There's a Bat in Bunk Five (11 page)

We play eliminations. I lose. They play for the championship.

I practice on another machine, feeding it quarters.

There's someone tugging on my Camp Serendipity sweat shirt. It's the little kid.

“Lady, want to play?”

Lady, he thinks I'm a lady. He's seven or eight so I guess he thinks I'm a grown-up. The little kids at camp are the same way.

A little kid. I bet I can beat him. He doesn't look tall enough to see over the machine. Maybe I've got a chance.

He continues. “Loser pays for both games, after the first one.”

“Sure.” I'm sure I'll win, but even if I do, I won't make him pay for the next game.

We play.

Final score—320,840 for him to 16,500 for me.

I've been hustled.

“Where'd you learn to play like that?” I ask.

“Tom's Pizzeria in New York City, near where I live and go to school. I play there a lot.” He grins. “My name's Paulie. What's yours? Your turn to pay.”

I put in the quarters. “I'm Marcy. How about teaching me?”

We play.

I pay.

He teaches.

I think Ted and I'll have to come here sometime and play.

Then it all comes back to me. Ted's mad at me, out somewhere with Betty. I bet he never talks to me again.

Heidi and Sally come over. “We'd better get back. It's getting late.”

I wave good-bye to Paulie, who's getting more quarters from his parents.

He waves back.

By the time we get back to camp, it's dark.

We all go over to the staff recreation room. There are some people there, but no Ted and Betty.

Sally and Heidi go over to talk to somebody.

Jimmy comes over to me. “Looking for Ted?”

I say nothing.

“I saw him go off with Betty. Why don't you and I go off for a walk?” He lifts one eyebrow.

“Thanks, but no thanks. I'd rather be alone,” I say and walk away from him.

I wave good-bye to Heidi and Sally.

Heidi comes over and whispers, “Want some company?”

“I think I'm going for a walk. Thanks anyway.”

She nods. “Just remember—the path of true love never runs smooth, or something trite like that.”

Once I get outside, I think about Jimmy's offer. Maybe I should have taken him up on it. That would teach Ted. But Ted probably wouldn't even care.

I feel as if someone has ripped my heart right out of my body.

I go off to the area where there are swings.

Corrine's on duty so I don't have to go right back to the bunk. I'm glad. I don't want anyone to see me right now, not when I feel like I'm going to split in two and want to die.

Sitting down on a swing, I start to cry.

It's all so confusing. I love Ted. He used to say he loved me.

Life can get pretty complicated, growing up. I used to think that if I were in love with someone who loved me, everything would be absolutely wonderful.

But it's not working out that way. It's so confusing.

I like being with Ted, having him hug and kiss me, hugging and kissing him. Sometimes I get nervous because I like the feelings so much and then I get scared that I'm not sure I'm making the right decisions. But mostly I just like it.

Now, though, I feel as if I'm never going to stop crying, that all of the water in my body's going to exit through my eyeballs.

Someone sits on the swing next to me.

It's Barbara.

I try to stop sobbing but can't.

She says, “Want to talk about it?”

I nod.

She waits for me to say something.

“I feel so dumb . . .and I'm trying so hard to be a grown-up. It's terrible.” I continue to sob.

“I know it's hard,” she says softly.

I tell her everything. How much I love Ted, how I set the goal for myself to be grown-up, how hurt I am because Ted went off with Betty, how I'm trying so hard to do everything right with the kids that it makes me nervous, how confused I am.

“You shouldn't be so hard on yourself. It's difficult growing up. Carl and I always talk about what we want to do and be when we're grown up.” She smiles.

“You do? But you are grown-ups,” I say, wiping my eyes.

“Marcy, I'm not even sure what it means to be a grown-up. Everyone has moments when he or she doesn't feel adult. We're all concerned about doing
the best thing and we've all had times when we're confused confronting new situations. You've really got to learn not to be so tough on yourself, to realize that lots of other people have the same problems. That doesn't mean that your problems aren't important, you've just got to learn to put them in perspective. You should try to progress at a comfortable rate without worrying about being perfect.”

“It just doesn't seem fair. I do the best I can. And still things don't work out. I feel as if I'm being punished all the time.”

“But you're not. It's life. Things happen.” She shakes her head. “You know, Marcy—an example—I know there are times you hate your father. But he really does care about you. When you hadn't written to them, he sent me a note asking if you were all right, just so they didn't have to worry. So you see he does care, even if you think it's unfair that he's not perfect.”

“How come you never told me?”

“He said not to. He figured you were busy, but your mother was ‘driving him nuts' with her nervous concern about you. And he didn't want you to think that he thought you were incompetent. You know, Marcy, he doesn't. He sounded very proud of you in
the letter. So you see, you've got to learn to look at the whole situation. Did you do that with Ted, take his feelings into account?”

Thinking back, I realize I didn't, that I figured that he wouldn't mind—that I didn't have to check it out with him.

“Did you always have an easy time when you went out?” I ask.

She laughs. “No. I made lots of mistakes. Maybe that's why Carl and I do so well together. We've both made mistakes and learned from them. Now we try hard to understand each other and listen.”

“I wish there was a magic pill that would make everything all better,” I say.

“But there isn't, and pills are not the answer. Working on things is.”

“It's scary.”

Barbara nods. “It's the only way, and it gets less scary as time goes on. You've got to allow yourself the chance to work things out. You'll survive it. And there are some very good times to be had, just remember that.”

“Probably not with Ted. He hates me now.” I start to cry. “Could you talk to him for me?”

“No.” She shakes her head. “So many people make that mistake, trying to get a friend to be in the middle. You've got to confront him yourself.”

“I can't.”

