When the news reached Vivian, she felt a small twinge of sympathy before the glee set in. She’d been stung by a bee once, in Central Park, while she was just sitting by herself under a tree. The little buzzer had come out of nowhere, and she’d ended up walking all by herself to the drugstore to buy medicine since her parents were at work, as usual. Even with the medication, the bite had been itchy and swollen for a week.
She couldn’t imagine how badly it would hurt to be stung as many times as Archie was. The whole camp was talking about it. “A hundred times,” one of the Rainbow Smelts said that night at dinner. “He was stung all over his body!”
Still, if Vivian wanted to win their bet, she had to push that feeling of sympathy as far down as possible and think about strategy instead. Already her well-placed comments about his homesickness had led to better results than she had ever expected. So she had to think how she could use this latest setback to her advantage. Archie may have considered himself the chess master, but it was his overconfidence that would be his downfall, she was sure of it.
She’d guessed right that any parents, hearing how homesick their kid was—and from a counselor, no less—would be sure to come for Parents’ Day. Even all the way from South Jersey. But she’d only hoped the unexpected visit would keep him busy all day, not land him in the infirmary as the camp’s most-talked-about patient a half hour after the families arrived.
Still, she knew if she’d been handed a chance like this one, she had to grab it.
That night, once the Rainbow Smelts were settled into their bunks, she waited patiently until she could hear the breathing of all of her fellow campers grow slower, the whispers and giggles fading into nothingness and sleep. She willed herself to stay awake, pinching the inside of her upper arm every time she felt herself dozing off. Once she was convinced everyone else was finally sleeping, she slowly shifted herself out of bed, trying in vain to keep the rickety bunk from creaking or shaking.
“Vivian?” Sasha’s sleepy voice drifted down from the top bunk. “Is that you?”
Great, Vivian thought. This is exactly what I need. She tried to keep the displeasure out of her voice. “Just going to the bathroom.”
“Oh, are you okay? Are you sick or something?”
“I’m fine, Sash, just go back to sleep.”
Sasha didn’t answer. Vivian hoped she’d fallen back asleep. As stealthily as she could, she stood up from the bunk and slipped out through the broken screen in the cabin’s front door without opening it. At least that was one benefit of that door, even if it did let in armies of mosquitoes.
Once she was outside in the cool night air, she let out her breath. She hadn’t realized she’d been holding it since Sasha spoke. Then as quickly as she could walk without making any noise, she headed down the path to the arts and crafts cabin. She’d already plotted out a route that kept her away from any of the places the counselors might be, like the mess hall or the infirmary.
This is going to be easier than I thought it would be, she thought to herself as she ducked behind the bushes under the back window of the arts and crafts cabin. All she had to do was push open the window, climb through, get the paints, and then make it back to her bed before anyone noticed she was gone.
She’d just begun to ease open the window—it was sticky, and a bit higher up on the outside than it had been when she’d opened it earlier in the day—when she saw motion out of the corner of her eye. A boy, his face in shadows from the trees. But that didn’t matter. She knew that boy.
It was Oliver, Archie’s not-so-little sidekick.
Without thinking, she ran.