“Why don’t you get settled and we’ll see you when everyone else gets here, okay?”
“Thanks, Stu. Holler if you need anything.”
“You got it, golden girl.”
He tips his hat in a playful way and heads toward the office. But as he walks off, his face falls, a furrow forming at his brow. For a second, I wonder if his worry is related to me. If he regrets letting me come back.
But I don’t know what I would do if, after everything, I lost this place, too. The promise of spending the summer at Alpine Lake was the only thing that helped me get through the year. The stares. The whispers that echoed through the halls of Roxwood High. Whenever someone left a nasty note in my locker or shoved me hard in the shoulder, I would close my eyes and think of this place. Of the first day of camp. Of being reunited with Ava and Imogen.
They never treated me different even though I’m not like them. I’m a local—atownie. Someone who bypassed camp’s exclusive admissions exam and five-digit price tag because my parents work here. But Ava and Imogen don’t care about that. We’re all the same—the kids who live ten months for two.That’s all that matters.
I hope that’s still true.
The walk from the gazebo to Bloodroot only takes a few minutes, but you can see just about everything. I pass the volleyballcourt, the softball field, the upper picnic tables, and the first set of tennis courts. My cabin is fourth in a row on a big hill and it’s right in the center of all the action. Everyone has to pass it on their way down to the waterfront, so it always feels like you’re at the center of everything. Plus, like Stu said, killer views. You can see all the way to the lake from the counselor room.
But I love Bloodroot for different reasons. Ava, Imogen, and I lived here the first summer we were assigned the same cabin. The previous year, when we were eight, we begged the counselors to let us switch, but they never did. And then finally, a few weeks before we were due to be Ramblers, Ava’s mom called and worked some fancy-person magic so we were not only assigned to the same cabin, but also beds right next to each other in the far corner of the room, right by the big window that faces the waterfront. Like Stu remembered.
I push open the door, and as the metal springs squeak, tears prick my eyes.Thisis my home. I dump my duffel on a top bunk in the counselor room and walk slowly through the main cabin, running my fingertips along the wooden bed frames, the rafters overhead, and the cubbies that will soon be crowded with little girls’ linens.
I stop at the entrance and look up at the plaques. There’s one commemorating each year that camp’s been open, with the names of those who lived here painted in dramatic fashion. I recognize so many names. Girls who fell in love with each other, who formed friendships you can only make at a place like this. I search the plaques until I find ours.
There we are, along the bottom. Three lines of the same phrase, repeated over and over with our names signed below.Sisters by choice. Our handwriting still looks the same. Mine, neat and tiny,like I’m trying to fit as many letters as possible. Imogen’s loopy and bubbly, and Ava’s a quick scrawl.
I close my eyes and hold my breath, keeping this feeling in my lungs. It’s the first time since before the accident that I feel free. That I feel likeme. But I can’t think about that too much because I’ll break into tears, and if I do, Ava and Imogen will know as soon as they see me. They always know. And then I’d have to tell them the truth.
They don’t need to know yet. Maybe ever. It won’t do me any good. I’ll still be Goldie Easton, the most hated girl in Roxwood. I’ll still have to repeat a semester of high school. And Dylan Adler will still never walk again.
I was lucky I didn’t go to jail. That’s what people said around town.
It’s because she’s associated with that camp.
Those directors saved her ass.
Stu and Mellie pulled some strings for her.
She should rot in hell.
What if Ava and Imogen think I’m a monster, like everyone else? We’ve shared everything with each other. Complaints about the bumps on our bikini lines, the jelly donuts Ava special orders around Hanukkah, the secret things that make our bodies hum alone in the dark. But not this. I don’t want them to know about this.
It was easy to dodge their calls and the three-way FaceTimes right after the accident, and as the semester stretched on, they both became busier and busier, and their texts became less frequent. Now, six months later, I don’t know how I would begin to explain that my whole life has changed without them even knowing.
Plus, Ava’s got enough to worry about with her shitty investment banker dad who’s happy to write checks for her Upper East Side prep school but refuses to visit from Palm Beach. And Imogen’s busy with auditions after landing a cell phone commercial that plays before basically every YouTube video.
They never found out about the accident thanks to the fact that they never asked me about life up here. Well, and that Stu and Mellie made sure the news didn’t hit the local paper. Whenever Ava and Imogen brought up our futures, I’d just say I couldn’t wait to get out of this hellhole. No one expects anything else when you live someplace like Roxwood.
For now, I want to enjoy the summer. Eight magical weeks at Camp Alpine Lake. Nothing exists outside this place. Not even the past.
CHAPTER 2
Then
It was hard not to notice Heller McConnell at the haunted house orientation. There were nine of us, all seniors from Roxwood High, who had been cast to work the season at the old abandoned psych ward off Route 16, and Heller was the only athlete.
I was picking through a box of fangs when Heller walked over to inspect a roll of mummy wrapping. His dark curls swooped over one eye and a soft smile tugged at the corner of his red mouth.
“Didn’t peg you as a vampire lover,” Heller said, holding up a plastic knife.
His voice was low and smooth, the same way he sounded over the loudspeaker at school while making the morning announcements.