She frowns. “You're feeling too sorry for yourself. Of course you can. Look at how far you've come in the time I've known you.”

She's right. I used to be scared of everything when we first met. I can even deal with bats. Now I'm just scared of some things.

We sit and swing back and forth while I think about all that's been said.

All of a sudden I hear Carl yell, “Come on, Ted. Let's see how high they can go.”

I feel someone pushing me higher and higher.

Barbara's swinging higher and higher too.

“Are you okay?” It's Ted's voice that I hear.

“I want to get down. It's too high.” I slow down.

He helps me to stop the swing. I was a little afraid he was going to keep me swinging until I flew over the bars.

Barbara's stopped too.

She gets off and hugs Carl.

I get off and look at Ted.

We just stand there.

I want to yell, So, where's Betty? Where were you? But I don't scream. In fact, I don't say anything.

We stare at each other.

Carl says, “Barbara and I'll be over at the volleyball court setting up. Be there in a few minutes. We're playing your team for the championship.”

Team. I'm not even sure we're talking to each other.

They go off, arm in arm.

Ted and I just look at each other.

I think about what Barbara said.

“Ted, let's try to work this out. I'm sorry I didn't explain that I was going into town. I guess I just didn't take your feelings into account. I should have talked to you about it.”

He looks at me. “I'm sorry I walked away like that. I know you've got a right to do things with other people. It's just that all day long, the kids were driving me nuts and all I kept thinking about was that I'd feel better when I could be with you for a while. And then you were going off. I really wanted to be with you, to be with someone special, someone who didn't keep asking me to tie shoelaces or scream ‘There's a Fungus Among Us.' Someone who didn't pretend to
pull cooties out of my hair. I just wanted to spend some time with you.”

“You didn't even give me a chance to explain, to talk it out with you. You went over to Betty.”

He nods. “I know. That was lousy . . .to you . . .to me . . .to Betty. I wasn't being fair to anyone. Look, Marcy, I just walked her up to her cabin and then came right back down again to talk to Carl.”

“Honest?”

“Honest.”

I hug him.

He kisses me on the top of the head and then on my mouth.

When we stop, he says, “I think we've got a volleyball game.”

“I hate volleyball,” I say. “I like kissing better.”

“Me too,” Ted says. “But they've challenged us to the championship.”

“Do you think we can change it to a kissing championship?” I ask and grin.

He grins back. “They might win. I think they've got more experience.”

“We could practice a lot.”

He takes my hand, and we go over to the volleyball net.

It's very dark. There were lights by the swings but not here.

Barbara and Carl are pretending to serve.

There's no ball.

Ted and I get on the other side of the net.

“Ready,” Carl yells.

“Serve,” Ted and I yell.

I pretend to hit it back.

Barbara slams “it” down over the net. “Our point.”

“Cheat,” I scream. “Your hands were over the net.”

I can't really see but it doesn't matter.

We argue about that for a while and then decide to give them half a point.

We then get half a point for a disputed ball.

Another serve.

A return.

“It bounced twice,” Ted yells.

I can't believe it. It's pitch dark and we're playing volleyball without a volleyball.

Final score: 21½ to 21½.

No one loses.

We're all winners.

Game called on account of mosquitoes.

F
our days after the volleyball game and I'm in charge of bunk five.

Corrine got poison ivy.

Bad.

Her face's swollen to twice its normal size. There's a rash all over her body. She's got to wear mittens so she won't scratch.

At the infirmary right now Corrine's getting Calamine lotion poured all over her body.

I'm watching the final dress rehearsal of the skit before the talent show.

Ginger walks by.

“Hi,” I say.

She ignores me.

“What's the matter?”

“Do you care? You won't do anything about it anyway.” She looks at me.

I never did talk to Corrine. With everything else that's happened, I've been so busy, I forgot.

“Ginger. I'm sorry. How's everything going? Really. I promise we'll have a talk as soon as carnival and the talent show are over. I thought everything was going better.”

She shrugs. “Don't bother. It's not worth it. Who cares?” and she walks away.

The girls finish up the skit and hang out in front of the cabin.

Ginger sits by herself under a tree and draws. Risa and Linda go into the cabin.

A few minutes later they start to scream.

There's a bat in bunk five.

Oh no, not again.

Corrine's in the infirmary.

No one else is around but me.

I've got to deal with it even though I'm scared.

I can do it. At least I think I can. I'm learning that things happen that aren't always wonderful, but I can handle it. It's not punishment for being good or bad, a success or a failure—it's just life. Scary, but I'll survive . . . That's what I'm learning this summer, not to take everything so personally. The bat didn't wake up this morning and say, “Oh goody, I'm going to get Marcy Lewis today.”

I can survive—and more than that, I can live my life. I've always been so afraid that I couldn't do anything on my own. Now I can do lots of things. And what I can't do, I can try to get help with.

This bat, however, is not going to help me out. It's up to me.

I thought bats only came out at night.

A bat. An ugly, vicious bat. It's probably dripping with rabies.

Linda taps me on the shoulder. “Marcy, you've got to do something. It's flying all over the place. Our clothes are probably covered with bat turds.”

I grab a broom that someone's left on the front porch.

“Don't go,” Kitty yells.

“Don't kill it.” That's Stacey.

Everyone's upset except for Risa and Linda, who look like they're trying to keep from laughing.

It seems fishy to me.

Opening the door slowly, I look inside.

“It's in your room,” Risa yells.

Linda's rolling on the ground laughing.

I'm going to be brave.

I open the door.

On the floor of my room is a baseball bat with a sign on it: “
AUGUST FOOL
!”

That's it. That's the bat in bunk five.

I pick up the bat and pretend that I'm going to clobber Linda and Risa.