Archive of Our Own

There are a lot of things that make summer camp stupid. First and foremost, sharing space with multiple winged insects. Second (and related), the lack of real distinction between the outdoors and the indoors. Third, the outdoors. Fourth, all of the outdoor-related activities. Fifth, the food. Sixth, having to spend six weeks being referred to as “Alexis’ brother.” Seventh, the inevitable and cumulative sweat, bruising, bug-bites, and rashes. From being outdoors.

One thing that is decidedly not stupid about summer camp? Watching your very cute, very sporty, very glistening boyfriend take his shirt off in the middle of the daily after-lunch pick-up soccer game.

David Rose has been a reluctant camp-goer at Camp Sunrise Bay since he was ten years old. The last two years, however, he’s been considerably less reluctant thanks to the existence of one Patrick Brewer. Upon Patrick’s arrival the summer after Grade Eight, his sweet smile and dry wit instantly took up half of David’s social life and all of David’s daydreams. David spent the last two summers basking in Patrick’s glow, and the last two school years pining for it. Then, this summer, when Patrick got off the bus and saw David, he had a twinkle in his eye. Patrick kissed David on the third night, after the campfire, behind Pine Cone Cabin.

David whoops loudly when Patrick’s wet t-shirt hits the ground. Patrick turns to see him, smiles broadly, and winks.

“I’m jealous and I hate it,” says Stevie next to him. Stevie is the other half of David’s aforementioned social life. She’s the original. Established c. 2014.

“Of me or of him?” David wiggles his eyebrows. They’re sitting in the shade of a big sycamore overlooking the field, sharing a bag of M&Ms from the vending machine.

“That’s disgusting.” Stevie deadpans. “Neither. I’m jealous of the whole camp fling thing. I want a camp fling thing.”

David smiles and leans back on the trunk of the tree, resuming his appreciative gaze of the soccer field. He watches as Patrick dribbles closer to one of the goals, and then as Ted gets in his space, stealing the ball in one quick motion.

Patrick breaks away from the game and runs over to them. “Do you guys want to play?” he asks, which he asks almost every day.

David shakes his head. “No. You go away so I can ogle you.”

Patrick chuckles and says, “You got it.” He shimmies his shoulders as he backs away toward the game.

“Can you imagine if we went over there right now and tried to join?” He muses aloud.

“Unfortunately,” Stevie replies.

They both know what would happen. It’s happened before. Due to their complete lack of athletic ability, some of the players would roll their eyes and complain about having to take the time. Some would just watch. But some, and worst of all, would be excited and encouraging (Patrick) at first but would shortly become frustrated when David or Stevie couldn’t kick the ball right or run fast enough, and then stop passing them the ball.

The idea is equally ridiculous since both David and Stevie are in their signature high tops and holey jeans.

"You know, it’s really unfair that they get to take over the whole field every day,” says Stevie.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, what if we wanted the field?”

David hums in agreement. They’ve had this conversation a few times before. It always goes the same way. One of them complains about how they don’t get enough physical activity, and then the other complains about not liking physical activity. Then, they go into all of the reasons they feel that way. They talk about how gym class in school is always humiliating. They talk about how when it came time to play school sports in Grade Six, they were already behind all the other kids who had been playing volleyball and basketball and soccer their whole lives.

“I mean, how are we supposed to learn if everybody else is already so good, they don’t want to play with us?” Stevie whines. “It’s so unfair. Maybe I want to get better, you know? Maybe I would like to play soccer, but because I’m a girl, nobody lets me learn! It’s so frustrating. So, I’ll just have zero upper body strength and hand-eye coordination forever.”

David doesn’t bring up the fact that he’s a boy. As far as his athletic experiences are concerned, everybody puts him in the same category as the girls (even if they don’t say it out loud). Little League doesn’t count, he thinks. He recalls running the bases in the wrong direction that time in Grade One and cringes. He did not go back.

