Chapter 5

The camp bus screeches to the corner sounding like a giant pterodactyl, its doors yawning open like jaws ready to swallow us up.

The bad news is that I’m saying goodbye to David Lynch Film Camp for now. But the good news is that their website mentions a special end-of-summer two-week session. This is an advanced, invitation-only seminar based on a short film submission. Plus they offer financial aid.

So I figure if I if I do a good job participating at Camp Challah, make some friends, and make a great, short opus, I can score an invitation and convince mom and dad to let me go.

While other kids say quick goodbyes to their parents and start filing onto the bus, Mom gives Lily and me happy bon voyage hugs. I overhear Dad giving Lily the talk about having a good attitude.

“. . . Keep an eye on . . . Noah . . . blah, blah, blah . . . Noah . . .” he says, speaking really low.

Lily makes a gaggy sound at the back of her throat and rolls her eyes.

“Have fun!” Mom sings, looking all nervous like she’s afraid I might not.

Dad pats me on the back. “Yeah, have fun and . . . Noah, for God’s sake, try to read the room.”

Simon is standing nearby with his parents. They’re what my mom would call a handsome couple, and they have super good posture. Plus their clothes seem pretty fancy for saying goodbye at the bus stop.

Simon’s dad calls him “son” a lot, and they’re saying something about rallying, giving it his all, and making American friends.

The minute they’re back in their car, Simon goes back to brooding and sweeping through his phone, probably looking at pictures of his mates. As for me, I’ve rolled up the brochure to the DLFC and shoved it into one of my socks.

“Gettin’ in?” grunts the bus driver in a way that seems more like telling than asking.

I grab my camera headpiece from my backpack, secure it around my head, and step up into the bus.

“Hey,” Lily whispers sharply from behind. “Take that thing off. Now.”

“But I’m filming my short opus for the DLFC extended summer program,” I whisper back.

“Well, you look freaky,” she answers.

“Actually, he looks like a guy who does construction on the highway at night,” Simon remarks, climbing up the steps behind us.

“And that’s better?” she says.

“Well, maybe not,” he says, flashing a toothy white smile. “Don’t think we’ve formally met. I’m Simon. From London.” He says that last part like it’s super important.

“Uh huh.” Lily looks down at her phone and slides past me down the aisle.

“Well, that went well,” Simon mumbles.

“Don’t take it personally,” I say. “She’s not friendly—unless you’re popular.”

“Maybe I should be popular,” Simon says softly, his eyes sliding toward her.

“She’s also mad because she doesn’t want to go to camp either,” I say.

As I make my way down the aisle, kids glance up, then look down. I get that a lot. It’s like, “Oh, it’s just you. Not interested.”

My stomach wobbles, and I wipe my clammy hands down the front of my T-shirt.

“Sit down, Noah.” Simon nudges me gently from behind.

“Sit down!” echoes the bus driver, lifting one sharply outlined orange eyebrow.

The doors shut, and the bus jerks forward.

“Grab a seat,” Simon urges me again.

Right away, Lily’s cool-dar connects with some cute girls sitting toward the back. She catches their eyes. They smile and slide over. And, bam, she’s in.

How does she do that?

Moving forward, I nervously scan for a place, but every kid with a window seat throws a backpack on the open seat in rhythm. Slam, Slam, Slam.

I’m closing in on the back. Not good. That’s usually where the mean kids sit.

Two big guys with short necks, looking like they already shave, sneer at me. They’re like a pair of unfriendly Rottweilers behind a chain-link fence, tethered together at the neck, watching their next meal approach.

“Do you have guys like that in London?” I whisper over my shoulder to Simon.

“Yeah. Best to sit anywhere soon,” he warns, and with that, someone makes room for him, and he slides into a now-empty seat.

“Sit down now!” the bus driver barks, not even glancing in her rearview mirror. I wonder if she has some kind of bionic sensors under her beehive hair.

“Hey, you! What’s that on your head?” one of the big Rottweilers says. “Are you a roach exterminator or something?”

Kids laugh. Lily glares at me.

“Yeah, sit down, roach guy,” the other one says, making them both guffaw.

Suddenly, the bus jolts to a stop, and I fall forward. I try to grab one of the seat handles, but my already sweaty hands—now super sweaty—slide off the metal bar, and I stumble right into the bigger Rottweiler’s lap.

The bus explodes in laughter.

I squirm to right myself, but between the narrow seat and the weight of my backpack, I’m wedged in tight.

“Get off!” he yells, pushing me hard.

But I can only roll and squirm, roll and squirm.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” I mumble, my face squashed against his chest. The other Rottweiler is giggling hysterically at a surprisingly high pitch.

Finally, between his shoving and my squirming, I’m on my feet.

“Sorry. My backpack got me stuck. It’s like being a turtle.”

Somewhere I think I hear Simon groan. Maybe that wasn’t the right thing to say.

“Hey Mike, you got a turtle friend,” the other Rottweiler giggles. “A little turtle friend sitting in your lap.”

