Breakout! Read online

  Though, in a perfect camp world, Missi would be on the opposite team of her and Jamie. Jenny was tired of watching the two of them bond over being tone-deaf, and loving kitties on YouTube, and campaigning for Jenny’s Lieutenantship. It was time that Missi got a reminder of her place as awkward third wheel. BFF stood for Best Friend Forever, and like in Color War, there was only ever one Best, and that was always Jenny.

  Two taps over the PA system made everyone’s heads snap to the middle of the Dining Hall. There stood TJ and the Captain in front of a mountain of single-serving cereal containers. TJ was wearing head-to-toe white and the Captain was wearing head-to-toe blue. Not just camp-colored clothes, but also face paint, body paint, wigs, pom-poms—the whole shebang. Rolling Hills nearly lost their minds, Jenny included. She’d momentarily forgotten about saving her voice—she had the prewar bug, too, and there was just no stomping it out!

  From the Boys’ Side of the Dining Hall, Jenny could hear the Hamburger Hillers chanting: “Play Dough for Lieutenant! Ooh! Ah!” She stood on her tippy toes to catch a glimpse of Play Dough doing the cha-cha dance on top of his table. He seemed so confident. Was it because his friends believed in him? Because they supported him with all their hearts and cheers? Why couldn’t Jenny’s cabinmates do the same for her? She squeezed Jamie’s hand to give her a hint. But Jamie just squeezed back. Jenny tried to be more obvious. “Look at Play Dough!” She laughed. “The Hamburger boys are all cheering for him!”

  “I can’t see!” Jamie whined, jumping as high as she could, which was still shorter than Jenny when Jenny had her feet planted.

  So Jenny started the chant for herself, making intense eye contact with all of her cabinmates so they’d join in. They all did. First Missi and Jamie, then Sophie and Slimey, and then Melman. “Jenny for Lieutenant! Ooh! Ah!” And it felt amazing! Jenny threw her arms up, and her head, too, and right in her line of sight, on the wall were the Color War plaques dating all the way back to 1965. The Lieutenants listed on them were probably grandparents now! Jenny thought about how one day when she was a grandma, she’d send her grandkids to Rolling Hills, and they’d spot JENNY NOLAN on this summer’s plaque and dream of making it up there themselves. And then their grandkids would come to Rolling Hills and dream of it, too. War was cyclical, she’d learned in social studies, and she finally understood what that meant.

  But suddenly Jenny stopped hearing her name, and all the amazingness she’d felt vanished. Melman switched the chant to promote Slimey, and Slimey switched the chant to promote Melman, and then, little by little, the whole Dining Hall was chanting for different Lieutenants, like it was a job that could literally be anyone’s and wasn’t reserved for the best, most special Upper Campers.

  Before Jenny had a chance to protest, TJ broke through the mash of Lieutenant-requesting cheers with a “Can I get a Moooooo?”

  Yes, Jenny knew moooooo-ing made zero sense. But weird randomness was a general rule of thumb at camp, especially when Color War was on the brink of breaking. So it was no surprise that everyone, herself included, responded on cue: “MOOOOOOO!”

  The Captain was using every muscle in her face to keep from laughing.

  “Can I get a Bahhhhhhh?” TJ asked.

  “BAHHHHHHH!”

  The Captain buried her face in her hands, convulsing.

  TJ began to rap, crowning the Captain with a Froot Loops container he’d found at his feet. “My wife, my love, my dairy queen! This Color War is milk-themed!”

  Milk-themed? Last summer, the themes were White Land of Oz versus Blue Far Far Away. And the summer before that: White Apps versus Blue Board Games. What could TJ mean? Like White Cow Milk versus Blue Goat Milk? It seemed kind of limiting. Especially considering how many campers were lactose intolerant.

  TJ’s voice boomed into the mic: “White Creamer versus Blue Yogurt!” The camp mumbled in confusion. There was some laughter, some screaming cheers. “The Generals and the Lieutenants are listed—”

  Listed where?! Jenny hyperventilated.

  “—inside the milk cartons on your table!”

  Jenny darted her eyes to the 2% milk by Slimey’s feet. Slimey’s fingers were already going toward it, so Jenny had to act fast. She threw herself across the table, smushing the pancakes under her belly, and grabbed hold of the milk first. She sat up so that the carton would be out of Slimey’s reach, and with no time to waste, flipped it over to get a look at the inside.