Besides, David doesn’t want to argue with Stevie. He’s in complete agreement. Pretty much everything to do with physical activity gives him anxiety. He doesn’t want to exercise or play sports in front of anybody because it’s way too exposed and vulnerable; and he doesn’t want to exercise by himself because he doesn’t want to do it wrong and get hurt.

Last week, Patrick made him play ping-pong on the porch of the mess hall. At first, it was embarrassing and difficult. He couldn’t hit the ball, or if he did, it went flying out-of-bounds. But Patrick was so patient and unbothered, that after a while, David got the hang of it and they played for an hour—laughing and being flirtatiously competitive. He wishes all sports and exercise were like that. He wishes that there was someone—or a group of someones—who would show him how to do it, and give him lots of time to adjust and learn, and not care that he’s a beginner. Not care that he’s a beginner and not care if he never actually gets very good.

Patrick could be that person for some things. One-on-one things like ping-pong and tennis, maybe skills like hitting a baseball or shooting a basketball. But only if they were alone. If there were any more people involved, David would get too embarrassed and Patrick…. Well, Patrick would get way too competitive.

“I wish there were such a thing as a beginners-only game,” says David.

“Right?” agrees Stevie. “I bet it wouldn’t be allowed because it would be considered ‘exclusive.’”

“The counselors don’t get it. They’re all sporty people. They think that just because Tennessee and Heather are playing that the game is inclusive.” Tennessee and Heather are two girls who are part of the daily game. But they have both been playing organized soccer since they were two years old. They’re way better than all of the boys—and way more competitive.

“What if we tried it?”

“Tried what?”

“What if we tried to reserve the field sometime—like, for some other time during the day—and we had a beginner’s pick-up game?”

David tries to picture it. Running down the field with a soccer ball—tripping over it, backtracking, fumbling, falling over—and getting it close to the goal and trying to shoot it in, with nobody watching him but other people who are equally terrible at it.

“I want that,” David says.

Stevie turns around, looking excited. “Yeah?”

David rolls his eyes. “I can’t imagine we would be able to pull it off without somebody butting their stupid jock nose in it. But honestly? That would be amazing.”

“Let’s try it!” Stevie says. She’s acting uncharacteristically motivated and it’s making David uneasy.

“Ugh, Stevie, how would we even pull it off?”

“I don’t know, but we can go try and find out.” She stands up and puts her hands on her hips, surveying the field in front of her, and then the camp buildings behind her. “C’mon, let’s go see if it’s possible to reserve the field.”

David groans, and then follows. Before they get far, he hears someone call, “David!” When he turns around, Patrick is jogging toward them. “Where are you going?” Patrick stops short in front of him. He’s panting. And still shirtless.

David looks at Patrick up and down with relish. Patrick notices and grins his golden-boy grin. David doesn’t want to tell him about what he and Stevie are thinking. He’ll try to be helpful, he’ll want to come, he’ll try to give them pointers and advice. Which is all the exact opposite of the point.

So, David says, “We’re bored and hot. We’re gonna go swimming.” It’s not a total lie. They are probably going to swim later.

Patrick makes a pout and David wants to kiss it. They’re officially boyfriends, so he can. He leans over, carefully avoiding contact with Patrick’s sweaty torso, and presses his lips to Patrick’s. He tastes like salt, sunscreen, and sunshine. Patrick interrupts the kiss to say, “You don’t want to stay and watch me win this?”

Instead of answering, David leans in for another kiss. Patrick hums in approval. Stevie makes a gagging noise.

When they separate, Patrick looks appeased, and a little starry-eyed. “I guess we’ll meet up later?”

David tries to look nonchalant and cool. He knows he’s failed because he can’t help the smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Yep.”

David and Stevie find out that there is, in fact, a sign-up sheet for reserving the field in the camp office, though nobody usually bothers to use it. Mr. Roland is in the office today and they have to endure an agonizing ten minutes of inane conversation before they can get their hands on it.

