So Much to Live For (3 page)

F
OR an instant, Dawn was speechless. Confusion and anger tumbled through her with lightning speed. Behind her, five wide-eyed girls crowded, waiting to see what she would do.

Where’s Gail?
she wondered frantically. Then she recalled seeing her back in the hall reassuring some anxious parents. Gail wasn’t going to be here anytime soon to help her handle this. Dawn swallowed hard.

“That’s my bed,” Dawn said, trying to keep her voice even and controlled.

Marlee, didn’t look up. “Oh, really?”

“Your nametag is over there.” Dawn pointed to a bunk across the room. Marlee’s nametag and flowers littered the floor.

“I saw it, but I like this bunk better.”

Dawn took a deep breath, trying to calm her racing heart and boiling emotions. She stepped over her bedcovers wadded on the floor. “Well, you can’t have this bunk. It’s mine.”

Marlee glared up at her. Struck by the glittering hostility in Marlee’s eyes, Dawn almost backed off. But some instinct told her that if she lost this battle, she’d lose the confidence of the others and her authority to be a counselor.

“I want this bunk,” Marlee said.

“Well, you can’t have it.”

“What are you going to do about it?” Marlee stuck out her chin defiantly.

Dawn took a long, hard look at her challenger. Marlee was thin and lean. She was partially bald with wispy tufts of hair standing straight out. Her eyes were green, and one seemed fixed and staring. She looked more pitiful than mean, but Dawn refused to overlook her attitude. “I’ve got twenty pounds on you, Marlee. Now get off my bed before I throw you off.”

“You better not try.” Marlee sounded tough, but Dawn saw her gaze waver and a look of surprise cross her face.

“Don’t push me,” Dawn warned.

“I have cancer,” Marlee said, tossing the words insolently.

“Who in this room doesn’t?” Dawn challenged as she gestured to the girls pressed together in a huddle in back of her.

Marlee eyed her skeptically. “You don’t look like you have it.”

“You should have seen me when I was on chemo. I looked pretty grim.”

“We all have cancer,” one of the girls said. “You can’t come to this camp unless you have cancer.”

“Who asked you?” Marlee snapped. “I didn’t want to come to this stupid place anyway.”

“Then why did you?” Fran asked.

“Like that would be any of your business?” Marlee jumped off the mattress and hauled up her suitcase. It was so large and heavy that she staggered. Dawn’s arm shot out to help, but Marlee gave her a warning look that said,
Don’t touch
.

Marlee dragged the suitcase across the wooden floor to her assigned bunk. “Go ahead. Take your dumb old bed. Who cares? Just leave me alone, and don’t tell me what to do.”

Dawn took a deep breath, her knees shaking. But she said, “Wait, Marlee. You trashed my bed. I expect you to make it for me.”

“In your dreams!”

“I mean it, Marlee.” She stepped toward the girl. “Make yours and then mine.”

“What are you going to do if I don’t? Send me home?”

Oh, great,
Dawn thought. Maybe she shouldn’t have challenged her. “I’m not sending you home—you’re here to stay.”

“Fine,” Marlee said, jerking Dawn’s bedding up off the floor. “This stinks! I’m stuck here with a bunch of losers.”

Dawn ignored her and turned to the other girls. “All right. Let’s get those beds made. We’ve got to be back in the mess hall for supper in an hour.”

The girls dashed off to their respective beds and began unpacking while Dawn walked calmly into the bathroom and shut the door. Once inside, she sagged over the sink and let her breath out in one long slow motion. Her hands were trembling and sweat was running between her shoulder blades.

“Just when I was starting to think this was a good idea,” she muttered at her reflection in the mirror. Well, she’d won the first round. But if Marlee was going to continue to be such a brat, then this would surely be the longest week in Dawn’s life.

* * * * *

Back in the hall for supper, Dawn told Gail what had happened.

“Sounds like she’s a pretty angry girl,” Gail said. “We’ll have to watch her closely. Go tell Dr. Ben.”

