Over & Out (5 page)

“What are we going to do with you, Miss Jokester?” Andie sighed with exasperation, but she was smiling. Nat, Alex, and Alyssa just shook their heads and smiled, too, but they still looked worried.

“I'll be fine,” Jenna called back to her friends as she was carried off the field. “As long as no one else sees me on this stretcher.” She smiled a little when she heard the sound of their laughter. That was her job, to make everyone laugh. But the last thing she felt like doing was laughing right now. All she could do, as the nurse led the way to the infirmary, was hope that things weren't as bad as they seemed.

chapter THREE

Things weren't as bad as they seemed. They were worse. Jenna sighed and shifted in her emergency-room bed, replaying this afternoon's catastrophe over and over again in her head. Why hadn't she seen that stupid groundhog hole? Of all the ridiculous ways to end up in an ER, that had to be the dumbest. All of her earlier attempts to make light of this situation had fizzled out when she was faced with the creepily clean hospital. She couldn't even think of one single, solitary joke to tell to pass the time. More than that, she didn't even feel like joking. And when that happened, she knew she was in bad shape.

“Jenna?” a voice pulled her out of her thoughts. “Are you going to put down a card, or do I have to play your hand for you?”

Jenna blinked and looked up from the cards in her hand to see Andie sitting across from her on the bed.

“Sorry,” Jenna said, trying to scratch at a spot on her calf hidden under the makeshift splint. “I guess I zoned out.” She laughed halfheartedly. They'd been playing cards for the last three hours, in between filling out paperwork and waiting for doctors and nurses in the ER to come poke and prod Jenna. They'd made her put on a totally see-through hospital gown before they would X-ray her leg, and she'd been shivering ever since.

But that wasn't even the worst of it. The worst was that she'd been taken to the X-ray room in a wheelchair! How mortifying, when she could walk perfectly fine. Almost. Sort of. Okay . . . not really. She couldn't walk at all. And now she had to stay put in this bed—doctor's orders—until he came in with the results of her X-ray. If he
ever
came, that is.

Jenna sighed again, then handed her cards to Andie. “Can we take a break for a while? I don't feel like playing anymore.”

“Sure,” Andie said. “How about a little celeb gossip instead?” She pulled
Cosmo Girl
and
US Weekly
out of her bag.

“Nah,” Jenna said glumly.

“Your leg's not hurting you too much, is it?” Andie asked worriedly, tucking the blanket on the bed around Jenna's legs.

“Not too bad,” she said. “I don't think anything's broken.” Maybe if she kept saying that, it would be true. Her leg was throbbing, even inside the splint, and every time she accidentally moved her toes or shifted her weight, the sharp pain was enough to make her eyes fill with tears all over again. She could tough this out . . . she
had
to. Color War started next week, and she was going to play, no matter what. “I bet it'll be fine by tomorrow,” she said hopefully.

“Maybe.” Andie smiled sympathetically, and Jenna could tell she was trying (a little too hard) to stay optimistic. “Let's just see what the doctor says.”

“Where is he, anyway?” Jenna grumbled. “They took the X-ray like an hour ago.”

“About twenty minutes ago, to be more precise,” the doctor said, walking into the room.

“Sorry,” Jenna stammered, blushing.

“No apology necessary.” The doctor smiled. “Waiting in an emergency room can make minutes feel like hours.”

“You're telling me,” Jenna agreed, smiling in relief.

“So, how's your leg feeling now?” the doctor asked, checking Jenna's toes and knee for swelling.

“Way better,” Jenna lied. “I think we can take the splint off now. No problem. Nothing's broken, right?”

The doctor slid Jenna's X-ray out of a large envelope and clipped it onto a lit-up screen on the wall.

“Well, Jenna,” he said, “it's not good news, but it's not as bad as it could've been, either. You have a hairline fracture in your tibia.” He pointed to a very thin, barely perceptible crack on the X-ray of her calf bone.

“That means it's not broken, right?” Jenna asked, her heart giving a small leap of hope. “That means I can play sports again? If it's just a fracture.”

“I'm afraid not,” the doctor said gently. “A fracture is still a broken bone. You're lucky it wasn't a worse break. This type of fracture heals relatively quickly. But we'll have to set it, and you'll need a cast for about six weeks.”

“Six weeks!” Jenna cried. “But that's forever!”

“It'll go by faster than you think,” the doctor said as he took down the X-ray, snapped Jenna's medical chart shut, and stepped toward the door. “I'll send for one of the nurses to apply your cast and show you how to use your crutches.”

“Crutches, too?” Jenna flopped back on the bed as the doctor gave her one more patient smile before walking out of the room.

“The doctor was right,” Andie said, squeezing Jenna's shoulder. “The next month will fly by. I broke my wrist when I was ten, and I had the cast off in no time.”

“But you didn't break it at camp, right before Color War, did you?” Jenna asked, not even trying to hide the crabbiness in her voice.

“No,” Andie admitted reluctantly, “but you'll still have a blast in Color War. You'll see!”

“Not in sports,” Jenna said.

“You can be our token cheerleader!” Andie cried. But when Jenna shook her head, she tried again. “Mascot? Coach?”

“It won't be the same,” Jenna whispered. She bit her lip, trying to fight back the tears. But she couldn't hold them back anymore, even as the nurse wrapped the plaster cast around her leg. There went her chance to compete in Color War. There went the rest of her summer . . . down the drain.