“So, what is it that you kids are planning on using the field for?” He asks.

David doesn’t want to tell him, and neither does Stevie based on the wide eyes she’s making at him.

“We, uh, want to use it for dance practice,” David tries. “We want to do a coordinated dance for the talent show.”

Stevie wrinkles her nose, but David watches Mr. Roland’s eyes glaze over, so he’s pretty sure he picked a good fib. Stevie reserves the field for the hour after dinner, during which time the sporty boys have a habit of playing basketball.

The next step is to tell people. Twyla is the first natural choice. She’s their friend, and she’s always by herself in the art room. She’s definitely not athletic and nobody ever thinks to include her in stuff.

“That sounds really fun,” Twyla says. “But I don’t know the rules for soccer.”

“That’s the point,” says Stevie, conspiratorially. “You don’t have to know. We’re all terrible!”

“But don’t tell anybody,” David warns. “If any of the boys find out, it’ll ruin the whole thing.” David isn’t worried about Heather or Tennessee—they won’t care at all. They’re in lifeguard training after dinner anyway.

They also tell Alexis. She doesn’t have the same hang-ups about her body as David does, and she can run laps around him—but her hand-eye coordination is terrible. “I’m in!” She claps her hands for emphasis.

They tell a few more people—some of the more introverted A Capella girls, a couple of the less athletic boys, even some of the younger kids. Though, David warns Stevie to keep it to a minimum because “none of them can keep their yappy mouths shut.” In the end, they get twelve people together.

He should’ve told Twyla not to talk about it at all, even to him and Stevie.

“Hey guys, see you after dinner!” She says, passing them by in the mess hall.

“What’s happening after dinner?” Patrick asks.

David panics and can’t think of an answer that’s not an extremely blatant lie.

“We’re hanging out,” Stevie says, cool as ice.

Patrick raises his eyebrows at David. “Are we hanging out later?” He points between them.

The puppy-dog eyes on Patrick make David feel all gooey, and he leans over on his elbow with his face in his hand to get closer. Patrick smells like Irish Spring and, underneath, sweet boy scent. “Aren’t you playing basketball after dinner?”

Patrick shrugs. “I don’t have to.” He moves his face closer to David’s.

“It’s okay,” says David, he’s basically whispering now. “We’ll hang out after, and then we’ll hang out at the campfire together, and then we can hang out after that too.”

Patrick beams, as if that isn’t exactly what they’ve done every day for the past four weeks, and it makes David’s stomach flip-flop. “Okay,” Patrick says, and David lifts his head to place a chaste kiss on his temple.

There’s an air of excitement on the field that evening, and it makes David feel vindicated. He thinks Stevie feels the same way because her usual placid expression has been replaced with one of interest and attention.

They have brought four balls, which they had a hell of a time finding. Turns out, they are kept in the sports shed behind the mess hall. David didn’t know there was such a thing as a sports shed.

Everybody’s circled up, and David drops the bag of balls as he and Stevie approach.

“So, what do we do, guys?” asks Twyla.

Stevie shrugs. “I don’t know. Play soccer, I guess.”

They split in half, and pick goalies. One of the younger kids tells them they’re supposed to “kick-off” from the middle, so they do. David and Stevie face off first, and he kicks the ball before she does, and it goes flying somewhere he didn’t intend. Not that he had much of an intention.

It goes just like that. Everybody runs for the ball and they make more contact with each other than the ball. There’s some running in the wrong direction on the part of Twyla and David. There are a few moments where one person tries to pass to another person and it doesn’t go anywhere. David watches Alexis run after the ball on her tiptoes, screaming in delight the whole way.

At one point, one of the A Capella girls, Grace, passes the ball to David. He sees it coming and swings his leg back and then forward and kicks the ball hard with his toe. It goes flying across the field. It’s way out of bounds, but everybody cheers anyway and it feels so good, David doesn’t mind chasing after it himself.