Dawn wasn’t able to speak to Dr. Ben until after the campers had played several get-acquainted games and had headed down to the lake for the bonfire ritual. On the trail, she quickly spilled her story to Dr. Ben.

“Marlee Hodges,” he said, flipping through the papers on his clipboard until he found his mini-profile on her. “She’s from Columbus— your hometown.”

“Terrific,” Dawn said sourly.

“Let’s see, she has non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma—that’s cancer that causes tumors to grow on internal organs. She’s had two operations to remove tumors, and it says here that she lost an eye.”

“She did?”

“Her left eye is artificial. She’s still taking chemo, so coming to camp may be a bit overwhelming. Her hostility can be a cover-up for fear.”

“But she acted so hateful.”

Dr. Ben studied her profile again. “It says that both of her parents are deceased and that she lives with her grandmother on her father’s side. She’s Marlee’s legal guardian.”

Dawn thought back to all the times her parents and Rob had helped her through her illness. She knew she couldn’t have made it so far without them. But Marlee was partially blind and had no parents. She began to feel sorry for the girl. “How should I treat her?”

“Sounds to me like you did just fine.”

“I did?”

“She’s probably pretty scared and angry. You were thirteen when you were diagnosed, weren’t you?” he asked.

Dawn nodded.

“Think back to how overwhelmed you felt. Maybe she’ll open up in rap sessions,” he suggested. “Let me know how it goes.”

By then they’d arrived at the lake, and the campers were settling around a pyramid of logs and sticks. Dawn quickly took a place between Val and Esther. Directly across from her, she saw Brent with several young boys huddled around him. He waved and smiled, and she smiled back. But her mind was still mulling over the problem of Marlee.

The sun set in a red ball, and the sky filled with brilliant hues of red, lavender, and violet. The group grew quiet. From the middle of the lake, a canoe began its advance through the darkening waters. Soon, two Indians stepped onto the shore, each carrying lighted torches. Dawn listened as Dr. Ben invited the campers to empty their ashes on the fire.

Slowly, campers filed forward, shaking out the contents of boxes and bags. Dawn also stepped forward. Last year, she’d scattered hers and Sandy’s ashes onto the pile—Sandy’s had been part of the legacy from her friend’s cardboard box. Now, as she stood watching the ashes flutter downward, tears threatened. Quickly she turned and went to her place on the log.

The Indians lit the wooden pyre, a war whoop went up, and the crowd clapped and yelled, “To victory!” Then the counselors passed out bags of marshmallows along with roasting sticks, and in no time, the sizzle of melting sugar blended with the smells of night-blooming flowers and pine trees.

“This is yummy,” Esther said, licking blackened goo off the end of her stick.

“Hey, Cindy!” Val called. “There’s room for you guys over here!”

Dawn scooted over to make room for the girls from her cabin.

“Where’s Marlee?” Cindy asked.

“Who cares?” Esther said.

Dawn searched the crowds until she finally located Marlee standing alone by the pier. In the shadows she looked lost, reminding Dawn of a scrawny, dejected cat. Still, she was making no effort to join in the marshmallow roast.

“Maybe we should ask her over,” Dawn said, pity stirring inside of her.

“Forget it,” Paige said. “She tripped me when we were coming down the trail.”

Dawn stared at the one-armed girl. “Are you sure? Maybe it was an accident.”

“She snatched my scarf off my head,” Fran offered. “And right in front of two guys. I was so embarrassed.”

“She’s just mean and nasty,” Val said, shoving another marshmallow onto her stick. “Ignore her.”

Dawn decided that Val was right. If Marlee wanted to join in, she could. It was up to her.

After a while the fire had burned low and cooled enough for each camper to gather ashes for the following year, and then they returned to their cabins.

Wearily Dawn prepared for bed, knowing that six o’clock the next morning would arrive in no time, and with it, her first full day as a CIT. She listened to the excited buzz of the girls as she turned out the lights and crawled between her fresh-smelling sheets. Her feet met resistance. She pushed harder, but the sheet didn’t move. Figuring it was somehow wadded up, she shoved with all her strength. She heard the sheet rip as her feet poked through it.

