Chapter Text
Ken kept his arms crossed tightly over his chest as his mother's beat up Chevrolet Cavalier struggled up the gravel road. The suspensions squeaked as they hit pothole after pothole, and he was jostled this way and that in the backseat along with the other inanimate objects stuffed into the backseat with him.
The trunk, shiny, black, and new, which took up the two seats beside him, slammed into his side as his mother hit an especially big hole.
"Ow!" He exclaimed, despite himself. He'd been determined to not speak to his mother the whole ride up, and the exclamation opened the opportunity for a conversation he did not want to have.
"Sorry." Apologized his mother, her worried eyes scanning his face in the rearview mirror. The apology was layered.
Sorry for the bumpy road.
Sorry for forcing you to do this.
Sorry for thinking this is for your own good.
They'd already had two out of those three conversations, and they'd all ended the same; with either him crying, or his mom crying. Honestly, he didn't know which he disliked more.
"It's okay." He mumbled. He'd resigned days ago that there was no way he was going to get out of this.
"You'll love Camp Kittatinny." His mother encouraged. Ken only drew his arms tighter around him, still. "I went there when I was a girl."
He'd heard this all before, too. How his mother had made lifelong friends. How she had spent the best days of her youth here. How she had met his father here.
But he wasn't like his mother, and for some reason, it had always been hard for her to understand that.
She was social and likeable. Pretty, and with easy confidence. She'd loved school, participated in clubs, had friends abound…
Not like him. No, for him, school had been hell. He was small. Strange. Solitary. And worst of all, an easy target for ridicule.
When kids picked on him, he would simply ignore it. He didn't let them get a rise out of him, or, at least, witness him break from the harassment.
He never snapped. he never fought back. He just took it. It was what he had known of conflict avoidance, but it had not worked on his middle school bullies.
No, instead this made his bullies try more desperate means to break him.
Physical violence. Humiliation. Ostracisation.
Ken's mom had not understood why he had begged her to let him continue school virtually in high school.
"Those will be the best days of your life!" She cried. "You can't miss out on your youth like that!"
He'd tried to make her understand. Tried to make her see how for him, this was about surivival.
But she didn't care about his survival, she wanted him to live.
So, this was her condition.
Four weeks at summer camp, sleepaway camp, and he could go to school virtually in the fall. This way, his mom had said, he would have lived, at least a little.
He pushed the trunk back away from him. All of his belongings had fit so neatly inside, it was a wonder.
His stomach burned with anxiety. It made him nauseaus.
He thought about the boys he would share a room with. Thought about the sight of his mom's powder blue Chevy driving far away, leaving him stranded here, up this God forsaken mountain.
Bile rose in his throat and he swallowed it down.
It wasn't news to him that he had seperation anxiety.
His mom, no matter how angry he was at her right now, was the only person in his life who had never left. As a child, he watched his father walk away and taken the happy family Ken had known his whole life with him. His mom and him were a team from then on. Inseperable.
It was shameful to even admit that on nights when his heart would pound in his chest and prevent him from sleep, that he would lay a blanket and pillow outside her bedroom door just to hear her snoring in the other room.
He'd spent his whole childhood plagued with this secret anxiety. Dodging field trips and sleep overs to avoid anyone finding out that he was broken in this way.
But in middle school, they'd found out, anyway. And the kids loved nothing more than to watch him break.
He wondered how long it would take for the boys in his cabin to find this out, too. How long would it take for them to know that he was different and strange?
Most times, people knew just from looking at him. It was some kind of weird, human instinct, to weed out the weak.
And that's what he was.
"Here we are!" Cried his mom, and the Chevy took another sharp turn, smaching Ken between the trunk and the car door, again. He held tight to the chest that contained all of his belongings.
Thought about the telescope inside, and tried to cling to hope.
At least he could see the stars, this far from the city.
At least he had stars.
