and hearing no more tapping
and telling myself again and again
there’s no one there,
I finally fell back to sleep.
At lunch the next day,
someone tapped me on the shoulder.
I turned
and almost fell off my chair.
It was the camp director!
“Are you finished eating?” she asked.
I nodded,
speechless.
I’d never seen her talk to a camper before.
She made announcements
and drove around in a golf cart
and spoke into a walkie-talkie.
Why did she care if I’d eaten?
“I’m taking Eleanor for a second,”
the director called across the table to Hope.
I looked with wide eyes at Joplin.
She looked with wide eyes back.
“Come,” the director said to me.
My brain raced as I followed her.
But I couldn’t think of why she wanted me.
She led me into a little office
and shut the door behind us.
We sat down at a round table.
I waited for her to speak.
“I just received a call,”
she said.
“From two very worried parents.”
“Oh,”
I said.
I looked down at the table.
I knew she meant my parents.
I knew they must’ve read my Esmeralda letter.
“This happens every year,” she said,
sounding very kind.
“Someone has a tough start to camp.
I’ve thought about your situation,
and I’ve come up with a plan.”
I looked at her serious face.
“Have you heard about the Wall of Feelings?”
she asked.
I nodded.
Hope had told us about it.
Every summer,
girls write down their feelings about camp
and post them on the dining hall wall.
For everyone to see.
“We’re starting the Wall of Feelings tomorrow,”
the director told me.
“I want you to post two pieces there.
One about how you felt
when you wrote that letter home.
And one about how you feel now.
Be absolutely honest, please.
You do not need to include your name.
Lots of people don’t.
But you do have to be honest.
And include pictures!
I’ve heard you’re a good artist.
After that,
if you still want to go home,
you come and tell me.
I’ll give it serious consideration.
How does that sound?”
I thought for a second.
Something worried me.
“If I write honestly about my feelings,”
I said,
“I’ll say bad things.”
“Of course!” she said
with a big smile.
“That’s perfect!
Who wants a Wall of Feelings that only says
‘I love camp,’
‘I love camp’?
That’s boring!
Besides, happiness is only one feeling.
It’s a Wall of Feelings.
Plural.
So you have an important role to play.
Can you do it?”
I nodded.
“Good,” she said.
“Don’t forget.
If you still want to go home,
you let me know.
OK?”
“OK,” I said.
She stood up.
I stood up, too.
“One last thing,” she said.
“Will you please write your parents
a little something positive?
To make them feel better?”
I nodded again.
Then she opened the door and set me free.
I sat in my bed at rest time
and thought and thought and thought.
Of positive things.
Then I wrote a letter to my parents.
I wrote:
Dear Mom and Dad,
My counselor is nice.
I got to walk a goat.
And gluten-free cookies are okay,
as long they’re chocolate chip.
Here is a picture of me walking a goat.
And here is a picture of a gluten-free cookie.
All my love,
which is the MOST POSSIBLE love,
Eleanor
When I finished,
I handed my positive letter to Hope.
“Will you please mail this? Soon?”
I said. “It’s important.”
“I will,”
she said.
“I promise.”
I had farm that afternoon.
It was nice to see Cornelius.
But he had a big sign on his pen
that said:
OUR GOAT’S NAME IS
ALFIE!
CONGRATULATIONS
TO JACKIE BOBROW,
PRAYING MANTIS
I felt like tearing up that sign.
Alfie was a stupid name!
Cornelius was so much better!
I bent down
and looked that goat in the eye.
“Do you like Alfie?”
I asked.
He gave a little snort.
“Me neither,” I said.
Soon after that,
the farm counselor gathered all the kids in the barn
and taught us how to clean the pens.
“Yuck,” Kylie kept saying
as we shoveled out Cornelius’s stall.
It was pretty yucky.
But I figured
Cornelius couldn’t clean his stall himself.
And he deserved a nice space.
So I didn’t mind.
I took a fast shower after farm.