Dawn lay seething in the darkness. Marlee had remade her bed all right. But the little brat had short-sheeted her.

D
AWN felt as if she’d barely closed her eyes when she heard her alarm clock buzz beneath her pillow. She groaned, shut if off, and stumbled out of bed. Fortunately, the buzzer didn’t wake up any of the campers. Hurriedly, she freshened up and dressed, then headed to meet the other CITs.

“Remind me to murder Dr. Ben,” Theresa grumbled to Dawn as the two of them and the other sleepy-eyed CITs stumbled into the assembly hall.

“Morning, Dawn,” Brent said with a grin. “You look pretty,” he whispered in her ear.

She returned his sunny smile. “Maybe we’d better get going,” she suggested. “We’ve got to serenade ten cabins by seven o’clock.”

The group trudged outside where the sun was beginning to break over the tops of stately pine trees. They came to the first cabin and began singing. As Dawn heard stirrings from inside, she realized waking up to a song was better than waking up to an alarm buzzer or to a clanging bell from the mess hall.

About thirty minutes later, all of the campers had been roused, and everyone had quietly assembled beside the lake where Dr. Ben spoke words of hope and encouragement. Dawn studied the campers—some on crutches, some bald, some with partial limbs, some with sores and bandages. It seemed like everyone felt perfectly free to “come as they were,” without pretense or shame about how awful they might look or feel.

She remembered her first camp session with Sandy. Their hair had finally begun to grow back after chemo. In the privacy of the woods, they’d pulled off their scarves to compare lengths and hugged each other over the progress. Absently, Dawn fingered her hair, which now brushed her shoulders. She didn’t think she’d ever wear her hair short again. It brought back too many bad memories.

She was pleased to see her cabin of girls sitting together on a log. Even Marlee had turned out, though she sat hugging her knees to her chest, ignoring the other girls.

Afterward, they all filed back for breakfast and then returned to their cabins for cleanup. Dawn had been assigned CIT inspector duty for the day. When the bell had called the campers for arts and crafts, she went through each cabin with a clipboard, checking off the items that counted toward the Clean Cabin Award. Her inspection of her own cabin revealed a spotless bathroom and neatly made bunk beds—except for Marlee’s.

Angry, Dawn stared down at the jumbled bedcovers. All the others were trying to win the pizza party, but Marlee wasn’t cooperating. It wasn’t fair. Dawn felt like pulling the girl out of crafts and forcing her to return and make her bed. With a sigh, she decided to do it herself this one time. But she would talk to Marlee about it later.

She yanked up the satiny pink sheet and saw that it was elaborately monogrammed and trimmed in delicate eyelet lace. “Good grief,” Dawn muttered. “Who brings designer sheets to camp?” She tucked in the corners and spread a beautiful, country print comforter over the sheets. “Pretty fancy,” she said aloud, admiring its beauty. Certainly nicer than anything
she’d
ever owned.

Once finished, she looked around for the usual assortment of stuffed animals that girls usually brought to camp. The other beds were teeming with plush wildlife, but there were none to perch on Marlee’s bed. “They all probably ran away from her,” Dawn told Mr. Ruggers before leaving.

* * * * *

“What do you think about this, Dawn?” Paige asked the minute she stepped inside the main hall. The tiny ten-year-old held up a clear plastic bottle that she had turned into a terrarium.

“That’s great,” Dawn told her, inspecting the mini-jungle that Paige had carefully planted inside. Other girls came around to show off their handiwork. Everyone except Marlee had created a terrarium to take back home.

“It was stupid,” Marlee told Dawn when Dawn asked her why she hadn’t made one. “Who wants to take home weeds in a bottle?”

Dawn bit her tongue to keep from saying something sharp.

Right before lunch, Tony announced, “Hey, guys. Dr. Ben says the photographer’s here to take the group picture. Get your suits on and meet down by the lake. Then we can swim until the lunch bell rings.”

