Okay, so it had to happen sometime.
That morning at eight, to be exact.
The start of summer school!
I don’t know how much you need to hear about this. You’ve been to school. You’ve taken English and social studies and math and all that stuff. The only real difference was that this school was held in a couple of tents on the camp grounds, with signs on them that said the fun starts here!
I was starting to figure out that the people at Camp Wannamorra had a whole different definition of fun than I did.
One surprise was that the girls came over for school in the morning too. I even saw Georgia, but we just kind of waved at each other and kept moving. It’s not like we were in the same classes or anything.
My group included me, Dweebs, Smurf, and Booger Eater, which was another big surprise.
“I kind of thought you’d be in with the brain patrol,” I said. But Booger Eater shrugged it off.
“My mom thinks I could use some extra help,” he said.
Still, it seemed weird. He just looked smart. Not to mention that he always had some kind of book surgically attached to his arm. It was hard to imagine a kid like that not being good at school.
First period was science. The Challenge Program kids went off to study the lake or something while my group sat in a tent and learned about the human circulatory system… just like I’d learned about it (kind of) at Hills Village Middle School.
Second period was English. Mostly, the teacher talked about the play we were going to put on that summer, You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. I didn’t know what that had to do with English, but I guess it could have been worse.
Third period was social studies. (Are you getting bored yet?)
I was just starting to wonder if that morning was ever going to end, when I walked into fourth-period math. That’s when I saw our math teacher for the first time.
“Hi, everyone,” she said. “I’m Katie Kim. Nice to meet you all.”
Her name was Katie Kim.
Katie Kim.
Did I already say Katie Kim? I just wanted to make sure that you knew her name. It was Katie Kim.
Listen, I don’t know what love is supposed to feel like, but I definitely had something at first sight that morning. She even made me forget about math for a little while.
Actually, scratch that. It doesn’t take anything for me to forget about math. But Katie Kim made me just a little bit glad I was there.
I’m not going to say she was the best teacher in the world, because to tell you the truth, I don’t really know. I mean, I heard all the words coming out of her mouth, but I wasn’t really putting them together into sentences. I was just sitting there, thinking about how much I wished Katie Kim wouldn’t ever stop talking.
I mean, it’s not like I thought something was going to happen. No way, no how. She was at least in college, and I was… me. But still, I’ve never felt that way about a teacher, ever, ever, ever—unless Jeanne Galletta counted. She was my tutor back in Hills Village, but that wasn’t the same.
Nobody was the same as Katie Kim.
Katie Kim. That was her name. Did I already mention that? Is this getting a little stupid? I don’t care. It was still great!