“Shut up, Jake!” he snaps.

A white-hot burn crawls up my cheeks, and the loud muffled roar of kids sounds like a beach seashell at my ear.

But they’re not just laughing at me. Rottweiler Mike’s face flushes bright red too. He grabs a handful of my shirt, bumping my headpiece askew, and glares into my eyes.

“Listen, Turtle,” he says, and his breath smells like he just ate a whole pizza with extra garlic. “We’ve been coming to this camp for four years. Now, I don’t wanna be mean or anything . . .”

He doesn’t want to be mean?!

“’Cause I’m not a bad guy,” Mike declares. “But I can tell already that you’re the kind of kid who messes stuff up. Maybe not even on purpose. Maybe you don’t even know you’re, like, in the way or causin’ problems or anything.”

This conversation is turning into one of those talks I have with the school counselor.

“But I got stuff to do this summer,” he says. “Business to attend to. And I need to do it right. To concentrate.”

He needs to concentrate on business? At camp?

“So you stay out of my way, and I’ll stay out of yours,” he says. “But mess me up, and I’m gonna mess you up.”

“ ’Kay,” I squeak, feeling like I’m gonna pass out from the fumes of his breath.

I have no idea what he’s talking about but, fortunately, the bus grinds to a stop, and more kids get on, breaking the tension. Mike releases me with a shove.

I’m feeling kind of weird, like totally lost, and my stomach is starting to hurt. These camp kids are tough, and I haven’t even gotten to camp yet.

Suddenly, a gray backpack decorated with about a million pins creeps over an empty seat. Then, bam, it’s on the floor. Someone is making room for me!

I throw myself into the vacated seat.

“Thanks!” I beam at the girl sitting by the window.

She stares at me over the top of her book then brushes away a frizzy tendril of brown hair that’s escaped from one of her two long braids. She seems like someone who likes nature, in her green-beige T-shirt that looks like it’s been washed too many times, tan cargo shorts, and scuffed-up brown hiking boots.

And there’s a row of small earrings crawling up around the side of each ear. They’re cartilage piercings, and I know this because a few months ago, Lily wanted cartilage piercings but Dad was like, “That’s not happening.”

“For making room, I mean,” I add.

She lifts her book up higher.

“Because there was nowhere to sit and you made room.”

“Yeah.” She shifts her body toward the window.

“’Cause I was standing and had nowhere to sit. And I think that guy in the back is super mad at me. Doesn’t he look like a Rottweiler?”

She makes a very loud sighing noise, shifts her whole body toward the window, and lifts the book up so that it covers her whole face.

“Hi,” I say, leaning toward her. “Watcha reading?”

She holds the book up for me to see.

“Plastics: The Silent Killer,” I read aloud. “Is that science fiction? My sister Lily used to love to read about hot supernatural guys. Now she likes to read about time travel.”

“It’s about the environment,” she says flatly. “How people are destroying the planet with plastic so they can keep their veggies in containers that burp.”

“Containers that burp?”

“Like when you close them and make them airtight?” she says, like it’s a question. Then she raises an eyebrow like she’s pretty sure I don’t get it, which I don’t.

Sighing and looking exasperated, she turns toward me and points to her oversized T-shirt.

“Um . . . nice shirt,” I say uncertainly.

“No, this,” she emphatically jabs her chest with her finger.

I lean in and read the faded words: Earth is Dying.

“Ah. Gotcha.” I nod like I understand, but I have so many questions I want to ask her.

I want to know why Earth is dying. Is it only because of plastic burping containers or other things? And how long does it have to live? Does she know for a fact that it’s dying, or does she just think so? Will we have any warning? Or will it just be dead one morning? And how will we know?

I’m just about to launch into a bunch of questions when I remember what Dad said about reading people’s faces. Her face looks like it wants to bite me.

“I’m Noah,” I finally say.

“Hey,” she grumbles, then places two earbuds in her ears. She turns and gazes out the window, balancing her scruffy work boots up on a black guitar case at her feet. The name Mia is written across it in squiggly gold paint. I guess that’s her.

We cruise onto the highway. After a while, everyone sways into the ride, listens to music, or plays on their phones. It seems pretty clear that Mia is engrossed in her dead Earth book, so I pull out my phone to upload my latest film footage, when I hear a voice mumbling low.

“Huh? Are you talking to me, Mia?” I turn to her. “I hope you’re not mad, Mia, that I guessed your name’s Mia, but it’s on your guitar case, unless it’s someone else’s guitar case, but why would a girl who’s not Mia have a case with the name Mia on it and . . .”

From the bottom of her throat comes this weird growly vibrating sound, and it grows stronger until it’s just the right volume.

And I realize she’s not talking to me at all.

She’s singing softly, a tuneless kind of song that starts out with mumbles and grows into formed words. Some of the verses are awkward rhymes, and the chorus is something about recycling, the crying earth, mangled plastics, lady times of the month and lunar cycles, her Bat Mitzvah, and starting a new chapter in her life.

And she does this all the way to Camp Challah.