ENYA
Sunday morning arrives with all the enthusiasm of a dental appointment. I'm standing in the kitchen, watching Dad make his third cup of coffee while pretending he's not worried about me leaving.
"You sure you'll be okay?" I ask for probably the tenth time.
"Enya." He gives me that patient dad look. "I'm a grown man. I've survived forty-six years on this planet. I think I can handle six weeks without you hovering."
"I don't hover."
"You've asked me that question seventeen times since yesterday."
"I have not—" I stop, because he's probably right. "Okay, maybe I've asked a few times."
"A few." He's smiling now, a fond exasperated smile that makes the wrinkles around his eyes deepen. "Look, I'll be fine. Work's crazy busy anyway, we've got three major projects coming up that'll keep me at the shop till late most nights. If anything, you being gone means I don't have to pretend to have a normal dinner schedule."
"That's not healthy."
"Neither is worrying about your old man when you should be out having fun and making memories." He ruffles my hair like I'm twelve. "Besides, Elliot's coming back for Fourth of July weekend. That's only two weeks away. I'll barely have time to miss you."
Elliot left yesterday, heading back to college for summer classes. The house felt immediately bigger and quieter without him crashing around, leaving his stuff everywhere, eating everything in the fridge. Now it's just Dad, and soon it'll be just Dad alone.
"You'll call if you need anything?" I press.
"I'll call. Now go prepare, or you'll be late. Brenda seems like the type to mark tardiness in permanent record or something."
I've told him all about Brenda and he's not wrong. I go to my room and pack some stuff. Dad lets me borrow his car and I promise to bring it back next weekend. He did ask why I'm not going with either of my friends and I came up with an excuse.
The drive to Camp Pinewood takes forty-five minutes, which is just enough time for my brain to cycle through every possible anxiety about the next five weeks. Living on-site. Actual campers arriving tomorrow. Being responsible for tiny humans who might drown or get poisoned or have emotional breakdowns in the middle of the night.
And Maddie. Always Maddie, lurking in the background of every thought like an unskippable ad.
I park in the counselor lot and grab my stuff, trying to project confidence I don't feel. The camp looks different on a Sunday afternoon— more official, more real. There are actual staff members everywhere, doing last-minute preparations. The calm before the storm of children.
"Enya!" Brenda appears like she's been summoned, clipboard in hand, smile at maximum wattage. "Perfect timing! Let's get you checked in and show you to your cabin."
She leads me toward the cluster of counselor cabins— smaller than the camper ones, designed for two people each. There's a sheet taped to a bulletin board listing room assignments.
I scan for my name.
Cabin 12: Enya Jabari & Jessica Murphy
Jessica Murphy. I vaguely remember her from orientation—q uiet, seemed nice enough, into photography or something. This could work. This is manageable.
"Okay, so here's the thing," Brenda says, and my stomach immediately drops because nothing good ever follows that phrase. "Jessica had a family emergency last night. Her grandmother's in the hospital, and she had to withdraw from the program."
"Oh. That's... I'm sorry to hear that."
"So we've had to do some reshuffling." Brenda's flipping through papers on her clipboard. "Let me see... yes, okay. You'll be in Cabin 7 instead. With Madison Elton."
My heart sinks to my stomach.
"What?"
"Cabin 7. With Madison— Maddie. You two know each other, right? I thought I saw you talking during orientation."
Talking? Really?
"We... yeah, we know each other." My brain's trying to catch up. "But how does that make sense? Alphabetically, logically, there's no reason—"
"Well, Maddie's original roommate also had to drop out— turned out she's allergic to basically everything outdoors, which seems like information she should have provided before signing up for camp— and when we were reshuffling, it just made sense to pair people who already have a rapport."
Rapport. That's one word for it.
"Plus," Brenda continues, oblivious to my internal crisis, "Skylar mentioned you two were close friends, so I thought it might be nice! Familiar faces and all that."
Skylar.
Of course it was Skylar. That traitorous bitch.
I'm going to kill her. Slowly. Painfully. With something from the nature crafts supplies.
"Right," I say weakly. "Nice."
"Cabin 7 is just down that path. You're the first one here, so pick whichever bed you want! Maddie should be arriving soon." Brenda checks her watch.
She bustles off to terrorize some other unsuspecting counselor, leaving me standing there with my duffel bag and a sense of impending doom.
Cabin 7. With Maddie. For weeks.
I can handle this. I handled orientation with her passive-aggressive perfect counselor act. I can handle sharing a small enclosed space with bunk beds and probably minimal privacy.
This is fine.
Everything's fine.
I make my way to Cabin 7. It’s small but not tiny — two bunk beds for the counselors in a corner, a cramped bathroom that probably smells like mildew already, and a main area packed with four bunks for the kids, four on each side.
There’s a window facing the lake — pretty, if you ignore the cobwebs. I drop my duffel on the bottom bunk and sigh.
In a few days, this place will smell like bug spray, wet socks, and sugar-high twelve-year-olds.
Summer paradise, my ass.