"I got it, Gran!" Momo called, opening the truck door, jumping out into the compact dirt to the back of her grandmother's old white pick up.
Gran slammed on the brakes, not expecting her only granddaughter to quite literally leap from a moving vehicle.
"Wait until I've parked the damn truck!" Gran shouted back. But this fell on deaf ears. A sharp clang sounded as Momo unlatched the back of the truck bed, held together precariously by a series of bungee cords. The locking mechanism had broken long ago. "Momo!" Chastised Gran, only just shifting the gears into park. "Wait until I get out, you can't carry that all by yourself!"
But she could, and she would, because she'd heard what the lady at the gate had said.
Cabin 7. She was going to be in Cabin 7! Four years of attending this camp and she was finally in one of the new cabins. None of them had air conditioning, but cabins 7 and 8? They had ceiling fans.
One hand on the leather strap of her beat up, well loved trunk, she pulled it out from the truck bed, the trunk falling with a hollow thump onto the dirt.
And she pulled, dragging the trunk to the prestegious Cabin 7.
This is Momo's fourth year at Camp Kittatinny, and she is giddy with excitement at what this summer awaits her. Giant campfires, swimming, windsurfing, sailing,hiking, arts and crafts, and best of all… Color War.
The yearly, three day long relay race was the cornerstone of Camp Kittatinny, and she'd brought all her Color War gear in preparation.
Red headbands, red shirts decorated with sharpie noting wins and losses for each year she'd participated.
She dragged her trunk into the cabin. The old cabins had dark, age worn floors. Metal, army like bunk bed cots; a small window accompanying each bunk. It wasn't a completely uninviting cabin, but it wasn't like the new cabins. Momo looked around in wonder at the new facilities. Shiny, light colored floorboards decorated the floor. Live wood beams on the ceiling, and wooden bunk beds lined the walls of the room. The prestigious ceiling fan spun slowly above her. Ah, she could feel that breeze.
Momo took a deep breath. Joy filled her. This year was going to be the best year ever.
She looked around, a smile permanetly affixed to her face, searching for the potentional bed she would occupy for the summer.
There was a strategy to this, and this choice could make or break her camping experience. The worst bunk to choose was the one next to the bathroom door. Everytime a camper needed the bathroom at night, a beam of light would shine into the bunk and wake you up. And also, the smell… Nobody wanted the bunk next to the bathroom.
The second worst bunk was the bottom bunk tucked into the corner of the room, the end another bunk butted up against the side of it and all night the victim of the corner bunk would have someone else's stinky feet just a 'foot' away from their face. Could the bunk neighbors decided to sleep head to head? Sure, that would make sense, but the ladder was also mounted on the corner of this bed, and people didn't want to sleep with their face next to the ladder. It's the stinky foot problem all over again! And worst of all, the nature of being all closed off between two bunks like this made the lower corner bunk dark and gloomy. The 'loner's bunk for sure. The top corner bunk, contrarily, was well sought out real estate. No ladders. No gloomy corners. It was the Bestie Bunk. Two campers could sleep head to head here, and chat all night amongst themselves.
This was the bunk she wanted, as she was anticipating to have fun, all night conversations such as this with her best friend Aira. They'd been in the same cabin for 3 years straight, and on the registration forms for summer camp, campers can request to be bunked with their friend. She and Aira had met at their first year of camp, and had both requested each other every year since.
This year was no different. Momo had requested to be bunked with her best friend.
Only… Aira had not kept very much in contact lately. She'd become strangely busy this year. Aira had started a new school, had made new friends. It hadn't bothered Momo too much, this summer they'd reconnect and be just as close as they'd always been.
Momo made her way to the corner bunk, and peered over to see if she'd come early enough to claim this spot for herself.
With disappointment, she saw it was already occupied with a girl reading a GL magazine in one bunk, and another painting their nails in another.
Drat. She'd come too late. But then again…
She knew this girl.