Then,
still wearing my bathrobe,
and with my hair still dripping wet,
I sat on my bed
and chewed on a pen
and tried to think.
Because I had to write my two pieces
for the Wall of Feelings.
The camp director had told me to describe
how I’d felt about camp
the night of the Esmeralda letter.
And how I felt about it now.
I squeezed my eyes shut
and recalled the Esmeralda night,
when I’d just skinned my hands and knees and chin
and failed my swim test
and then woken, terrified, from a rat nightmare—
in the middle of the night, in a strange room
and a strange bed,
with no chance of seeing my parents.
I could remember exactly
how that felt.
So I opened my eyes
and started writing.
I wrote:
I hate camp.
I just hate it.
I wish I didn’t.
But I do.
Being here is worse than
bug juice on a burger.
Or homework on Thanksgiving.
Or water seeping into my shoes.
I want to go home right now.
I really do.
I drew a picture next.
Because the camp director
had told me to.
I’d just finished when Joplin rushed over,
startling me.
“Come on!” she said.
“Dinner starts in three minutes!”
I gasped
and leaped off my bed
and threw on some clothes.
Because of this camp rule:
Any camper late for a meal
&nbs
p; must sing a crazy song about a chigger
to the whole dining hall.
We’d already seen one poor Cicada do it,
and two Dragonflies,
at breakfast that morning.
After I’d pulled on my shoes,
Joplin and I both sprinted from our cabin.
She was cheetah-fast,
with her ridiculously long legs.
I huffed and puffed behind her,
thinking,
I will not sing that chigger song
all by myself.
I will not.
I pushed myself harder than I ever had before.
And reached the dining hall,
sweaty and exhausted,
five seconds behind Joplin.
And just barely in time.
Hope let me skip flag-raising the next morning.
Because I still hadn’t even begun to write
my second piece for the Wall of Feelings.
It was so quiet as I sat on our cabin steps,
with no one else around.
Just me and a couple of birds
in the trees around me,
chirping at each other.
I hugged my knees
and thought and thought
about all that had happened
since the Esmeralda night.
I hate swim lessons.
But I like being better at treading.
I hate not having my thick quilt.
But I’m getting used to my bed.
I don’t like tetherball with tall people.
But I do with short.
I like Cornelius a lot.
I just wish he wasn’t named Alfie.
I hate chili and sloppy joes and bug juice
(and the chigger song).
But croutons
are delicious.
I miss my parents.
But I like my counselor and my very tall friend.
And,
more than anything else,
I hate my stupid life jacket.
When I’d finished writing, I added this picture:
Then I went to find Hope.
So I could give her my pages to post.
I visited the Wall of Feelings that afternoon
and read other girls’ pieces.
Which were so enthusiastic.
“Camp Wallumwahpuck rocks!”
a lot of them said.
And
“I never want this summer to end!”
“I love this place!”
“Camp Wallumwahpuck is heaven!”
Why can’t I love camp?
I thought,
reading all of that.
I was glad I hadn’t signed my name
on my own negative pages.
I hoped no one could tell they were mine.
I kept reading and reading
until finally
I found one other piece
that was negative, too.
It said:
“I don’t care what everyone says—
I don’t love this camp.
But I don’t need to love it.
I just need to survive it.”
I read that piece
again and again.
And started feeling better.
I wished that girl had signed her name.
I wished I could meet her.
I don’t need to love this place,
I told myself,
walking away from the wall.
I just need to survive it.
I can do that.
Only,
I might have to start stealing rolls.
Camp went by faster after that.
I saw the director sometimes, on her golf cart.
She always waved at me,
and I always waved back.
But I never asked to go home.
Not even after I got a bug bite on my eyelid,
and my eye swelled half-shut.
I quit some activities because
of that bug bite.
Like archery.
Because it’s dangerous to shoot a bow and arrow
with one eye swollen half-shut.
I still had to go to swim lessons, though.
And,
after our seventh lesson,
our teacher tested us
to see who could move on, beyond Guppy.
I worked so hard during that test
to breathe just right
and show my teacher a strong kick.