In minutes, the girls from her cabin had cleaned up the craft tables and raced to change. She followed them to the lake where a photographer arranged all the campers a cluster and took their picture. Boys mugged and made faces, and then afterward, everyone dashed for the water.

“You ready for that diving lesson?” Brent asked Dawn as she watched her kids splashing in the cool blue-green water.

“I told you, I’m hopeless. You’ll be wasting your time.”

“I taught one of my boys to dive already. It’s simple.”

Still, Dawn hesitated, not wanting to embarrass herself in front of her girls. Then Brent turned to Marlee, who was just climbing up onto the pier. “Hey, Marlee. Help me show Dawn how easy it is to dive.”

Without waiting for her to answer, Brent took Marlee’s hand and stood beside her on the wooden dock. Dawn saw Marlee’s face turn beet-red. Her few tufts of hair were plastered to her scalp and her good eye darted nervously. The other was covered with a patch. Again, Dawn thought back to her first camp session when she’d felt ugly and Sandy had helped her feel better about her looks.

“I’ll do it if you will,” Dawn suddenly blurted out, trying to help Marlee feel less in the spotlight.

By now, a small group had gathered. Other voices chided, “Yeah, Marlee, do it so she has to.”

Marlee let Brent coach her for a moment before she rose on her toes, arched her arms over her head, and leapt upward. Her body made a graceful straight-arrow entry into the water. The other kids clapped when she surfaced.

“Dawn’s turn!” somebody yelled. Dawn made an elaborate display of backing out of her promise. But in the end, she perched on the end of the dock and listened carefully to Brent’s instructions. Yet when she tried to follow his directions, her arms somehow lost their arch, her legs had a mind of their own, and she entered the water with an ungainly splash. She sputtered to the surface to the sound of laughter.

“Graceful as a baby hippo,” Brent said from the dock, blue eyes twinkling.

She splashed water on him just as the lunch bell clanged. The campers scrambled from the lake and raced to the hall. Dawn and Brent walked at a more leisurely pace.

“You were a good sport,” he drawled. “Did you mess up that bad on purpose?”

“Did you pick Marlee over the others because she was having such a miserable time and needed the attention?” she countered.

Brent smiled sheepishly. “Maybe so. But she’s no amateur diver, believe me.”

“I thought she looked a little too graceful,” Dawn declared.

“She’s spent a lot of time getting that good. I’d say hours’ and hours’ worth of practice.”

As she entered the mess hall, Dawn noticed a table had been set near the door. Dr. Ben was dispensing medications in small white cups. Dawn saw Marlee take one of the cups and felt relieved because she no longer had to endure the round of chemicals that could make a person nauseous and sick. But because she didn’t have to, she felt a little guilty, too.

The afternoon passed quickly, and that night after dinner, Carnival Night started. Each cabin set up a booth of games for campers to try. Dawn’s cabin opted for the game of tossing rings around soda bottles. Dawn spent her time retrieving rings, righting bottles, and passing out prizes. It wasn’t until the bell sounded for campers to head back to their cabins that Dawn realized how exhausted she was.

She fought to keep to her eyes open while everyone got ready for bed. Girls chattered and giggled, and she sadly remembered how she and Sandy had done the same thing, never once thinking that some poor, exhausted counselor wanted to sleep. Each night, when the lights had been switched off, the two of them had whispered in the about their day’s activities. Once, Dawn had crept to Sandy’s bunk, and they’d hidden under the covers with a flashlight and read love scenes from a romance novel. Now, lying in the dark, waiting for the girls to quiet down, the memory returned so vividly that Dawn had to shake her head to dislodge it.

Finally everyone except Marlee was in bed. Dawn waited until she heard the bathroom door creak open and Marlee skitter across the floor. She held her breath as she heard the gentle rustle of Marlee’s bedcovers, followed by tugging and yanking and tearing. From across the room, she heard Marlee hiss, “Hey! Who messed with my sheets?”

Dawn cooed sweetly in the dark, “You’d better learn to make your bed every morning if you want to avoid accidents. Good night, Marlee,” she added with a satisfied yawn, then promptly fell asleep.