"Aira!" She exclaimed. The girl with the magazine lowered it to look down at her. Momo, at first a bit shocked to see Aira had cut her hair short, and dyed it pink, gasped audibly, then smiled. "You changed your hair!" Momo climbed the stairs of the bunk, meaning to join her friend, but to her surprise, Aira sat up, and stretched out to not allow her space inside.
"Momo!" Aira said, her mouth splitting into a smile, yet it didn't reach her eyes. "You're in cabin 7 too? What luck!"
Momo's smile fell a bit, feeling that something strange was happening here. Aira had not embraced her. She hadn't screamed in happiness at the sight of her like she'd done in previous years. And she looked… so different. Not like the girl she'd been last year, but like a… like a woman. Up close, Momo could see the change in her. Pretty, pink nailpolish. A shiny layer of gloss on her lips. And… makeup? Since when?
Since when had her friend been into things like this?
Last year, they'd spent plenty of time mocking girls who were superficial and dolled themselves up like barbies, prefering, instead, to cover themselves in war paint and pretending seances in the abandoned buildings of the summer camp. And now Aira was one of them?
"I put your name in the registration form." Momo said, a tinge of sadness in her voice. Hadn't Aira done the same? Had it been dumb luck they'd been bunked together at all?
"Oh that's so sweet!" Aira replied, her fake smile turning into a showy, sympathetic pout. And then Aira looked to the bed next to her. The bed which was supposed to be reserved for Momo, not for…
A stranger.
The new girl, dark skinned and pretty with long, braided hair that cascading over her shoulder gave Aira a strange, knowing smile.
As if saying… 'Is this the one you've been talking about?'
Momo gasped, feeling suddenly deflated. She'd been replaced.
There is a secret way that teenage girls speak to each other. Not with words, because if one would translate the conversations into text, no actual meaning other than placid kindness could be read. But with subtle body languange, with knowing looks, and with gut instinct, a person could know.
A girl could know, could feel the rejection sinking in.
Momo had been replaced.
"I thought we could bunk together…" Momo said sadly, her last plea to her years long summer friend. Aira cheered at this.
"Oh, don't worry, I've save this bed for you, Momo. We can still be close by, look!" Aira bent over the railing of her bunk to peer into the dark, bottom corner bunk. The stinky feet bunk. "You can take this bed and we can still be super close, I promise!"
Momo smiled, hearing the words and feeling a small hope that perhaps all was not lost. That she and Aira would still be friends. Maybe Aira had simply forgotten how close they'd been, how much fun they'd had in the past. Maybe Aira just needed a couple more days to become reaquainted and to remember why they'd ever been so close.
So, with a wan smile, Momo took the small backpack from her shoulders and placed it in the stinky feet bunk.
Ken wanted to wait as long as possible to get out of the car. He watched from the backseat window as his mom walked around, asking camp counselors in green shirts where they could possibly find cabin 13.
Thirteen. It was an unlucky number.
He tried not to think about it too much. It was ridiculous superstition to be afraid of numbers, numerology was as baseless as astrology, and therefore he should not feel such ominous dread from being assigned to…
Cabin 13.
The camp counselor in the green shirt turned towards the car, waving to Ken with a happy smile. Ken returned a tight smile, not wanting to seem impolite, but not willing to show outward enthusiam. The counselor pointed to a cabin at the edge of the woods. A little plaque by the door labeled it cabin 13.
His mother jogged back to the car, smile plastered to her face as she pointed to the cabin.
"Get your trunk!" She said, "let's meet your bunkmates."
Ken sighed. He could delay it no longer. He would have to leave the car. He pulled the car handle, thinking how the next time he would be in the back of this car he might be completely changed. How this experience could scar him for the rest of his life. How the next time he would be in this car, he would be on his way home to a sweet, quiet year of homeschooling.
It just had to be done. If only to prove to his mother that he really was a reclusive freak. That he was not suitable to survive in groups. That there was something so broken in him, that he could not tolerate regular school.