I claim the bottom bunk on the left, tossing my bag onto it. Start unpacking with forced focus—clothes in the cubby, toiletries in the bathroom, books on the small shelf by the bed. Making this space mine before Maddie arrives and brings her perfectly organized presence into it.
Twenty minutes pass. Then forty.
Where is she?
I'm starting to think maybe she's not coming— maybe she dropped out too, maybe this whole thing fell apart and I'll get the cabin to myself (such a sweet deal)— when I hear footsteps on the porch.
The door swings open.
Maddie stops dead in the doorway, suitcase in one hand, looking like she's just walked into the wrong movie.
"No," she says.
"Good afternoon to you too."
"No. There's been a mistake. This is—Brenda said Cabin 7, but that can't be right because—" She's looking around wildly, like maybe she missed the sign indicating this is actually a different cabin that just looks identical, besides they all look the same.
"It's right," I say flatly. "Jessica and your roommate both dropped out. They reshuffled. We're roommates now, deal with it."
"That doesn't make sense. There are other counselors. Other possible combinations."
"And yet, here we are."
I don't think now is the time to tell her that Skylar was the mastermind behind all this mess.
Maddie's still standing in the doorway like she's considering just leaving.
"This is ridiculous," she finally says. "I'm talking to Brenda. There has to be another option."
"Good luck with that. She seemed pretty set on this arrangement." I go back to scrolling on my phone, pretending my heart isn't racing. "Something about us having a 'rapport.'"
"A rapport." Maddie laughs, but it's not a happy sound. "That's what she called it?"
"Yep. Apparently Skylar told her we were close friends."
Now is the time.
"Of course she did. Of course this has Skylar's fingerprints all over it." Maddie steps fully into the cabin, letting the door close behind her. She looks tired — more tired than orientation would explain.
"You look like shit," I say before I can stop myself, since we are talking now.
"Wow. Thanks. Really feeling the roommate bonding already."
"I just meant you look tired."
"I am tired." She drops her suitcase with a heavy thunk. "I'm exhausted, actually. From everything. From this." She gestures vaguely between us. "But sure, let's add forced roommate proximity to the list of things making my life complicated right now."
There's something in her voice that makes me pause. Something is wrong.
"Maddie—"
"No." She cuts me off. "Just... don't, okay? I can't do the thing where we pretend to care about each other's lives right now."
"I wasn't pretending."
"Whatever. It doesn't matter." She looks around the cabin, her expression somewhere between resignation and despair. "You took the bottom bunk?"
"Yeah. You can have whichever one you want."
"I'll take the top right." She starts unpacking, and I notice her hands are shaking. "We'll just stay out of each other's way. We can manage a few weeks of coexistence."
"Sounds good to me."
Easy-peasy.
She unpacks in silence. I don't dare ask or look her way.
This is going to be a disaster.
I pull out my phone to text Skylar a strongly worded message about boundaries and meddling and how she's officially the worst friend ever.
But before I can type anything, there's a knock on the door.
"Come in," Maddie calls, not looking up from her suitcase.
The door opens to reveal Noah, grinning broadly.
"Hey roomies! Just checking if everyone got settled— oh." His smile falters slightly as he picks up on the atmosphere. "Everything... good?"
"Great," I say at the same time Maddie says "Fine," and we both sound very unconvincing.
"Okay then." Noah rocks back on his heels. "Well, there's a counselor meeting in twenty minutes. Main hall. Brenda's doing final logistics before the kids arrive tomorrow." He looks between us. "You guys sure you're—"
"We're fine," Maddie interrupts coldly.
"Right. Cool. Well, see you at the meeting!" He backs out like he's escaping a crime scene.
The door closes. Silence descends again.
"This is going to be the longest five weeks of my life," Maddie mutters.
"Join the club."
She looks over at me and I notice her eyes are red-rimmed, and I can see she's been crying.
Something in my chest twists. "Seriously, are you—"
"I'm fine." She turns away, shoving clothes into her cubby with more force than necessary. "Just peachy. Living my best life in my assigned cabin with my former best friend who I'm now legally obligated to cohabitate with."
"Former," I repeat. So soon?
"What?"
"You said former best friend."
Maddie freezes, her back still to me. "Well. Yeah. I mean, we're not exactly—" She trails off. "Are we?"
The question hangs, unanswered and unanswerable.
Because I don't know what we are. Not friends, clearly. Not enemies, exactly. Just two people who used to know everything about each other and now can barely have a conversation without everything going sideways.
"I should go," I say finally, grabbing my lanyard with my counselor ID.
"Right behind you."
Skylar is already there, and her face lights up when she sees me, Maddie five feet behind me. She mouths something that looks like "You're welcome!" and I flip her off discreetly behind my back.
Morgan's sitting next to her, looking concerned. She's clearly been briefed on the roommate situation and has Opinions.
Brenda calls the meeting to order, launching into a presentation about tomorrow's arrival procedures, safety protocols, emergency contacts and how much we are getting paid for this. I'm trying to focus, but I'm hyperaware of Maddie sitting two seats away, with her red eyes.
What the fuck is going on with her?