He felt his cheeks get hot. “Quiet, I guess.”
“Is it weird, talking about yourself? Or maybeit’s just being a kid. To be honest, I don’t know a thing about kids. Except having been one, of course. And that was a long time ago.”
He couldn’t help himself. He laughed.
She smiled. “What?”
“You’re funny.”
“Funny, as in weird?”
“Just funny.” He laughed again, and she laughed this time, too, grabbed another fry. He liked this lady.
“So Devon, tell me about the camp. How’d you come up with the idea?”
Devon gulped the chocolate shake, wincing at the loud sluuuuuurp, but the newspaper lady didn’t seem to mind.
“Well, I got to thinking one day about how a buncha kids my age don’t have much to do once school lets out. Me too—and it gets really, really boring. When you get to be my age, most of the grownups decide you’re old enough to stay home alone. But some of the kids get into trouble.”
“Like, fighting?”
“And drugs, graffiti, all that stuff.”
“Drugs? In Dahlia?”
He gave her a look. She raised her eyebrows, jotted some notes.
“How old are these kids? Like, teens?”
“All ages, high school down to elementary.”
“Wait. Kids in elementary school stay home alone in the summer all day long?”
“Well, yeah. Grownups have to work.” He fiddled with the stripy straw in his shake. “The churches offer free camps when you’re little, but those end after second grade.”
“They don’t have any other camps in Dahlia?” Her eyes were wide.
“Those cost lots of money.”
She frowned. “So you decided the kids needed someplace to go.”
“Yeah.” He grabbed another fry. “I figured the churches are always looking for ways to help, but older kids like us can be hard. And I know the teachers are off all summer, so I thought maybe we could do something at school. Not like regular school, more like fun school, only in the summer.”
“Fun school. That’s pretty genius.”
“Thanks. Anyway, I went to my pastor, we got the school and the other churches to say they’d help, and presented it to the town council last month. That’s about it.”
“I’m impressed.” She snagged another fry, wrote furiously. “So the name, West Dahlia Leaders Summer Enrichment Camp.”
“I wanted to call it Fun School, but they all thought this sounded better. And besides, they call all the kids ‘leaders’ in the camp.” He shrugged. “You know, to make us feel important. I’ve gotta admit, it does feel good being called Leader Devon all day long.”
“Expectation breeds success,” she said.
“That’s what Miss H always says.” He gave her a smile, and she smiled back. “We’ve got fifty-three kids this year, from eight years old all the way to the end of middle school.”
“And I hear the staff is all-volunteer—no one gets paid at all. Retired teachers and a handful of regular schoolteachers, right?”
“And some high school helpers. They get summer school credit for it. It’s a pretty good deal.”
