Summer Short Stories

Author's Note: Hi everyone! My goal is to be posting these short stories every week(ish) over the summer for your entertainment, if you want a fun series of stories to keep you occupied - I know summer can be a bit boring, at least for me. I'm hoping for some feedback/advice/comments if you're willing to share your opinion. These stories are designed to be quick, hopefully quirky and funny and enjoyable, reads. This post is my first one. I hope you enjoy these each week! Short Story #1:

Strangers, S’mores, and Squirrels

In my personal opinion, summer camp is not the greatest.

Okay, maybe “not fun” is a better description, because honestly, who wants to go somewhere with a bunch of strangers you don’t know so you can have quote-unquote “fun” outside - “fun” meaning you get eaten by mosquitoes and play in the woods (as in tripping and falling and getting hissed at by squirrels in the woods)?

No one with any brain cells left, in my opinion, but then again, do you really have any brain cells left after you’ve survived a year of sixth grade?

No, you do not.

But when I told my mom that I would much rather stay inside playing Fortnite and Mario and FaceTiming my friends in the basement like any sensible twelve-year-old boy, she told me the outdoors was “good for me” and that she expected me to enter the week - the whole WEEK! - of camp with an open mind.

I hate it when moms say “Keep an open mind!” because there is absolutely no chance of me participating in summer camp with zero judgment. But try explaining that to a parent who doesn’t want to hear it.

So here I am, on the first day of camp, standing in front of a dozen kids around my age and wishing I was invisible.

The camp counselor half-heartedly introduced me to everyone with a careless, “This is Aiden, everyone. Welcome, Aiden. My name is Sunnah.”

The campers stared at me.

I died inside.

First of all, everyone was wearing shorts and t-shirts. I, on the other hand, was perfectly happy (but hot) in my black sweatpants.

And on top of that, of course I was the only redhead there.

Fiery orange hair surrounded by dull blonds and browns?

I stood out like that one guy who doesn’t own a pink sparkly Stanley water bottle.

Because seriously, what self-respecting tween boy is going to parade around with a bright pink Stanley - just like all the girls except for that one girl who doesn’t own one because there is always that person, it’s middle school, people - and pink Converse?

I am seriously starting to hate the color pink.

Especially here, surrounded by it, even though this is not school and I seriously thought maybe everyone here at a freaking Vermont summer wilderness camp would be normal and smart and non-Stanley-obsessed.

No such luck, apparently.

Even Sunnah had a pink Stanley clutched in her long pink fingernails.

Ew.

While standing up there like a piece of junk everyone was scrutinizing, I can’t help but glance around looking for someone - anyone - I know, or maybe even don’t know, that I could - potentially - befriend.

How To Survive Summer Camp Tip #1: Cling to someone who looks decently okay. Neon shorts, a Stanley, fake nails, and/or wearing the color pink? Nope. I have to try to find someone who looks like a normal non-preppy seventh-grade guy. Or girl. I honestly don’t care, though girls freak me out a little because I always run the risk of interrupting their saving-the-world thought processes whenever I try to talk to them and then getting snapped at.

Better to be safe than sorry, right?

I spot a dude in a floral Hawaiian shirt sitting on one of the benches in our camp pavilion who looked okay. He has square glasses and tousled brown hair and he’s the only one not staring at me rudely, instead staring anywhere but me like I’m contagious or something. 

Okay. 

That’s a start.

Sunnah invites me to sit on the bench in between her and The Hawaiian Guy, and I accept it. Unfortunately, everyone’s eyes follow me, tracking my movements. Yeesh. Awkward much? It’s like they’ve never seen a human before.

Quite honestly, I’m feeling extremely self-conscious. Social awkwardness, even anxiety, has never been a thing for me before today.

Now I feel physical pain in the horrific silence that followed Sunnah’s Aiden Intro. Physical pain! How in the actual hecking universe am I going to survive an entire week of this?

“Hello.”

I jump when I hear his voice. It’s the kid next to me, The Hawaiian Guy. He’s looking at me intensely. I try not to squirm under his gaze, but it’s hard.

“Um…hi,” I say. Sunnah is just sitting there on her phone, checking her texts. Everyone around me is having side conversations and has gone back to normal, not staring at me anymore, thank goodness. I guess camp is just hour after hour of sitting there with a useless counselor trying to socialize? “I’m Aiden…”

“I know.” He’s still staring at me. “Keiko.”

“Okay, hi, uh, Keiko.”

“Hello,” he repeats.

This is The Actual Worst. I want to be in my basement right now playing video games! What was my mom thinking? I suck at people-ing!

