“Who was sick?” I ask, but Mackenzie is already walking back to the cabin. Isaac gives me an apologetic shrug and follows her lead.
When I turn to Simone, she looks mad. “Phoebe ——。”
“Phoebe?” I ask, concerned. “Is she all right?”
“Yeah, she should be. I mean, she threw up and was looking for you.” Simone saunters back to the cabins. She has some things she wants to say to me first. “Then Mackenzie gets me from the staff cabin, and I go over to find Phoebe anxiously avoiding a pile of vomit, the little girls complaining about the smell, and you nowhere to be seen.”
“Shit.” I twist my fingers together, feeling the exhaustion crashing over me.
“Mackenzie made a whole production out of it, straight up assuming you were abducted or some shit.”
“I’m so sorry.” I’ve been up nearly twenty-four hours straight at this point. What time is it even? “I just stepped outside for a minute and then—”
“Lilah, that was irresponsible.”
“But . . . I mean, come on. Haven’t you and Bobby kind of been encouraging this? As my friend, can’t you be a little understanding?”
“This? No, I have not been ‘encouraging this.’ You have a break from nine thirty until midnight when you can do whatever you want if you’re not on duty. Otherwise, we’re on the clock. It was a stressful enough day already without all this. So yeah, sure, tough break or whatever.”
“For sneaking out?”
“Getting caught.” She nods up ahead. “—— so guess who gets to clean up the vomit pile.”
Oof, that’s easy enough to assume. “Me.”
“Yep.”
I’m directed back to the cabin, where Ethan is still waiting outside, shaking his head disapprovingly. “Gary will be having a talk with you two.”
I hurry inside, immediately hit with the smell. Most of the young girls are still awake but quiet in their bunks. I shine my phone flashlight, discovering the puddle of puke in front of Phoebe’s bed, as colorful as the cereal we had for dinner mere hours ago.
“Hey, it’s me. Are you all right?” I ask Phoebe. She rolls over and takes a sip from her water bottle.
Mackenzie steps inside with a handful of paper towels and Clorox wipes. “Simone said to give these to you.”
“Ah, Lilah,” Phoebe says. Her voice is hoarse and low, and her lips are moving slowly. “You’ve missed all the fun. My stomach certainly had a night.”
* * *
I finish the sanitizing job and meet Gary outside the cabin. I dare a quick glance at my phone. It’s almost four in the morning. Fuuuuck. I join him outside and wait in uncomfortable silence while he checks his phone before looking up at me.
“I’m very disappointed,” he says loudly. “Can you hear me? That was immature behavior and not why you’re here this summer.”
“I’m sorry. I—”
He puts up a hand. “Now is not the time for this discussion. Honestly, with everything that happened tonight, —— at the bottom of my priority list. —— first and only warning. You enjoy considerable freedoms as a junior counselor, but you are still a trainee. Don’t slack on your job responsibilities. Or else, since you’re not yet eighteen, I’ll have no choice but to call your parents.”
So much for feeling grown-up this summer. I can only imagine how my parents would react if I got fired from this job for sneaking out late at night to see a guy.
“And I doubt they’d be keen to hear why,” Gary finishes.
“It won’t happen again,” I assure him.
“Good. Ethan already interpreted my conversation with Isaac, too. So you’re not being singled out here.” Gary looks around to the two damaged cabins and slides a hand down his face, stifling a yawn. “What a night.”
“Yeah.” I’m not sure if I’m allowed to go to sleep yet.
“Okay,” he says, nodding. “Go on. If Phoebe needs extra rest tomorrow, you two can hang out here for a little while. Just coordinate with Simone.”
I finally crash back into bed a few minutes later. I lie on my stomach and stick my face into my pillow, muffling a groan.
“Lilah,” Phoebe calls out in a tone that suggests she’s called my name a few times and no longer cares if any other campers hear her.
I hold out my phone and light her face with the screen. “Yeah, sorry. You okay? Gary said we can sleep in if you need to.”
“Good. Are you in trouble?”
“No, I don’t think so.” I ponder this for a minute. “But it was a close one. You know—”
Phoebe drops her head back to her pillow, apparently already fast asleep, and a text from Isaac pops up on my phone.
Isaac: sorry :/ tonight was fun until we got in trouble. see you tomorrow.
Since I’ve been so worried about camp not having enough funding and proving myself as a junior counselor, I never even considered being sent home early was a possibility. We’ll have to stick to hanging out during official break time. I really like Isaac, but I can’t jeopardize my time at camp again.
Chapter Twenty
Natasha shakes me awake in the morning. She climbs up and sits on my bunk uninvited. Mackenzie and the other girls are already on their way to breakfast.
“What are you doing here?” I sign and say through a yawn.
“Why are you not up yet?” she signs.
“Simone texted me earlier to stay here with Phoebe.” I look through the wooden slats to confirm that Phoebe is still asleep in her bunk. “What’s up?” I ask Natasha.
“We need to talk.” She looks mad. Great. It has to be about last night. What’s it to her? Her signing is too fast for me to follow, especially this early in the morning.
I hesitate, trying to recall any of her motions to figure out what she just signed, but I end up having to ask, “Again, please.”
She rolls her eyes and adds voice to her signing. “Don’t hurt Isaac. He’s not really as confident as he seems here.”
I shake my head, eyebrows narrowed, questioning what she’s talking about.
“You don’t know him in the real world. He’s had to deal with a ton of jerks at school, always fighting his way out of messed-up situations. And girls have tried to date him, but they don’t actually bother to try to communicate with him or really get to know him, so he’s got a lot of trust issues, especially with hearing people. So as his best friend, I’m telling you—be careful.”
This explains why Isaac would be cautious around relationships. It puts into perspective his hesitation earlier this summer and what he said about wanting to make sure he really knows someone before he dates them.
“Okay, but that’s not me,” I say, feeling defensive and a little tired of having to prove myself. “And you know that. I wouldn’t be part of that problem. I like him, and he clearly likes me, and you two are friends, and I was kinda hoping that you and I were getting to be friends, too. So why don’t you trust me instead of threatening me? Isaac can take care of himself.”
Natasha shakes her head. “I’m not threatening you. I’m warning you.”