He doesn’t know what to do with his arms when he’s running, but he doesn’t worry about it. Every time he runs across the field, he has to stop to lean over and catch his breath, but it doesn’t matter, because so do most of them. Even the ones who can handle the running have to spend several seconds contemplating the ball before they can kick it.

It’s glorious.

It doesn’t last.

“Hey! Could you guys use some more players?” David whips around and sees Patrick jogging toward them from the other side of the camp. He’s followed by Ted, Mutt, Grant, Jake, Ken, and Gary. All the sporty high school boys. Apparently, basketball wasn’t distracting enough.

David’s heart sinks.

When Patrick reaches him, he whispers, “I saw you playing. I thought you guys could use some help.”

David starts saying, “No, thank you, get outta here,” but before he can get the words out, Patrick is already in the middle of the field, grabbing the ball. He starts yelling instructions. He’s dividing the sports boys into two teams and they start kicking the ball around. Then, David watches Patrick start to explain something to Twyla and one of the younger girls.

“No!” David yells, and he runs up to Patrick, who looks at him quizzically. “Stop doing that!”

“Doing what?” Patrick asks.

David is frazzled, and he doesn’t know how to explain to Patrick how unfair this is.

“You’re ruining everything!” He hisses. “If you want to play, then it should be boys versus girls or us versus you.”

“What? David, that’s not fair. If we did it that way, your side would have no chance of winning.”

“So? Like this, we won’t have any chance to play!”

“What are you talking about? We’re all going to play together! Teamwork, David.”

“That’s not how it works!” David is yelling now. Maybe if he yells loud enough, Patrick will hear him.

The ball comes flying in their direction, and Patrick gets control of it by way of his chest and then dribbles it away. David waits for him to come back, but he is already caught up in the game. He watches Patrick try to pass it to Twyla, but she spins out of the way. Patrick shakes his head, chases after the ball, and then passes it to Mutt.

Fuck this, David thinks.

He turns on his heel and stalks away, bunching his fists. He kicks a pebble in his path. He’s not sure where he’s going. This is exactly why he didn’t want to tell anyone. He thinks about Patrick shaking his head at Twyla. He’s just a stupid boy. A stupid stupid butch sportsball jock boy whose head is up his stupid butt.

Patrick looks around. The game is going okay. Twyla gave up, but Stevie got a few kicks in and Alexis is basically running laps across the field. Some of the younger kids look scared of the ball, but a goal has already been made, so Patrick is gratified. Maybe he should start teaching soccer lessons after dinner. He likes soccer better than basketball. Or maybe he should teach baseball instead, it’s not a contact sport. He watches as Stevie collides with Wayne and they topple over. Definitely baseball.

The ball comes toward him and he passes it to Jake who dodges around Grant for the goal. He likes teaching. Maybe when he gets back home, he’ll coach Little League or something. That could be good.

Home.

Patrick doesn’t want to think about it. He doesn’t want to think about two weeks from now when he’ll have to go back home and start Grade Eleven four hours away from David.

David.

He and David met when they were fourteen, Patrick’s first summer at Camp Sunrise Bay. He first saw David when he got to the cabin they shared with two other boys. David brought a very fancy bedding set complete with throw pillows and, within the first three minutes of their meeting, David lectured Patrick on keeping any and all food far far away from it. Patrick liked him immediately.

David was like nobody Patrick had ever met before. He was dramatic and vibrant and had sunscreen that smelled like peaches. Other kids thought it was weird when David used big words or made references to obscure famous people. But instead of being put-off, Patrick felt strangely protective of him. He stuck by David closely, and they became fast friends. They stole snacks from each other’s care packages, shared headphones to listen to each other’s music, celebrated each other’s summer birthdays, and told each other secrets.

