Day Camp Brats

Chapter 1
Day Camp Brats, Part One

Part One

Summer break was supposed to be for sleeping in.

I was still recovering from all the papers and finals I had crammed into a marathon study session over the last half week or so. One year of college down, which meant it was time for a well deserved vacation. I planned on finding a part-time summer job eventually, since some extra cash would be nice, but only after enjoying a week or two of relaxing first. 

The problem was, my sister had already found a job, and apparently I was going to be her ride every morning now that I was back and my car was an option. It was pretty obvious that our parents were using it as a tactic to get me up at a ‘reasonable hour’ during the week. 

April had just graduated high school, and her present was going to be the same as mine had been–whatever used car our parents could find at a decent price. Since that car hadn’t been acquired yet, mine was the only one available while our parents were at work. So, I had a choice. I could either drive her to the day camp she’d be working at, or let her borrow my car every day if I didn’t want to wake up early.

Obviously, I wasn’t cool with the latter. I wasn’t about to deal with a car-less existence for the majority of the day, plus I could see April keeping it after work if she got along with her fellow counselors and started doing stuff with them, or decided to go to a friend’s place for the evening, or whatever. I’d just have to get up early, drive her over, then go back to the house and sleep a bit more. 

That’s how I ended up waking up at 8 AM on a Monday, just two days after the beginning of my summer. The only real effort I put into my appearance was splashing my face with water and changing from PJs into a lazy shorts/tee combo. It didn’t really matter, when I’d just be pulling up to the curb or whatever parking spot they had outside the camp.

For the most part, April and I just coexisted at home. We didn’t really bicker, but we also weren’t that close. Different genders, different grades, different social circles in high school, and all that. She still occasionally teased me about my size, since I was shorter than her despite being male and more than a year older, though it wasn’t nearly as frequent as when we were teenagers.

She was more of a morning person than I was, which made the drive a little painful. I was still waking up, while she was finding a pop station on the radio and asking me if I had found a job yet. Since graduation was earlier than my semester let out, she had already been at the day camp for a week.

“You should get on that!” she said, “Mom and Dad don’t want you sitting around the house all day. And I’m pretty sure video games stunt your growth.”

Yeah, no. That’s not how that worked. I didn’t really dignify any of that with a response, when I wasn’t in the mood to let my younger sister pester me about getting a job. I just turned the music up a few clicks and kept driving.

When we arrived, I was surprised when she told me to come inside for a few minutes. Something about how she had to check on something with the office, and might need to make a quick run to the store. I started to protest, since driving her at all was more than I wanted to do at 7 AM, but she shut me down pretty quickly. 

“Seriously, Nicholas? It’ll just take a few minutes. Do you have something more important to do?”

Sleep. That was more important than waiting around for something that one of the counselors who actually had a car could surely handle. Not wanting to turn it into a whole thing, however, I just said, “Fine. Five minutes; that’s it.” Plus whatever time it would take to swing by the store around the corner if it came to that.

“Fine. You need to come inside with me,” she replied, “They have a super strict rule about cell phones. I won’t be able to text you.”

Great. It made sense, with how there was all this liability when it came to working with kids. At the same time, that was just another way my simple vision of the morning was being messed with. I wasn’t even wearing shoes.

April said that was fine, and that I’d only need to hang out in the lobby for a second while she checked in. I begrudgingly got out of the car and followed her inside, where I was introduced to Holly. The brunette seemed to be April’s age; she was cute, though way too energetic for my liking at the early hour. I briefly greeted her, then took a seat on the nearby bench while the two girls went off to take inventory.

I just sat there, impatiently waiting. 

The ‘no phones’ rule extended to me, since I was over eighteen and not a parent of one of the campers, so I had to leave that in my pocket. There was nothing in the area to kill time with, so all I could do was twiddle my thumbs.

Any minute now.

I wasn’t sure what was taking April so long. According to her, this was a simple check-in. Every Monday, they had to make sure they had the necessary supplies for the week. If I were in charge, I’d do something like that on a Friday; that way, someone could run to the store afterwards, or beforehand the following Monday. 