He never, ever wanted to go back to regular school.
His heart hammered in his chest as he pulled the handle of the trunk, trying to pry it from it's spot in the backseat.
"Need some help with that, mate?" Came a voice behind him. The camp couselor, with his 'camp counselor' green shirt on, sunbleached hair, and black sunglasses seemingly permanently attached to the top of his head said in an enthusiastic voice.
In a foreign voice.
"Uh. Sure." He said in return, letting this much bigger man pry the trunk from the backseat.
"Grab the other side." The man said, and Ken obliged, grabbing the handle on the other end before the trunk could fall onto the ground. "All right, then! Let's go on in together!"
Ken said nothing. This man wasn't from here. He had an accent Ken couldn't place. The way he'd said 'together', like it ended with an ah and not an er. What was he, British?
"Name's Kenny. I'll be your counselor for the summer." Said the camp counselor as they hauled the trunk to cabin 13. Ken barely had to pull any of the weight. Kenny might have done it all on his own.
"Oh." Ken replied, surprised that they shared a first name. Well, at least sort of. "My name… is Ken."
"Crikey! Two Kens in one cabin! That's going to be awkward. The Ken's of cabin 13, can you imagine?"
Ken gave a weak laugh, then realized what this meant. He and the camp counselor share the same name? He knew how the boys would treat the kid who shared the name with the teacher.
Would he be considered a suck up? a brown noser? Or, perhaps the contrast between him and the counselor was so stark that the boys would consider one of them the 'cool' Ken and the other…
The other the reject Ken.
He looked at his cheerful camp couselour. Tall. Blond. Tan. Built. He could picture this man easily with a surfboard over his head.
And that's when Ken placed his accent.
It was Australian.
"Watch that step, it's a doozy." Said Kenny as he climbed the wooden porch steps up to the cabin. The weight of the trunk shifted to Ken's arm's, and he was suddenly over encumbered.
"Oof!" He said, nearly dropping the whole thing.
"Steady, now. You've got it." Kenny encouraged. Ken's arm's burned, he feared he would lose his balance. But, to his surprise, recovered his equilibrium managed to take the steps up. "Atta boy!" The counselor said.
Ken gave a small smile, not used to being encouraged this way. It was nice, but he didn't want to let this momentary happiness touch him. Ken was still determined to hate this place. But, at least he could concede…
The camp counselor was alright.
This momentary happiness had no risk of touching him at all once he breached the threshold of the door. He and the couselor placed the trunk with a resounding thud on the dark, wooden floor, and voices which had once been busy and distracted, hushed.
Nine boys stared at him. Strangers, all of them, but Ken saw the familar face of his bullies. Brown eyes, blue eyes, eyes behind glasses. Some slanted, some wide, all judging him.
Seeing him for what he was.
Knowing him for what he was.
Ice ran through his veins. Could they tell just from this? Was their perception of him this instantaneous? Was his deficiency so obvious?
Kenny moved to stand next to Ken, and whispered to him, "They're all waiting to say hi, you know. Nothing like a cheerful hello for good impressions?"
Ken wanted to cry, but he did as he was told anyway. He felt the weight of the couselor's hand on his back, and that small feeling of encouragement returned to him.
"Hi. I'm…" He stuttered over this, his barely managed smile wavering as he considered the oddity of the couselor's name.
"This here's Little Kenny!" The counselor said, giving a small tap of his hand on his shoulder. Ken, surprised, looked up at Kenny.
Little Kenny? Ken looked up at the blond, handsome man. How was he, small, skinny, dark haired, anything like this masculine 'other Ken'?
Kenny was proclaiming him as his own. Ken breathed a sigh of relief, and turned back to see the boys, their faces once mean and judgmental, breaking into smiles and friendly hellos.
"Your name is Kenny, too?" One said.