It wasn’t until the very end of the second summer when Patrick’s feelings toward David started taking a different shape. It was so hard to say good-bye, and Patrick was left with a sharp ache in his chest for days.

During that school year, Patrick talked to David more than anybody else. He told David stuff about music, his parents and his cousins, kisses with girls, and his first high school party with alcohol. David told Patrick about not fitting in at school, about his dreams of going to art or fashion school, and about the ongoing struggle to label his sexual identity. They sent each other playlists and memes and had month-long Snap streaks.

After a while, Patrick figured it out. It wasn’t a lightning strike, it was a settling. The truth slowly collected in the basin of his consciousness and one day, it was enough for him to put into words. He liked boys, not girls, and he liked David most of all.

He looked forward to summer, resolved to do something about it. Four weeks ago, as soon as he thought David might want it, Patrick kissed him. He plans on spending as much time as possible over the next two weeks with David. Holding David. Talking with David. Kissing David.

David.

David walked off a while ago, having given up the game. Maybe he has the right idea.

“Hey guys, I’m gonna head back!” Patrick calls. Only Grant notices, and he just shrugs.

He runs back to the main area of the camp and looks around. No David. He checks their cabin, the mess hall, the rocking chairs on the front office porch. No David. So, he decides to do a lap around the grounds.

When he gets to the path to the lake, he takes it. He sees a figure sitting on the end of the pier, and as he gets closer, he sighs in relief. There he is. He’s sitting crisscross applesauce, his silhouette is illumined by the setting sun ahead of him.

When Patrick’s foot hits the wood, David turns around. When he sees that it’s Patrick, he furrows his brow and turns back around to face the water. That’s not what Patrick was expecting. His breath catches in his throat, and he approaches cautiously.

“Go away,” David says.

“David,” Patrick says. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m mad at you.”

“Really? Why? For the game?” Patrick knows that David was being huffy, but David’s huffy a lot.

“Yes.” Their exchange is scored by the sound of waves hitting the dock and jostling the canoes that are tied there.

Patrick kneels down to sit behind David. “Don’t you think you’re overre—”

“—Oh my god! If you say the word ‘overreacting’ I’m going to squash you like a bug!” David turns around, bodily this time.

“David, you hate squashing bugs. I have to squash them for you.”

“I am capable of squashing my own bugs!” David’s arms are waving around for emphasis. It usually makes Patrick laugh, but even in the fading light, Patrick can see that David is angry.

“You are,” Patrick concedes.

“I just choose not to.” David crosses his arms. He’s biting his lip. Patrick’s worried he might be about to cry.

“David,” he tries again, this time more softly, a little desperately. “What did I do?”

David exhales and doesn’t say anything for a moment. Patrick just waits.

When David speaks, his voice is thin. “Splitting players up so that there is an even distribution of good and bad players across the teams is not fairness.”

“David, wha—”

“—Let me finish. Putting Mutt and Ted on one team and Grant and Ken on the other didn’t make things fair. It’s true, it gave each team a chance of winning, but it gave everybody else exactly no chance of playing.”

“That’s not true, David. Everybody can play.”

“Oh yeah? How many times did you pass the ball to Twyla?”

Patrick thinks back to Twyla and how she left the game shortly after David and opted to sit in the grass.

“Once or twice,” he says, lamely.

“This is why I hate sports!” David throws his hands in the air. “Twyla was really excited about trying to play soccer tonight. And she had plenty of access to the ball before you showed up and ruined everything!”

Patrick is still having trouble comprehending. “But you guys weren’t playing right. I was watching you for a while before I went to get the other guys. You were knocking into each other and chasing the ball at the same time. At one point, your goal was completely unguarded—”

“—We were having fun!” David shoots back. “We were trying something that nobody ever let us try before. We might not know all the rules or all the strategy, but it was basically everybody’s first time getting to play a sports game without fucking gym teachers breathing down our necks or stupid jocks hogging the ball or our parents being embarrassed by us! It was our first time! We’re supposed to be bad!”