Just the sight of the Lakeview campground as they drove in from the hospital made Jenna feel even worse. As she looked out at the lake, which she wouldn't be swimming in, and the soccer fields, which she wouldn't be playing on, her heart took a plunge to at least six feet under. She wobbled uncertainly on her crutches as she pulled herself out of the car, and she nearly tipped forward on her first awkward step. Luckily, Andie was there to steady her. Jenna didn't even have the energy to protest when Andie had to help her maneuver from the car to the bunk.

“Do you want me to see if I can get Pete to make a plate for you from the mess hall?” Andie asked as they slowly climbed the few steps to the bunk.

“I'm not really hungry,” Jenna said. Suddenly she felt exhausted. Her leg felt strangely heavy and clunky in its cast, and her armpits hurt from leaning on her crutches, even though she'd only been using them for a few minutes. Great. How were her arms going to feel tomorrow after a full day of crutching it? She didn't even want to think about it. All she wanted to do was crawl into her bed, pull the pillow over her head, and forget about this whole awful day.

But as she hobbled into the bunk, she saw that she wouldn't be getting her wish anytime soon.

“Jenna!” Natalie cried, leaping off her bed and rushing toward her. “Are you okay? We've been so worried.”

Alyssa, Tori, Karen, and Jessie surrounded her, trying to give her half-hugs around the bulky crutches and help her to her bed all at once.

“So, what's the damage?” Alyssa said, inspecting Jenna's cast.

“A hairline fracture,” Jenna said, making her best attempt at her usual carefree smile, but it wasn't easy. She had a feeling her friends could see through her, too.

As Jenna settled onto her bed, her friends flocked around her. Nat fluffed her pillows, Karen searched through Jenna's cubby for her pj top and a pair of shorts (since her pj bottoms wouldn't fit around her cast), and Mia broke out a set of permanent markers from the arts-and-crafts box under her bed.

“First things first,” Mia said, sitting down at the foot of Jenna's bed. “Your cast is way too white. Don't you know white is out this season?” She flashed a rainbow of markers at the girls. “Leave it to us.” She tapped the cast gently. “We'll make it so fabulous, we'll start a new fad. Castwear—for the truly trendy.”

“I'm going to give Dr. Steve an update, and then I'll be back in a few,” Andie said to Jenna. “I'm leaving you in good hands.”

After she left, the girls crowded enthusiastically around Jenna's bed, picking colors for their artwork, and Jenna tried her best to put on a happy face. All the girls—even Chelsea (shocker!)—made a big show of signing her cast and rallying around her. But although Jenna appreciated their efforts, she still couldn't believe her bad luck.

Half an hour and ten permanent markers later, even Jenna had to admit that her cast looked more like a masterpiece than boring plaster. Alyssa had written a poem titled “Owed to a Groundhog” down the right side of the cast; Nat and Tori had painted soccer balls, basketballs, and bunk cheers all over the rest of it; and all had signed their names and written encouraging messages.

“It looks great,” Jenna said. “Thanks, guys.”

Just then, Andie stuck her head around the bunk door. “I'm back, and I brought a few more reinforcements.”

Adam walked in the door with Alex, Grace, and Brynn.

“All right,” Brynn said. “Let's see the war wound.”

Jenna pointed to her brightly colored cast.

Adam sat down on the edge of her bed. “Sorry about your leg, Boo,” he said, ruffling her hair. “What a bummer.”

“Tell me about it,” Jenna grumbled. “And
don't
call me Boo.”

“Right,” Adam said. “Sorry.”

Alex hugged her, then sat back to inspect her cast. “That's impressive,” she said, looking for a place to sign it. “Too bad there's not a Color War competition for cast crafts.”

“No kidding,” Jenna said. “With my crutches, I think the only thing I'll be able to compete in is Scrabble. And I
hate
Scrabble.”

“Yeah,” Chelsea said. “And you stink at it, too.”

Alex rolled her eyes at Chelsea's remark, but only Jenna saw it. It made her smile.

“Color War's not that big of a deal anyway, is it?” Tori said. “I mean, what's so special about it?”

“What's so special?” Jenna cried, throwing up her hands. “It's only the biggest event of the entire summer!” This was Tori's first year at camp, so Jenna couldn't exactly blame her for not understanding Color War. But she needed to get filled in ASAP! “The whole camp gets involved in Color War, and everyone—even people in the same bunk—gets divided into the Red and Blue teams. There's a huge rally and balloons and fireworks, and one year one of the counselors even swung through the trees with red and blue torches,” Jenna rambled, talking a mile a minute. “Then, the war's on. Every year the competitions are a little different. There're division events for separate ages and group events where everyone gets involved, and there're cheers and pranks and—”

“Whoa,” Andie interrupted, laughing at Jenna. “Don't forget to breathe.”

Jenna giggled and gulped in air. “Sorry . . . I
love
Color War.”

“Sounds . . . active,” Tori said, actually looking a little frightened by the idea of spoiling one of her perfectly matched outfits. Only Tori and Nat would worry about something like that.

“It totally is!” Alex said, echoing Jenna's enthusiasm. She loved Color War more than anything, too. “There's soccer, basketball, swimming, croquet, tug of war, and Scrabble.”