"We're both Dave." Two other boys said in unison. "I'm going to go by coconut, and he's going to go by melon head." Said the one who proclaimed himself as Coconut Dave.
"On account of his head being so big." Melon Head Dave replied, then the boys looked at each other, and perhaps realized that both their heads were pretty big.
"No one has a name like mine." Said a boy with dark skin, and bright, bleached blonde hair. "My name's Khalil."
"It's common where I'm from." Said another, a chubby boy with sharp glasses. "I'm Mohammed."
And suddenly, Ken didn't feel so strange. He felt… perhaps… this wouldn't be so bad.
"Ken's a stupid name." Said one, last voice. Deeper than the others. Ken's heart plummetted at the sound. A blond, tall, boy emerged from the bathroom. "You play with Barbies or some shit?"
And there he was. The one Ken feared. They were all the same, really, these faceless bullies.
"No." Ken replied stupidly, but could not counter with what he was actually into because it might be more cause for ridicule. Being into aliens was not cool.
"Watch your mouth, Aaron." Warned Kenny. "Won't be having that talk around here."
Aaron raised his brows, a cheeky smile on his face, and he held up his hands, conceding.
Aaron walked toward the middle bunk, made a show of climbing up the ladder in one step, and threw himself onto his bed, to Mohammed's annoyance, who occupied the bunk below.
"My robots!" Cried Mohammed, alarmed that the jostling of the bunk had knocked some of his robot action figures over.
"Don't pay any mind to him, Little Ken." Kenny's warm voice said to him. "Go on and pick a bunk."
Ken took a deep breath, and looked about.
He was at his school cafeteria all over again. Students scooting over in benches to make sure there was no room for him to sit, Ken, looking about lost with a slowly drooping lunch tray as he watched… watched his peers all shut him out.
There was an empty bunk above the bed to the left Ken could take… but it was over Kenny's. He could tell because there were big, blocky boots at the foot of it, and a very adult looking blankets. Plaid ones with actual sheets on it.
But… no. He couldn't just cozy up to the counselor. He'd really be labeled a suck up and a brown noser.
He looked at his other options. Mohammed and his robots… the bunk next to him was available but it was too close to Aaron, who Ken wanted zero proximity to. The two Daves, who had apparently become fast friends, occupied both beds to to the right.
"You can have this bunk!" Khalil cried, pointing to the bed below him. It was the bunk next to the bathroom. Khalil's comforter was decorated with little soccer balls, and above his head, he'd pinned a poster up of a soccer player.
A jock?
Ken's defenses were up. Jocks were never nice to him. Was this kid trying to bait him? But he looked at his face. His goofy, crooked smile. His outlandish blond hair that did not suit his skin tone…
He wasn't like the jocks he'd known. Ken gave a small smile, and nodded.
Khalil gave a wide, toothy grin, and for a fleeting second, Ken felt all warm inside.
Then, he heard the engine of his mother's ancient Chevrolet turn over, and all mirth left him. For a moment, he'd forgotten…
Panic hit his stomach like ice water, and he turned on his heel to bound back out the cabin door.
"Mom!" He cried, in a pathetic, high pitched screech. A howl of laughter came from the inside of the cabin, and Ken turned back in horror to witness Aaron, clutching his stomach as he reenacted Ken's pathetic cry for his mother.
The other boys couldn't contain themselves. They laughed. Even Khalil slapped a hand over his mouth in the attempt to keep from laughing.
"Quiet!" Kenny the camp counselor barked, in a tone far sharper than Ken had heard before. It was a manly, commanding tone. One that Ken hadn't expected from the laid back man he'd met moments ago.
Ken felt tears sting at his eyes, and his breath shook with the effort to not cry. If he cried, it would all be over. Kenny came to his rescue. His large hand gently pushed Ken's shoulder through the door, away from the cabin stifling laughter.
"Go say goodbye to your mother." Kenny said in a hushed tone.