Patrick blinks, taken aback. He always thought of himself as really encouraging and inclusive of everyone. Did he miss something?

David continues, “I didn’t invite you for this exact reason. I knew you would want to take over and coach and like, have all your buddies there to help us. And we didn’t want that. We just wanted to try kicking a ball around without it being a whole Little Giants moment.”

Patrick’s seen that movie. It’s the one where all the misfit kids start a football team. Very triumphant.

“You don’t want a Little Giants moment?”

“No!”

Maybe David didn’t want it to be something triumphant. Maybe that’s not what David cares about.

Patrick sighs. “I’m sorry, David.”

“Yeah, well, it’s ruined now. Nobody is going to want to try again.”

“David,” Patrick says, hoping that David will look him in the eye. He doesn’t. Instead, he looks back out at the water.

“You don’t get it. You’ve always been good at sports. You think that by yelling at someone or with the right instructions, people can just do it. And when they can’t, you just shrug your shoulders and give up.” David looks at him now. “But that’s not true, Patrick. Somebody taught you when you were little. Maybe you don’t remember, but somebody was patient with you and kind to you, and didn’t judge you when you fell down or made a mistake.”

“Didn’t you have that?”

David scoffs. “Not with sports! I was always too weak or too effeminate or too afraid of dirt. Anybody with any ability to teach me gave up pretty quickly. They wrote me off. And I’m actually a boy! What about the girls? I saw you tonight. You passed Twyla the ball and when she dodged away you just gave up. She got one chance to prove herself and that was it. I bet that has happened to her every single time she has tried to play any sport. It happens to every girl.”

“But Heather and Tennessee—”

“Heather and Tennessee have parents who knew that unless they put their daughters in sports as literal infants, that they probably wouldn’t be successful athletes. A lot of time and money has been invested in getting them to where they are now. Their parents made sure that every time somebody passed them the ball, that they would know how to kick it.”

“Get control of it,” Patrick corrects.

David ignores him. “So, they keep getting chances. But what if something happens? What if Heather’s boobs get too big, or if Tennessee’s parents go broke? What then, huh? Will they still get more chances? Will they be accommodated? Will their coaches and teammates tell them to keep trying because they’re important?”

Now David’s taken it to a whole other dimension. Now he’s getting into sexism in sports and equity and everything. Isn’t that kind of beyond the scope of the conversation?

No. It’s not. David’s trying to tell him that he’s not the only one. That these are challenges that he and Stevie and Twyla have had since childhood.

“We wanted to have time to just play badly, without worrying about winning or getting all the rules right. We just wanted to kick a ball around. It was okay if it was just pretend.”

To play badly. To play without worrying about winning. And isn’t that the whole point of sports? Isn’t that what his coaches and parents have told him his whole life?

Patrick thinks back to what he saw earlier that evening—before he ran to get the guys and took over the game. He starts to reorganize his observations. It’s true, he saw they were having fun. Twyla was laughing, and Stevie was smiling. He remembers Wayne jumping back and forth in front of the goal post. When Patrick saw him before, he thought Wayne looked really weird. Now, he realizes, Wayne was just trying things out, probably to find out what reaching for a ball might feel like.

David continues. “You know, you don’t have to take over the field every hour of every single day. That’s not real inclusivity. It’s actually hogging.”

Patrick wants to argue, but he can’t. David is one hundred percent right. He thinks about so many things. About all the kids at school who sit on the sidelines during gym. He thinks about David and the funny way he runs. He thinks about his dad playing catch with him in the backyard, and about kiddie hockey and Little League, and about recesses growing up. He thinks about his coaches’ lessons about teamwork and trying hard, but also about the growing levels of difficulty, the kids who had to run extra laps in front of everybody, about all the kids who didn’t make try-outs. Those things never really bothered Patrick before, because he always made the team. He figured it was a fair system.