Rather than the two counselors I was waiting on, a pair of middle school girls darted into the lobby from a different door maybe thirty seconds later. “Hey!” one of them exclaimed, “What’s your name?”

Did I have to engage? It kind of felt like I needed to, when the alternative was staying quiet and ignoring them after already making eye contact.

“Nicholas,” I said. Splitting the difference, by simply answering the question and then glancing back towards the other door. Hopefully they would run along, back to wherever they had come from. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with their peppy energy.

“Omg, that’s perfect!” the other one giggled, “Pissy Nicky!”

With no warning, they both ran up to me. Each girl pulled out a spray bottle from behind their back and, working in tandem, they both pointed it at my crotch and pulled their triggers rapid-fire to hit me with the water before I could process what was happening.

“HEY.” By the time I properly reacted, the front of my shorts was soaked; I could feel my underwear clinging to my skin underneath as well.

The girls just burst into laughter and ran away. What the actual fuck?! I had avoided cursing at them, due to both their age and the surprise of what they just did; still, I couldn’t fucking believe them. Maybe a ‘prank’ like that is acceptable to pull on their peers, but I was a young adult they didn’t even know.

I stood up and looked around for napkins or paper towels or something, also nervous that a parent/child combo would walk in and think that someone my age had an ‘accident.’ Where was the nearest bathroom? I had never been there before, and wasn’t sure where to go.

Before I could make a decision, April and Holly returned. “Sorry for the wait,” Holly said, “We had to- Nicholas! Did you-”

“What the fuck?” April asked. Apparently the sibling who was the day camp counselor was the one who wasn’t great at filtering her language.

“No, I didn’t,” I scoffed. There was no reason to be embarrassed, when I didn’t actually do anything. “These two brats ran in here and sprayed me with water. Guess it’s still funny to do immature nonsense in middle school.”

Holly didn’t look convinced. It didn’t help that the teen girls managed to make it look like an actual accident, rather than just blindly soaking my shorts. “Two random boys did that?” she asked.

“Two girls,” I clarified, “Where’s the bathroom? And is there a towel or something I can use?” There probably wasn’t a change of clothes for me on hand; the best I could hope for was being able to wrap something around my bottoms after drying them as much as I could.

“You’re saying two girls came in here and sprayed your pants? For no reason?” Holly summarized, “That’s quite the story.”

“It’s not a story!” I groaned, “It literally just happened.”

“Where would a camper get a spray bottle?” she asked, “And why would they leave the gym? Just tell us the truth, Nicholas. Did you have an accident?”

“No,” I flatly said, “It’s just water.”

She turned to my sister. “April?”

April thought about it for a moment, then said, “He’s never had a daytime accident before. But he wets the bed all the time. Probably from chugging all those energy drinks while gaming at night.”

“April!” I snapped, staring at her incredulously. It was obvious what she was doing. Saying that this was a common occurrence would be too suspicious. Instead, she went with a more believable lie that would make my current situation more plausible. “That’s not funny. Holly, I don’t wet the bed. And this is water, not piss.”

The moment Holly glanced back my way, April smirked. She gave me a little wink as well, before saying, “I told you not to have so much soda earlier.”

“Come on, Nicholas,” Holly said. She walked up to me and placed a hand on my back, nudging me forward, “I’ll take you to the bathroom. April, can you write up an incident report?”

“You got it,” April smiled, “Sorry about my brother. He’s normally better behaved than this!”

“There’s nothing to apologize for. Accidents happen,” she said, “This way, Nicholas. Left down this hall, then right. We’ll use the farther bathroom, and I’ll make sure no one bothers you while you’re in there. 

Slightly flustered from how quickly all of this was unfolding, as well as the lingering shock of the stupid prank, I gave April one more look. As in, ‘Don’t be a brat. Tell her the fucking truth. I’m serious.’ It was difficult to actually voice those words, with how Holly was in my personal space and treating me in a way that was no doubt similar to how she operated with those that actually attended the day camp.

April just shrugged, and gave me another subtle wink while Holly wasn’t looking. “Just do whatever Holly says, okay?” she teased, “She’ll take good care of you!”