Ken stumbled down the wooden stoop, his tears falling free down his cheeks. And he ran. He ran to his mother's smiling, waving form through the window of the driver's side window. Her smile fell as he ran towards her.
He was six again. He was running from the school bus which had threatened to take the whole first grade class to the planetarium. And the stupid thing? He'd been so excited to go. He'd thought that this time he could do it, he could go on a field trip without his mother chaperoning.
She'd followed in her car behind, just like she'd promised she would. She would be there, if he needed her. On the bus, Ken had clutched his bag of sour gummy worms, his favorite snack, as panic had risen higher in him. Was she still close behind? He had peered into the alleyway of the bus to see her car following close behind. He'd turned back around, too nauseus to actually eat any of his favorite candy. Then, the bus had turned, and when Ken peered back again, his mother's car wasn't there.
He'd thrown up on the bus. Right then and there. The bus had pulled over, his classmates screaming in disgust, and his mother's car pulled up right next to them. She'd never been too far after all, but he'd ruined it all, anyway.
He'd run from the bus, and his mother had taken him home.
He'd never gone to the planetarium.
Ken ran to her car, now, in the same way he'd done, then. The same sickening anxiety coming over him. He was older. He was stronger, but still this anxiety gripped him.
"Mom!" He cried. She opened the car door to come out and embrace him. "I don't know if I can do this…" He said into her shoulder. He wasn't very tall, but he was almost as tall at her, now. He was too old for this.
He'd been too old at the planetarium, too. But he couldn't help it. He was stunted in this way.
Broken in this way.
"Yes, you can. Remember, I can always come pick you up if it's truly horrible. I believe in you, Ken. You can do this." She told him, cupping his face between her slender hands and wiping at his face with her thumbs.
"Promise?" He said, hiccuping. She gave him a small smile.
The same smile she'd given him as she'd kissed him goodbye that morning he boarded the bus to the planetarium eight years ago.
"Promise." She repeated. And he nodded, sniffed, and trusted her.
Trusted that she would be there. That if he needed her, she'd be there.
He could do this. He must do this.
If not, how could he ever call himself a man?
Ken nodded, let his mother kiss him on the cheek, and muttered a goodbye to her. He tried to appear stoic as he watched her go. The rest of the cabin was surely watching. He had to be strong.
He watched her car grow smaller down the dirt road, then it turned. And his mother's car was gone.
It was like a string was unravelling inside of him. The thing that connected him to her was unwinding rapidly as he imagined the quickly increasing distance between them. But he had to trust she would come back. She would, if he truly needed her.
She wouldn't let that string break. She would never when somewhere, out there, the string that once had connected him to his father floated frayed in the wind.
Ken tried to stay calm as he came back into the cabin, tears barely contained.
"Did you kiss your mommy goodbye?" Aaron teased, earning a warning from Kenny the counselor to shut his mouth. Was it normal to talk to kids like this in Australia? Regardless, he was glad for him. If Ken had any guts at all he would have told Aaron off in the same way. Or worse.
Ken gave Aaron a seething, still watery glare. He didn't understand, Ken told himself. Boys like this didn't understand what it was like to have no one and nothing. They didn't know what it was like to lose.
And somehow, he forgave the ignorant bully.
Sure, Ken had abandonment issues. But boys like Aaron… they didn't know what it was like. Ken ground his teeth and looked away from the boy, towards his new bunk, and blinked in surprise. His trunk was already pulled next to his bunk, and Khalil waved him over.
"It helps to make your bed to feel a little bit more at home." Khalil said in a quiet tone. "I remember my first year at camp."
Ken said nothing in fear he might cry again, but he nodded and afforded a tight smile. Ken unclasped the lid to his trunk and it popped open, stuffed to the gills. He flipped the lid open and took in a sharp breath as he saw…
At least twenty packs of sour gummy worms.
"Whoa." Khalil said as he beheld the hoard, then gave Ken a devious smile. "You brought contraband."