It’s not. It’s the opposite. David is telling him so. David is telling Patrick that he just wanted to play for fun and that nobody had ever let him. Patrick thinks about how he ran into their game and started taking control of things. Now, Patrick was one of those people, keeping David from learning about how to have fun playing a game.

“You’re so right, David. You’re totally, completely right. I’m so sorry I didn’t see it before.”

David sighs, and his body relaxes. “It’s okay. You didn’t do it on purpose.”

David still looks sad, though the anger has dissipated. “I don’t know, David. I think you’re letting me off too easily.” He’s thinking about what David said, about how Patrick ruined everything. He moves to sit closer to David, facing him. He reaches out with both hands to grab David’s. “We should do something about it. I want to help you fix it. I don’t want you to hate sports forever, just because I’m—”

“—a competitive, paternalistic meathead?”

“I was going to go with ‘moron’ but, sure.”

David shakes his head and squeezes Patrick’s hands in his. “It was never going to work anyway.”

Louder, Patrick says, “C’mon, David! Refuse to lose!”

David rolls his eyes. “Ugh, is that a sports slogan?”

“Teamwork makes the dream work.”

“Oh, my god.”

“All it takes is all you’ve got!”

“I am going to push you into the lake!”

Patrick chuckles and then scoots even closer. Maybe if he puts his face close enough, David will relent and kiss him. “I’m serious,” he says. “I want to help.”

David looks at him, skeptically, but also like he might want to say yes. “I don’t even know what we would do.”

Patrick shrugs. “Well, we’re not going to find out by sitting around here.”

“No,” David agrees. Then, he looks up at Patrick. “But I can think of some other things we could do…sitting around here.”

Patrick grins, and David pulls him in by the shoulders for a kiss.

The next day, they decide to try again. At breakfast, Patrick goes around to everybody and apologizes for interrupting their game, taking it over, and being an overall butt-head.

Then, Patrick and Stevie sit down to strategize about what they might do next—how to encourage people to try again and to make sure that it doesn’t get interrupted by other kids.

They end up deciding to invite everybody to the field again, but to try and find a way to enforce that it’s “beginner’s only.” Patrick says that he can guard the field, but Stevie says they should get a grown-up on board too. Mr. Roland is a lost cause, but Mrs. Jocelyn and Ms. Ronnie might understand.

Patrick and David go out to the field early—for David’s nerves to settle and so that Patrick’s other friends don’t expect him to show up for basketball. Patrick tries kicking the ball to David, who glares at him as it whizzes past.

“Sorry,” says Patrick. He is suddenly unsure of what to do. Before yesterday, he would have teased David and said something like, “Part of the game is actually kicking the ball.” But he can’t say anything like that now.

He runs after the ball before it gets too far. When he gets back to David, he says. “I’m not really sure what to do in this situation, David. I don’t want to be walking on eggshells about this stuff.”

“You don't have to walk on eggshells,” says David. “Just don’t be a jerk about it.”

“Was kicking the ball to you a jerk move?”

David shrugs. “I guess, generally, it’s not a jerk thing to do. But I’m in a very fragile state right now.”

Patrick is still unsure of the right way to act. “What if I coached you through it, gave you fair warning, told you how?”

David shakes his head. “Yeah, I can see how you might think that’s a nice thing to do. But unsolicited advice is a no-no.”

“So I’m just supposed to let you mess up?”

“Pretty much,” David says. “Let me warm up, let me find my sea legs, get used to the ball and the space. If I want to learn something or if I want your advice, I’ll ask, okay?”

Patrick thinks this sounds reasonable, but he’s still bugged about something. “But what if you never ask?”

“Then I guess you’ll just have to be okay with that.”

David looks around at the field. Not everybody they invited showed, but most did, and David considers that a win. He hazards a glance at Patrick, who is dutifully looking away, standing guard. He knows that Patrick would rather be playing with them, but he’s holding back. And David is grateful.

