup of vanilla yogurt. She the set the food onto my bed, turned on her heel to her own, and sat onto it cross-legged, her back facing me.

My stomach growled as if saying, “Molly, look! Food! Eat now or I will cut up your other organs and eat them myself.”

I didn’t argue and ate it all within probably five minutes. The food was good, but the grilled cheese was cold and I didn’t have a spoon for my yogurt, but I managed.

“Thanks,” I said.

Rowan, who still wouldn’t face me, just shrugged,

“What’s wrong?” I prompted.

She shrugged again.

Did I do something?

I could feel exhaustion taking over my body, trying to pull me down onto the bed for some much-needed sleep. My eyelids stung and felt like a pair of magnets that only wanted to connect and never release. But curiosity and determination kept me going. I needed to know what had been happening and why Rowan had ditched me in the middle of the woods.

“Rowan?” I prompted, my voice soft in the silence of the cabin which draped over us like a fresh blanket of snow.

“Rowan?” I tried again, hoping that she would respond again.

After a few moments, just as I gave up and was about to set my head onto the pillow, she murmured, “She was wrong.” Her voice was quiet, like she wasn’t very sure if she should be saying those words. My drooping eyes shot open and looked back at her. She was still in the same position as before.

“Who?” I asked.

Rowan turned her head, her brown eyes creased with sadness. “She can’t be sure. She’s not allowed. I forbid it!” For each word, her voice got stronger, more furious.

I shrank back a little, afraid that she would lash out just like I used to think that she would do.

Rowan turned her whole body to face me and looked down at her hands. Her voice was gripped with emotion, each word ending in a tiny, upset moan. “I can tell. It’s something awful.” She then looked up at me with wild eyes. “Molly, please tell me, Molly. Please… Just… Please let me know that… That we won’t agree with it. By the time comes, I fear that we will. She wants something. And it’s not going to be good.”

My jaw hung open as my mind flashed to all of the books I read about prophecies and oracles and oaths and a coming darkness. I wondered for a moment if it was real. If maybe Rowan was giving me a prophecy.

But don’t those usually rhyme?

That thought made me dismiss the theory, but the way that she was acting was peculiar.

~

I sat up in my bed, looking around, my vision cloaked in a sleepy haze. Huh? Where am I? Hints of golden light were spilling in from the window, signalling an oncoming morning. Gentle snores rang above my head, making me realize that Silvia was back. And so was I.

After a few moments of consideration, I concluded that I fell asleep shortly after considering that Rowan might be a prophet.

I guess I didn’t have to sleep in that forest after all, I thought as I started to instinctively smooth out some parts of the wrinkled blankets. No fear of some maniac attacking me, no fearing that bird’s call, no fearing never finding my way again. I sighed with relief. Yes. I am safe.

I was about to lay back down again when I noticed a slip of paper on my lap. It was folded into a neat square and I could see the dents from the letters which were on the other side of the page. Whoever wrote it must write really hard, I noted.

I quickly snatched it up from its place and eagerly unfolded it. It read:

Molly, if you’re waking up in the middle of the night, wake us up. I have questions, you have questions, and Rowan can answer most of them. Don’t try to be nice or anything and let us sleep. You’re not doing us a favour that way. So wake us up. Now.
-Silvia

Blinking away the sleepy haze I was still in, I pushed myself out of bed and faced Silvia, who was curled up into a ball. I nudged her once. Nothing. I nudged her again, a little harder. Nothing again.

Well, I guess that now she can’t yell at me for pushing to hard.

Gripping her shoulders, I shook her as hard as I could, her limp arms flailing. She quickly sat up, looked around wildly, and pointed her ring fingers at me. I stepped back a little, hoping that she wouldn’t accidentally punch me or anything like that. Recognition then flashed on her face and she cracked a slight smile.

“You got my note, huh?” she said, flinging herself out of bed.

I nodded.

“Well then let’s go wake Rowan up.” She began towards Rowan’s bunk.

Suddenly, as if on cue, Rowan slowly sat up in bed. Silvia and I both let out cries of alarm and jumped back.

“How can you do that?!” Silvia exclaimed at the same as I screamed, “How did you know?!”

Rowan just smiled smugly and launched herself out of bed. Literally. She jumped from her position off the bed and landed face-first on the floor with a loud thump.

“Are you ok?” I asked, worried.

“I’m ok,” she replied, peeling herself from the floor as if nothing happened.

“Uh, ok,” Silvia said slowly.

I held up Silvia’s note. “It was mentioned that there would be answers. What are they? What about the questions?”

My other cabin mates nodded and sat onto the floor. I uneasily repeated their actions, uncertain if there would be some sort of twist.

“What do you wanteth to knows first?” Rowan asked.

I opened my mouth to answer, but I paused. What did I want to know? What question should I ask first? There were all kinds of them.

“Why did you abandon me?” I asked, the words spilling uncontrollably from my mouth.

To my surprise, Rowan didn’t fire some sort of nasty retort that would be centered around blaming me for her leaving. Instead, she looked down and bit her lip.

“I thought you were gone,” she answered finally. “I thought you had left, but when I hear your cries, I thought of accident. Trust me, I tried to find you, but I just… You weren’t any place. You should have been below me, on the ground, when I was in the trees, but no.”

“Why didn’t you call back, then?” I demanded, maybe a bit more harshly than I intended.

“You sounded tunnel-y. Like you were in a tunnel. And like you were everywhere at once. I tried calling, but it wasn’t very loud. I can’t yell very strongly, actually.”

“So when did you guys realize that I was missing?”

“I tried looking for you,” she explained, “but by around an hour or two, I decided that you were definitely missing and told Cora.”

“She then gave us our phones so we could communicate if we were in trouble or lost or anything so we could look for you and Link,” Silvia said. “But I honestly tried harder for you because I like you more. You’re a lot less annoying.”

“Oh, trust me,” I said, “you don’t know the definition of annoying until you spend a night with him.” I shuddered. “Glad that’s over.”

“We were very worried,” Rowan continued, “especially Cora.”

“She was freaking out and everything,” my other cabin mate added. “She was worried that she would have to call those people who look for missing people.”

“Did Bethany find out?” I inquired.

Rowan nodded gravely. “Oh, yes. It was terrible. There was a lot of yelling involved. It brought Griffin to tears. She threatened to sue Cora and ban her from camp if we didn’t find you guys by lunch tomorrow. Well, I guess that it’s lunch today now.”

“She even threatened to not feed us,” Silvia mentioned.

“That’s awful,” I murmured.

“Does that answer all of your questions?” Silvia said.

I shook my head. “No. Did you guys hear a strange bird or something?”

“Strange how?” Rowan inquired.

After I described the eerie sound, Silvia nodded slowly. “I think so. Rings a bell, I think.”

“Any other questions of asking materiel?” Rowan yawned. “Slightly tired. Sleep is beckoning.”

“Not quite,” Silvia said. “Tell us, Rowan, why are the other cabins so mean to us?”

I nodded. “Yeah, why?”

Rowan’s gaze instantly jumped away from us and she licked her lips nervously. “Truth answer: I have no idea.”