Say You Still Love Me(6)

After spending two years with David, fit bodies alone don’t immediately grab my attention anymore.

But there’s something about this guy . . .

The way he moves, that slender nose, the shape of his forehead, that hair color . . .

It’s been years, and he looks so different, but . . .

I frown and my feet falter as I watch him climb the steps. No. It can’t possibly be him.

It can’t be the boy who broke my heart.

“Kyle?” I call out.





Chapter 2



THEN


2006, Camp Wawa, Day One

“Is that where we’ll be eating?” I crinkle my nose at the pavilion to our left. Two faded crimson oars crisscross the front, “Camp Wawa” scrawled across each paddle in white. The picnic tables lined up beneath the covering, on the other hand, look freshly painted, and in every color under the rainbow. There must be at least twenty of them.

My mom smiles wistfully at the structure. “Your cabin will pick a table and scribble all over it. It’ll be yours for the summer.”

“Sounds great.” I eye the dozens of sparrows that hop along the tables. Pooping, probably. As birds do. I sigh heavily. “Is there still time to quit and go to Europe?”

“You’re going to love it here, Piper. Trust me.” Nothing I say seems to dampen the nostalgic buzz that’s been radiating off my mother since we crossed an old one-lane bridge, about a half hour ago. “Being a summer camp counselor is a critical milestone. I wish more people got to experience it.” She turns the car into the parking area, hand over hand before shifting back to the ten-and-two position, as if demonstrating proper driving skills. That’s how she always drives. “You’ll make friends for life here. People you can call up twenty years from now, for anything, and they’ll be there for you. I promise, you won’t forget these days, ever.”

“Most traumatic events are hard to forget.” I watch four teenage girls trudge past Mom’s car like a pack of Sherpas, giant backpacks strapped to their bodies, fluffy pillows and sleeping bag rolls tucked beneath their arms. Their matching messy ponytails and cut-off jean shorts prove what my mother warned me of this morning when I entered the kitchen in a silky patterned sundress and jeweled sandals—that I’m highly overdressed for Camp Wawa’s counselor orientation day. “And I’ve been to camp before, remember? White Pine? I hated it.” Falling asleep to the sound of three roommates breathing for four weeks? Not a shred of privacy unless you locked yourself in the bathroom? No, thanks.

“That was not a real camp. Real camps don’t put their kids up in suites and serve meals on fine china. That was Constance’s influence, and I should have known better than to ever listen to her,” she mutters bitterly, throwing the car into park. She and my dad’s mother will only ever see eye-to-eye when they’re both six feet under, their corpses facing each other. “And, besides, you’ve never been a counselor before. It’s a whole different ball game.”

I sigh. “But why does it have to be at a camp three hours away from home?”

“Oh, look! They still have the wishing well!” she exclaims, ignoring my grumbles, waving her lacquered fingernails toward a circular stone-and-wood structure. The lake peeking through the row of tall, scraggly pine trees beyond it is a dark, cold, uninviting blue. “This brings back so many good memories. I always looked forward to my summers here.”

“You grew up in a whole different world than me, Mom.” Public school and family camping vacations at state parks; a tiny two-bedroom farmhouse and sharing a room with Aunt Jackie; drugstore hair-dye boxes and Sears shopping sprees once a year for back-to-school. A station wagon with a gaping hole in the floor of the front passenger seat, if Gramps’s stories are true.

It’s a far cry from the life she married into, the life I know—of a sprawling six-bedroom luxury home, of private school that costs more than many people earn in a year, ski vacations at our Aspen chalet in the winter, and lazy summer days at our beach house on Martha’s Vineyard, if we’re not jetting off somewhere. I know I’m lucky, and I never take it for granted. But gratitude only goes so far. “If you’re going to force me into this—and, by the way, I’m pretty sure there are parenting studies that speak out against this sort of thing—couldn’t I have at least gone to White Pine?”

She glares at me. “You just said you hated White Pine!”

“Yeah, but at least the rooms are air-conditioned.” The website for this place says I’m going to “become one with nature in a charmingly cozy cabin that holds ten campers and two counselors.” Translation: packed into a crowded, stuffy shed for the next eight weeks. With bugs.

“Trust me, Piper. We’re doing you a favor. It’ll be good for you to experience another side of life. The normal side. I’ve tried my best to keep you grounded, but . . . this’ll help teach you to be more conscious of our wealth.”

I struggle not to roll my eyes. Mom’s always talking about how we should try living a more “normal life,” like “normal people.” Ironically, the topic usually comes up as she’s flipping through the catalogue for her next new sports car, or writing a check to pay the caterers for the latest party she’s hosted, or pouring a celebratory glass of pricey cognac for my father when he closes his latest multimillion-dollar deal.