  The milk poured all over her face. Jenny didn’t even care. In fact, as the milk cascaded down her chin and onto her shirt, she thought about how, if she were a White Lieutenant, everyone would praise her for her commitment to the team! If she were on Blue, well, she’d have to duck into the shower. Or get her hands on some blueberry yogurt. When the last of the milk smacked off her eyes, a laminated card fell out of the carton. In black Sharpie it read: FAKEOUT.

  No, Jenny thought. No, no, no, no, NO!

  The entire camp broke into: “FAKEOUT, FAKEOUT, WE WANT A BREAKOUT!” They chanted it over and over.

  Jenny looked up at her cabinmates, who were keeling over with laughter. At her. She was covered in milk and blue pancakes. For nothing. The break was fake, and the war had not begun.

  “Aw, Jenny!” Melman said, giving her a hand that Jenny pretended not to see. “That was obviously a Fakeout. Milk-themed Color War? Really? We all saw the Captain. She could barely contain herself, the whole thing was so far-fetched.”

  Missi wrung out an especially soaked clump of Jenny’s hair. “Well, as someone who milks cows and goats, I believed TJ and thought the dairy theme was super-trendy.”

  Jenny wanted to whip her milky hair across Missi’s face.

  “I had no idea it was a Fakeout,” Jamie said, sitting beside Jenny but far enough away so that she didn’t get milk on her. She was one of the Intolerants.

  “Yeah, well, I knew it was a Fakeout,” Jenny lied, hopping down off the table. “I’m not stupid. I was just getting in the spirit to, like, be a good role model for Lower Camp.”

  She watched Slimey and Melman exchange one of their looks they assumed no one ever noticed, and then Jenny looked at Jamie for support. But Jamie was chewing the inside of her cheek, and beside her, Missi was looking down at her feet. Jenny felt a pinch of guilt. She hadn’t meant to call them stupid. Well, not Jamie at least. “Jamie and Missi knew it was a Fakeout, too. They were just defending me because they’re amazing friends, especially Jamie.”

  Jamie and Missi looked up, all smiles.

  Friendship comes so naturally to me, Jenny thought. I really will make the best Lieutenant.

  When the Faith Hillers headed to their first Activity Period, lacrosse, Jenny walked toward the cabin to shower. Before she climbed the porch steps, she clasped her fingers together, looked up at a cloud shaped like a meerkat, and prayed: “Hi, Color War Gods. It’s me, Jenny. So, I’m assuming you guys are going to break this war, like, now, so I just want to remind you that I deserve to be Lieutenant and would be the best at it. Thank you so much for listening. Amen.” And then the meerkat cloud morphed into a J cloud, and Jenny hugged herself, assured that everything she’d ever wanted was going to be hers.

  When It’s in Your Blood

  “Tonight’s Evening Activity is called ‘The Bandit’s Deal’!” Yoshi announced to the Faith Hill and Hamburger Hill campers gathered on the basketball court bleachers.

  Play Dough heard an eruption of girly giggles from the Faith Hillers, and he had no idea why. He guessed they were making fun of Counselor Yoshi’s enthusiasm for a dumb activity no one wanted to play.

  “So this isn’t just a cover for Color War break?” Melman asked Yoshi, who looked back at her with an I can’t tell you smile. Play Dough found that extremely annoying, because there was no way in smellzone that first-year counselor Yoshi knew his blues from his whites, let alone when the war was going to get started. That secret was safely locked in TJ’s and the Captain’s minds. If Yoshi thought he knew something they all didn’t, he
was suffering from brain jam.

  “So, the game,” Yoshi began. “Boys and girls line up on opposite sides of the court. Each boy and girl is assigned a number, one through six. When I call your number, you run to the middle of the court and try to steal this.” He motioned to Scottie, who tossed him a basketball. “Once you’ve got the ball safely to your side, your team gets a point. Got it?”

  “This is just Steal the Bacon,” Dover said matter-of-factly.

  “Without the bacon,” Play Dough said.

  “Will there be bacon?” Totle asked Yoshi.

  “No,” Yoshi said.

  “Kosher bacon?” Wiener asked.

  “No,” Yoshi said.

  That’s when the guys began to boo and the girls began to twist each other’s hair and make their hands into tunnels for secrets.