I was determined, too,
to tread water the longest.
And I did it!
I pedaled a bike very slowly,
just like Joplin had taught me,
and outlasted all the other Guppies.
Only by six seconds.
But still.
I did it!
“Congratulations,” my teacher said to me
after I’d swum back to the dock.
“You are officially an Angel Fish.”
My whole cabin was hovering
when she said that.
Because I’d told Joplin about the test,
and she’d told everyone else.
They all jumped up and down
and cheered for me.
Then Hope shouted,
“To the trampoline!
No life jacket
for anyone!”
We all ran and leaped into the water together.
I loved sinking
deep, deep underwater
and kicking my way to the top.
Instead of bobbing on the surface like a duck,
in my diaper.
Then I raced with everyone else through the water
to the trampoline ladder.
I wasn’t the first to arrive.
But I wasn’t the last, either.
And that felt good, too.
As soon as I’d climbed up,
Joplin grabbed my hand.
And we
STOMPED
SOARED,
first one, then the other, again,
high into the sky.
Later,
after changing into dry clothes,
I had an idea.
I explained it to Joplin,
and she said she’d help.
We gathered what we needed
and went outside.
I slipped my backpack onto my shoulders
and hugged my thin sleeping bag
and stood in front of my small, white cabin.
The way my mom had stood in front of hers,
so long ago.
I smiled,
thinking about my surprisingly nice day.
And Joplin took my picture.
I knew I wouldn’t look as happy as my mom did
in her picture.
I knew she really loved Camp Wallumwahpuck
and thought it was beautiful
and had never written an Esmeralda letter.
I knew she’d probably had a million happy days
at camp.
Still,
I liked having one
of my own.
On the very last morning of camp,
Joplin took a pen
and wrote her Brooklyn phone number on my hand.
“You have to come over,”
she said.
“My apartment is not candy-free.”
I wrote my number on her hand, too.
And we promised to visit.
Soon after that, my parents arrived.
Right away,
my dad threw his arms around me
and lifted me in a big hug,
right off the ground.
“Oh, how you’ve grown!” he said,
setting me down.
I couldn’t stop smiling.
My mom hugged me, too,
and looked at me close.
“So gorgeous!” she said.
“How long have you been this gorgeous?”
“Forever,” I said.
We both laughed then.
Because that was just ridiculous.
And because we were happy.
Both of my parents thanked Hope
for taking care of me.
She smiled her pretty smile and said,
“It was my absolute pleasure.”
Then my dad said to me,
“We’re not leaving
until your mom and I meet your goat.”
So I walked them to the barn.
When we passed the tetherball poles, my mom said,
“I used to love that game!”
“Let’s play!” I said.
I reminded her of the rules,
and we played a long, fun game
that she eventually won.
Because even though I’d grown,
she’s still a lot taller.
After that we kept walking.
We passed Braces Girl
and the teenager who often served me lunch.
They both waved.
And the teenager called to me,
“Good-bye, Salad Girl!”
“Who’s Salad Girl?” my mom asked.
“I am,” I said.
“I eat a lot of salad.”
“You do?” she said.
“Do you like pickles now, too?” my dad asked.
“Definitely not,” I said.
“And by the way,
will you make me a juicy burger when we get home?
With ketchup only,
on a bun?”
“Of course I will!” he said. “I’d like nothing better.”
We’d arrived at the barn then.
“It’s exactly the way I remember it,” my mom said.
“Even the smell!”
Inside,
the farm counselor was feeding the animals.
“Eleanor!” she said
when she saw me.
“We’re really going to miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too,”
I said.
“Your daughter is so helpful with the animals,”
she told my parents.
“You see?” I said to them.
“I’m a huge help with animals.
And dogs are animals!
So can we get one?
Please?”
My parents looked at each other.
“We’ll see,” my mom said.
And my heart went flying.
Because I could tell,
I could just tell,
that she really meant
yes.
Grandma Sadie called me up on the phone
about a week after I got home.