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Gwen was usually the type to grit her teeth and get shit done, or at least that’s how she carried herself. She ended conflicts with a kick and a close, then she was on her way back to her cabin to tend to her own business. She clung to her free time with aggressive abandon and complained when she wasn’t left alone when she needed it. One would assume that she despised the characters of her surroundings.
David knew better, though. While it was certainly easy to read Gwen’s solitude as her only state of rest, she was sometimes willing to participate in the most mundane of activities. She wasn’t dragged to the campfire when David brought out the guitar. She sang sweetly and softly while unprompted. She stayed and watched the embers fade when the kids made their way to their tents. She smiled and laughed at David’s remarks and jokes. She was, David thought, just as essential to their daily life as the glow of the moon. Without her, there was a noticeable absence. A night at Camp Campbell without Gwen was just as disheartening as the clouds that covered the light of the night.
And how essential was the moonlight, as it shone down on her smile for just David to see on those late nights. Pale blue shone on her face while flickering orange fire danced past her hair in flicks of fairydust.
When clouds shrouded Gwen, there was absence.
He hadn’t noticed that she was chest deep in sorrow until she finally stopped fighting the current. Body limp and barely there, she was only out of bed when he begged her for help with the campers. She barely talked, and when David tried to lighten the mood, he was surprised at his disappointment at not being met with a scoff and a sneer. She just looked…far away. She’d grunt replies in a low voice, barely heard under the usual chatter of the mess hall. Even some of the campers noticed when she stood idly by in their chaos. Usually, she’d be the one to round them up and shout for their undivided attention while David announced daily activities. Little heads turned to peer at her when she sat by a window and didn’t look up as David rounded them up himself.
“Is Gwen sick?” Nikki had asked David, tugging at the bottom of his vest to get his attention.
David looked back to the woman who was staring down at the table at a plate that had been long cleared. David scratched the back of his neck as he struggled to find an answer to the girl’s inquiry.
“I’m…not sure. Maybe she’s coming down with something.”
“Can I help? I know Quartermaster’s really good at healing people! He gave me one of these in case I get sick!”
She held up a little gray glob that David registered to be a leech only seconds after yelping and grabbing it from her, then dashing it onto the floor and stomping on it.
“Okay! No more medical advice from Quartermaster!”
“…His name was Jeffery. He will be missed.” Nikki bowed her head at the splattered leech on the ground before running off with Max and Neil.
There was a noticeable empty space beside David for the days to come. He was used to working the kids himself, but Gwen was usually somewhere behind the scenes doing… something. Even if she wasn’t exactly working, she was there. She was writing, she was reading. She was preparing a movie for them to watch later, she was present .
Gwen’s side of the cabin seemed to sink with her. Water bottles and candy wrappers littered her bedside table, sheets were stained, curtains were closed. David had leaned over to attempt to lend a hand, to clean up. This had always resulted in Gwen’s demeanor becoming more aggressive.
“Jesus David, I’m not a kid!”
“What?-“
She would scoop up a water bottle with dregs that David knew to be several days old.
“I’m still using these. Don’t clean my shit up when I’m still using it.”
She took a swig of stale water, and David backed off.
“Okay.” He grunted. He didn’t have the heart to disrupt whatever routine she had just made up on the spot.
David felt bitter that she was such a closed book. This past week consisted of him stressing over the campers and her, and to top it all off, he spent every night by the campfire alone. The moon was there, but he found it to be pretty hard to appreciate it alone.
There was an absence.
One night, Gwen had actually joined him after the campers had gone to bed. He smiled at her, and she acknowledged him. She sat across from him as they watched the fire in silence. David couldn’t read her expression as her features rippled from the heat waves of the crackling scarlet.
“…Gwen?”
“Mm.”
David felt a tightness in his chest.
“What’s going on with you?”
Silence. Her face shifted unfamiliarly behind the curtain of heat.
“Dunno.” She sighed..
He leaned forward.
“C’mon.”
He smiled lightly.
“You’re a great writer, Gwen! You know how to say more than that.”
Gwen crossed her arms and turned her head away, then lowered it again.
“I would if I could.”
Her voice came out in a rasp, almost like she struggled for breath in that moment.
“I would if I could.”
It hurt to speak, he could tell. Suddenly, Gwen stood up.
“I’m sorry.” She choked.
David reached out to grab her wrist as she walked away, and when she whipped her head around, he saw the tears that the fire had hidden. She was biting back her frown, and her expression pleaded for him to let her hide for a little longer.
“We miss you.” David whispered, then let go. Gwen glared at him for a moment longer.
She didn’t believe him. Why would anyone miss her? She’s always hated this place, and everyone knew she wanted to leave.
She bit her lip, then stomped off to the cabin.
She definitely wouldn’t miss herself if she were him. He just pitied her.
===
You drown in yourself when you cry. That’s an artsy way of putting it, but it felt so fucking ugly. There was no painterly way of doing it. There she was, pulling her hair and gagging on her own tears, screaming screams that weren’t screams. Every sound died in her throat as if they were never made in the first place.
Even so, someone heard her. She thought she was quiet, but clearly she had clogged her own ears enough to drown out the creaking of the door. She only interrupted herself when there were footsteps next to her bed, then felt the sensation of weight at the tips of her toes as someone sat on the edge.
“ Go- “
“ No . I won’t be going anywhere.” David cut her off.
Gwen shifted in her bed to glare watery daggers at her co-counselor, then she thought better of it as she lowered her head back down on the comfort of her pillow.
Every part of her mind screamed shame to her body. Her cover was blown. It had been blown for a while. Everyone knew what she was, though she tried so hard for so long to convince them otherwise. Everyone here knew that she was hateful, but now David knew that she was pathetic in more ways than one. There in that bed, she might as well have been nude, wallowing in her own filth. She sobbed, covering her face.
“ Why? ” She croaked.
“ Why’re you looking at me? I’m gross, I’m, I’m…”
Shudder, sob, deep breaths.
“I look like shit. You don’t wanna see this.”
“I think you look pretty, Gwen.”
David squeezed her hand.
“Pretty and sad.”
Gwen covered her face.
“Don’t flatter mmm…-“
She interrupted herself as his comment fully registered and, for some God-forsaken reason, she cried even harder.
“ Shut up!”
David scooted closer, a finger stroking her hair out of her face.
“Of course. I’m sorry.”
Gwen cried and cried, and somewhere along the way she was holding David’s hand. He was so quiet, which was unusual for the man. She had expected him to noisily talk her through her misery, yet here he was, silently leaning at the edge of her bed and squeezing her hand.
She breathed.
“I’m never gonna be happy again, am I?”
David dutifully opened a fresh water bottle and handed it to her.
“Happiness is like a sunny day.” He said slowly.
“You can go for months without seeing the sun, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there.”
Gwen gulped down the water greedily as she appeased the dehydrated headache that throbbed at her temples.
‘’You’ll see a sunny day, Gwen. I promise.”
“I dunno what that means.”
David smiled.
“You will. I promise.”
Gwen scoffed, sat up, then hugged the man close.
“Thank you.” She whispered.
She didn’t say it, but he was warmer than any sun she cared to seek.