  It was time to take control of this programming hiccup. “This Evening Activity blows!” Play Dough announced. He hopped down from the bleachers to poll his friends. “Raise your hand if you want to play Steal the Bacon with no bacon.” No hands. “Raise your hand if you want to play Knockout.” All the hands.

  Yoshi looked at Scottie in a panic. She just shrugged and went to get a second basketball for the game. “OK, good idea, Play Dough,” Yoshi said, pretending he had control over the matter. “Play Dough with the great ideas! The Bandit’s Deal is fun for another time.”

  Play Dough didn’t want his counselor to feel totally overthrown, so he threw him a high five. Fortunately, Yoshi smiled and tossed Play Dough the basketball and no one’s feelings were broken.

  So everyone began to play Knockout, a shooting hoops elimination game, every man for himself. And Play Dough was having an awesome time. Unlike Color War, where every game was worth valuable team points, in Knockout, if you lost, you got to sit out and flirt with unathletic, hot girls like Jenny, his Crush Since Bunker Hill.

  Which is what happened in the third game, when Jenny got out by Melman, and then Play Dough got out by Totle and met Jenny on the third row of the bleachers. He noticed her hair looked very straight today, like she’d used her illegal flat iron. He felt it. It was the yellow of Fritos, but smooth like spaghetti.

  “Um, what are you doing?” Jenny asked, tossing his hand from her hair.

  “Flirting,” he admitted.

  To his surprise, Jenny laughed. At first, that made Play Dough feel like a million bucks. But then he got paranoid that Jenny was laughing at him in a You’re such a dumb fatty kind of way, like skinny punks in Great Neck did.

  “Omigod, putting your fingers in my hair without my permission is not flirting,” Jenny said, still laughing.

  Play Dough noted this. Next time, he’d ask Jenny before he felt her pasta-soft hair. “Cool.”

  “Are you excited to be Lieutenant?” she asked him.

  He gaped at her. How did she know he was going to be Lieutenant? Did she have access to TJ’s and the Captain’s brains? He guessed if anyone could get a peek in, it would be her. Jenny was too pretty to say no to.

  “Play Dough, hello?”

  “Oh. Yeah. Hello. I mean, yes. I dunno.” Play Dough thought about sticking his head in a toilet and giving himself a swirly. At camp he was normally a smooth talker, but when it came to Jenny, his words always seemed to get jammed up, like when he ate mozzarella sticks too fast. “How do you know I’m going to be Lieutenant?” he finally managed to ask.

  Jenny smacked her hands to her lap. “Um, because you’re Play Dough.”

  Play Dough cocked his head, confused. He got why his friends thought he’d be Lieutenant. He was loud and bossy and good at making fast decisions, like, for instance, switching out the Bandit’s Deal for Knockout. And he got why his family thought he’d be Lieutenant. He had a long genetic history of Color War officers: Gramps Garfink in 1965, Great-Uncle Garfink in 1968, Aunt Denise in 1984, and Pops in 1985. All of them had been on White. All of them had won.

  Throughout the summer, he’d gotten packages with lucky Color War paraphernalia from each of their reigns: postcards, photographs, and even Gramps Garfink’s White Broadway SING packet with the lyrics of the march (an upbeat, rallying song) and the alma mater (a slow, sentimental ballad). Before leaving for camp, Play Dough got so pumped, he’d asked to try on his Gramps’ Color War shirt with GENERAL GARFINK ironed onto the back, but he’d been denied access. Either Gramps didn’t want his grandson to stretch it out, or it really was in vacuum-sealed-plastic protection.

  But now, Play Dough was starting to get nervous about it all. No Garfinks had been officers in the twenty-first century, and his whole family was banking on him to carry on the legacy: (1) He had to be Lieutenant. (2) He had to be on White. (3) He had to win. So naturally, every time someone told him he had Lieutenant in the bag, or speculated teams, or mentioned Blue’s three-summer winning streak, his armpits threw their own private pool party. Especially when that probing someone was Jenny. Jenny! He had to respond to her Um, because you’re Play Dough, and stop thinking about his wet pits. “Yeah, I’m Play Dough,” he confirmed.