The carefree exhilaration that pulsed through the game yesterday has abated. It's been replaced with something more intentional, more focused, less manic. Bit by bit, over the course of the next forty-five minutes, there is an increase in courage. Twyla chases the ball, Wayne moves out of the goal every once in a while to try and get his hands on it, Stevie tries dribbling. And David runs. He doesn’t make much of a move for the ball or to block other players, but he runs up and down the field and clocks more distance than in probably his entire life combined.

He gets sweaty and he doesn’t hate it. His legs burn and he doesn’t hate it. He likes the feeling of the wind on his face and on his back, the way his limbs move in new directions.

The last two weeks of camp pass quickly. Every evening, they hold space for the misfits on the field. Mrs. Jocelyn, always up for a project, suggests that they make it more formalized next year, try out some different sports. Stevie puts an end to that idea quickly because that would be too much like gym class and nobody wants that.

David doesn’t play every day, but he plays most days and that’s exactly what it feels like—play. He knocks into people and falls over and gets his shirts dirty. His legs get covered in bruises. He gets cramps and gets thirsty and has to take extra showers. He gets hit in the face with the ball and it’s not terrible.

He and Patrick spend every moment they can together. They hold hands under the table in the mess hall, they attend all the same camp activities, they go swimming and dunk each other under the water, they sneak away after lights out to makeout in the woods, on the pier, by the dying campfire.

David does eventually decide to put Patrick out of his misery. Two days before the last day of camp, David asks him if he would like to give him a private soccer lesson.

Patrick leans in close so they’re almost touching noses and says, “I have a better idea.”

Patrick loves to teach David new things. When they played ping-pong together, Patrick did the thing from the movies where he stood behind all close, pretending to show him how to hold the paddle. He loves teasing him, watching his eyes light up in accomplishment, in sharing something together.

Patrick loves it when David plays soccer out on the field. He loves it when David is all sweaty and dirty and smells more like himself. He loves it when David works hard for something and Patrick gets to reward him with lips, tongue and teeth.

Patrick loves it when David is giving him a hard time. He loves it when David teases about his overgrown curls, and his smart mouth, and his general lack of taste. He loves the volley back and forth of wit and biting observations.

But Patrick also loves David like this. David leaning back against him, wearing his beautiful clothes, smelling of peaches and sandalwood, wrapped in Patrick’s arms. They’re sitting on the pier, watching the sunset and sharing a bag of sour patch kids.

“I don’t want to say good-bye,” says Patrick. It’s the first time he’s allowed himself to say it. He didn’t want to spend his last days of camp talking about the ending.

David sighs, and Patrick tightens his arms around his waist. “I know,” says David. “Me neither.”

A trail of light ripples through the water. A breeze runs through Patrick’s hair, and he has to shake his head to get his curls out of his face. David shifts his position underneath him.

“What if we don’t say good-bye?” Patrick whispers.

David sits up to face him. The contours of his face are illumined with a warm, orange glow. “What do you mean?” he asks.

“I mean, let’s not say good-bye,” says Patrick. “Let’s stay together. Let’s talk every day. Let’s do whatever it takes to see each other during the school year.”

David’s looking at him. Patrick can’t tell what he’s thinking.

Patrick continues, “I don’t want to just be camp boyfriends, David. I want to be real boyfriends.”

Patrick waits for David to say something. He doesn’t say anything. Instead, he lets through a soft smile that goes all the way up to his eyes. He leans in. Patrick meets him for the kiss, warm and deep, and reaches to put a hand around the back of David's neck, pulling him closer. Patrick inhales deeply, trying to absorb David through all of his senses.

David moves his lips across one side of Patrick’s jaw, and then to nuzzle in Patrick’s neck.  It sends shivers down Patrick’s spine. David wraps his arms around Patrick’s waist and squeezes.

“I like that idea. I like it a lot.”