Finally, Sunnah claps her hands, bringing me out of my awkward social disaster - temporarily. “Okay, kids! Let’s get started!”

“Kids”? Ha. She’s only a few years older than us. What a joke.

“Today we’re going to go on a walk. In the forest, we will play some games and roast marshmallows for s’mores! Does that sound like fun?”

No, I want to say, because it doesn’t. I’m a basement kid, not a camp kid. The forest is the last place I want to go because HELLO, MOSQUITOES! But it’s not like I have much of a choice because everyone around me is saying yes, it sounds like fun.

Liars.

A blond girl tosses her shiny long hair behind her and smirks at me dirtily. Sneers, more like. Ugh. Not my fault I’m a Fortnite/book nerd! “OMG,” I hear her say to her friends, all clad in pink and carrying Stanleys. Girls are weird. “This is going to be soooooooo much fun! Last time I made s’mores in the woods, a squirrel jumped down from a tree and stole my marshmallow! I hope the same thing doesn’t happen again, LOL. Haha!”

All her friends laugh like she’s the funniest thing ever.

She is, most definitely, not.

I mean, come on, who says text abbreviations out loud? Better question: What century is this? I don’t even have a phone, unlike everyone else here. Technology - aside from Fortnite, of course - fries your brain cells. Not that any of us have any left.

Honestly, I’d take middle school over camp any day.

Sunnah leads us into the woods, giggling just like any other teenage girl over texts from some guy. I find it obnoxious. She’s a camp counselor. Focus on the “kids”, lady! 

We walk for, like, five hours (I’m kidding, obviously. But it felt that long), and then we’ve arrived at a pitiful little circle. A firepit inside a circle of moldy, moss-covered logs. Fun.

We sit down.

Sunnah tries to make small talk with me. Favorite baseball team? I don’t watch baseball. Favorite school sport? Don’t play any. Favorite color? I don’t know, man, that question freaks me out!

“Hello,” Keiko says for what feels like the fiftieth time that day, sitting down next to me. He keeps staring at me.

“Hi.”

“I’ve heard all about you, Aiden.”

Um, creepy much?

“From who?” I have to ask, because, um, every siren in my head is going off right now, blaring Stalker Alert! Stalker Alert! Stalker Alert! 

How To Survive Summer Camp Tip #2: Don’t let anyone find out anything about you unless it’s harmless information. Address? Nope on a rope. Middle name? Um, that information is harmful. I don’t know if anyone’s ever found out your middle name, but trust me, it is not fun. Fave TV series? Fine. You get the point.

“I have my sources.”

Okay, trying not to panic here. Hey Sunnah, you feel like getting the s’mores going anytime soon? “Okay…what do you know about me then?”

“Your last name is Lorjik. You hate the outdoors. You do not own a cell phone. Neither do I, actually. You have no friends.” He cracks up at this last one, and I try to laugh with him. Ha-ha, so punny, dude, so punny…Except I do have friends, as a matter of fact, so clearly Keiko’s idea of humor is pretty whacko.

I sigh.

One day at a time.

That’s when a squirrel decides to jump down from the tree, right as Sunnah decided to get the bag of marshmallows out to start prepping the s’mores.

It does not jump onto the bag of s’mores like a normal squirrel.

It jumps onto me.

It manages to tangle itself in my hair, and I’m screaming shrilly like a dying chicken because WHAT IF IT HAS RABIES, and everyone’s just cracking up. Um, a little help here??? I shake my head hard, trying to get the ding dong animal off my head and out of my beautiful hair.

It doesn’t work.

Sunnah just watches me, amused. THERE IS A SQUIRREL IN MY HAIR AND YOU ARE IN CHARGE HERE! I want to shout, but I’m too busy screeching like a banshee and running around in circles like my pants are on fire.

Who knew squirrels had this firm a grip?

I’m panicking. Dying, more like, because why is it me, of all people? None of my fellow campers are helping out. Not even Keiko.

Scratch that, Keiko is doing something.

He’s taking notes on a freaking notepad!

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

I trip over a log and fall down, rolling around in the muddy woodchip dirt stuff, banging my head on the ground repeatedly. The squirrel jumps off finally and scurries up a nearby tree.

I pick myself up off the ground.

I have a headache.

I hate the world.

I barely survive the rest of the day, and when I head home I say one word to my mother before heading downstairs to play Fortnite: “WHY?!”

It’s a valid question.

All I know is, summer camp is way overrated. And if you go to camp anyway (despite my traumatizing squirrel experience), just don’t say I didn’t warn you.