  Jenny just looked at him, and Play Dough just looked at her. Seconds went by. Suddenly, Jenny burst out laughing again, like Play Dough had made some legendary joke, and Play Dough felt like another million bucks. That was, until he remembered that Jenny had a dumb boyfriend named Christopher, whom she’d met on a Disney cruise right before last summer. It occurred to Play Dough that Christopher probably looked like a prince and not the Pillsbury Doughboy, and so all of this Apparently Awesome Flirting was a waste of time.

  Play Dough stood up, thinking he’d join Steinberg, who was developing an algorithm to determine when Color War would break.

  But before he had a chance to hop off the bleachers, Jenny TOUCHED HIS ARM and said, “What about me?”

  “Yeah, yup,” Play Dough answered, having no clue what Jenny was asking. His brain was melting, maybe.

  “So you think I’ll be Lieutenant, too?” she asked, grinning expectantly.

  Oh. Negative. Slimey probably, maybe Melman. Missi, even. But not Jenny. She sat out or got out in most sports because of injured braces and laziness, and was kind of intimidating to be around. But he didn’t want to make her grin disappear or mess up his time in the spotlight, so he nodded. “Definitely.”

  Jenny’s face exploded into an even bigger grin. “Omigod, what if we’re Lieutenants together?!”

  Play Dough could hardly believe it. Jenny wanted to be co-Lieutenants! That was a big deal. Right? He looked around, hoping Totle or Smelly was nearby and had heard her, too, but they were still in the game. “Then it will be the greatest Color War ever,” he said with a salute. And he meant it.

  Suddenly self-conscious that he was standing and she was sitting, Play Dough sat back down. But then Jamie pranced over and he stood back up. Jamie had always weirded him out—she reminded him of a gerbil with human sunglasses. Little people should not wear big-people clothes.

  “What took you so long?” Jenny asked Jamie. “I was just sitting here alone, and I missed your munchkin face.”

  Alone? Jenny was by herself for only a minute before he’d joined her. He stayed quiet about it, which made him feel invisible, and not in a superhero way.

  “I won!” Jamie cried with little-gerbil joy.

  “You won what?” Jenny asked.

  “Knockout!!!”

  Jenny chuckled in disbelief, and in attempt to feel visible again, Play Dough chuckled, too.

  “No way!” Jenny squealed to Jamie. “Honestly, Dover probably let you win because he has a crush on you.”

  Play Dough noted two things. First, Jamie was so pissed, her face morphed into that of a troll’s. Second, Dover did not have a crush on Jamie. He had a crush on no one.

  Jamie wandered off to Missi, who was tucked under Wiener’s arm and giggling like a hyena. Then she did that tunnel-for-secrets thing through Missi’s frizzy red hair where Missi’s ear was hiding.

  Meanwhile, Jenny was watching them, seemingly contemplating the world’s m
ost evil prank. Sour-sauce, Play Dough thought. My Jenny Fantasy Flirtball has reached Game Over. But then, by some miracle, she turned to him with a smile, like she didn’t have a care in the camp world. “What team do you think we’ll be Lieutenants for?” she asked sweetly.

  “I hope White,” Play Dough replied. He was about to explain his family history and the fact that they’d always led the White team to victory, but Jenny broke in.

  “Yeah, I look really good in white.” She lifted her sweatshirt, and underneath, Play Dough could see she was sporting a white T-shirt. “But I also look good in blue.” She peeled down her sweatpants, revealing blue leggings. The whole clothes-lifting/-peeling thing was making Play Dough nuts. “I’m so prepared for this war!”

  Play Dough sunk his sweaty back into the bleachers. “Me too,” he confided, emptying his shorts pockets. Stuffed in one was a white face-paint stick and in the other was a white bandana. “We’re both a little crazy, huh?”

  Jenny raised her eyebrows mischievously. “It’s Color War,” she said. “Crazy is the only way.”

  On the Brink

  Jenny had almost pulled her flat-ironed bangs out waiting for her cabin to fall asleep.

  Sophie had conked out first, sleep-mumbling about Shakespeare’s allergies. Slimey and Melman had been under Melman’s sheets-turned-fort, chortling about art or soccer or whatever. Then, probably because art and soccer are not chortle-worthy, they’d split ways and gone to bed. Missi had drifted off sometime before Jamie stole her leftover Visiting Day candy. Now Missi slept with two gummy kittens buried in her frizz, thanks to Jenny’s dare and Jamie’s obedience. And Jamie was latched on to Missi’s waist, cuddle-spoon style, fast asleep.