EIGHT

“CAMP IS REALLY OVER TOMORROW?” Golfy asks me. We’re sitting on the basketball courts after our evening program, and there’s chatter all around us. The air smells sticky and wet like freshly mowed grass after a rainstorm. I look up, and I see there are a million stars in the sky—way more than I’d ever see in Brookside. The crickets are making their metally hissing sound and it sounds louder than it usually does. I think they’re sad, too, that camp is ending tomorrow. “How is that even possible?”

“I have no clue, but it is,” I reply. “Maybe next summer I can stay for the whole eight weeks, although Kaylan would probably kill me, and I’m not sure I could leave her for that long.”

Golfy nods. “Yeah.”

I keep looking around for my friends, and I’ll spot them for a second but then they’ll disappear, lost in the crowd.

I roll my lips together, wishing I had lip balm in my pocket. “You always stay the whole summer?”

“Always, since I was seven,” Golfy replies. “Hey, do you want to go see a really cool place?” He hops up. “You’re gonna love it.”

“Uh. Sure.” I look at him for a second, starting to laugh. “I love really cool places.” I don’t even really know what I’m saying. When Golfy’s around, everything just feels silly and funny and easygoing.

I scan the crowd to find Zoe or Alice or Hana, but I don’t see any of them. I sort of overheard them talking about making a memory box for me, but I pretended I didn’t hear because I know they want it to be a surprise.

He puts his hands in his pockets. “Okay, so I’m actually going to show you two things because I just remembered another thing I want to show you. Okay?”

“Um, sure,” I say, walking along with him. “So no one calls you Golfy at home, right?”

He laughs. “No, of course not. At home, I’m just Jonah.”

“Just Jonah sounds like the name of a one-man show that’s off-off-off-off-Broadway,” I tell him, and he cracks up.

“It totally does!”

He stops walking. “Okay, so here’s the first stop, which is actually what I just remembered I had to show you.”

We’re standing outside of a bunk at the top of the hill, where the oldest campers live. They’re shaped like tents and they’re really old and only like six kids can fit in them.

I look at Golfy and wait for him to tell me what I’m supposed to be looking for.

“See that name?” he says.

“Um, there are a million names here,” I remind him. Graffiti is something that’s not really allowed at camp but still happens anyway.

“Nathan Malkin, 1980,” Golfy says. “Did you know my dad went here, too?”

I shrug. “Yeah, I kind of heard that, I think.”

“I always think it’s cool to find his name around camp, like he was actually a kid once, and a counselor here, and it just feels so funny but cool at the same time, ya know?”

“Yeah, definitely.”

For a second, I imagine my parents as kids and teenagers, and I wonder what they were like. I wonder how they would have felt if their parents decided on a tablecloth color without consulting them first. I wonder how people thought of them: Were they anxious Kaylan types? Or were they more go-with-the-flow?

Actually, why am I even considering this? My mom was totally an anxious Kaylan type. She still is. Come to think of it, maybe that’s why it feels so easy to be friends with Kaylan.

“Okay, ready for the next stop? It’s not too far. I’ll have you back at the basketball courts in like four minutes. And then we all have to go to the lake for the final friendship circle.” He pauses and looks at me. “Are you ready for everyone to cry?”

“Um, is anyone ever ready for that?”

“Good point.”

We walk for a little while, and all of the noise of camp feels so far away. We can still hear it, but it’s muffled.

“One more promise. You have to make this one. Okay?” he asks me.

“Okay.”

“Promise you’re coming back next summer?” Golfy asks.

“Oh, definitely.”

There’s this thing with Golfy where it kind of feels like I’ve known him my whole life. Like maybe we were both born in the same hospital, and we don’t know it. Or our parents knew each other when they were kids. There’s this cosmic connection kind of feeling I get with him, but it feels too soon to tell him that. I know the tell a boy how we really feel thing is on this summer’s list, but I don’t think that’s the thing, or this is the time for that anyway.

“Okay, close your eyes,” he says. “Just for a second.”

My heart pounds, but I don’t know why. I trust him, and I feel totally cool in this situation, but it’s still a little strange to not know what’s about to happen. “Um, okay.”

I put my hand over my eyes, and he guides me just the tiniest bit like that.

“Okay, open them,” he says.

I look around, and I swear we haven’t walked that far but I still have no idea where we are.

We’re standing in front of a teeny-tiny waterfall that flows through a tree and down into a little babbling brook. It looks so perfect, like someone made this for a school project or something—constructed it just so and got it to look exactly the way they wanted it to.

“This is my favorite place at camp,” Golfy says. “I’ll tell you a secret if you promise not to tell anyone else?”

“We’re making a lot of promises today, did you realize that?” I giggle.

“You’re right,” he says. “So does that mean you’re promising? Again?”

I crack up. “Yeah.”

“Sometimes I come here in the afternoon when we have free time, and I just, like, sit here and stare at the waterfall.” He pauses and looks me right in my eyes, and all of a sudden there’s a shiver down my back. A good shiver. “Like for a long time. Is that so weird?”

It’s not really all that weird, just a little unusual because I’ve never heard a boy talk like this before. And also they don’t usually sit still for long stretches.

“You haven’t answered,” Golfy says.

“Oh, I got lost in thought,” I reply, laughing a little. “No, I don’t think it’s that weird. I mean, maybe it’s a little unique. But it’s good to just sit and be with nature sometimes. I think so anyway.”

“Thanks for reassuring me I’m not the strangest person in the world.” He pauses and looks at me. “Do you want to sit for a second?”

“What about getting me back to the basketball courts in four minutes? We’re so getting in trouble, Golfy.”

“Okay, you’re right.”

We stand there staring at the waterfall and then he puts his arm around my shoulder, and we stay like that. I still want to get back to my friends and the basketball court, but I also want to stay in this moment, too. It’s strange to be really happy in a moment you’re in, but then also kind of want to be somewhere else at the same time. I guess the best option would be the ability to split yourself in half and get to be in both places.

Golfy leans his head on my shoulder, and I have no idea what’s about to happen.

“Okay, we’re running out of time and I just want to do one more thing but I don’t know how to do it, so can I just come out and ask you?” Golfy says, talking more quickly than I’ve ever heard him talk before.

I nod, and he picks his head up from my shoulder and moves his arm away, and then he’s standing in front of me. The rushing of the waterfall seems to get louder, and then it’s the only sound I can hear, like the whole world is this patch of grass and this waterfall and this tree.

“Camp’s over tomorrow, and I may not see you for a whole year, but you already promised you’ll come back next summer, so I’m not worried about that. But . . .” He stops talking. My heart races and I can’t stop biting my lip.

“Golfy! Please just tell me,” I blurt out, half laughing.

“Can I please kiss you?” he asks. “I have to tell you I’ve never kissed a girl before, and I don’t know what I’m doing, and please don’t tell anyone. But can I?”

I put my hands on his shoulders. I’ve never done that before, but in this moment it just kind of feels right and okay. “First of all, it’s not like I’ve kissed a million boys. Most people I know haven’t kissed anyone.” I smile. “I’ll just stand here and you can kiss me, and don’t worry, you really can’t mess it up.”

So that last part may have been a little bit of a lie because of what happened with Kaylan and Jason and the redo, but I think that’s pretty rare, and I don’t want to make Golfy nervous.

“Okay,” he says, and rubs his palms on his shorts. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

He leans his head in a little, and I lean my head in a little, and our lips touch. We’re standing in front of a waterfall and I’m kissing a boy and it’s summer and I’m away from home and when we pull apart we see a shooting star.

None of this feels like real life.