Dave Chen, however, was acceptable. In a big way. I'd overheard him telling someone he'd gotten a near perfect score on his math PSATs.
I was sitting there, wondering why it felt wrong, somehow, to drag a guy like Dave into my problematic existence, when I had never thought twice about dragging Rob, whom I like a whole lot better than I like Dave, into it, when Ruth suddenly went, "Don't you have your first tutorial this afternoon? Shouldn't you be, oh, I don't know, practicing, or something?"
I took a bite of my pizza. Not bad. Not as good as my dad's, of course, but certainly better than that sorry excuse for pizza they serve at the Hut.
"I prefer for Monsieur Le Blanc to hear me at my worst," I explained. "I mean, you can't improve on perfection."
Ruth just waved at me irritably. "Go sit with your little hellions. They're calling you, you know."
My little hellions were, indeed, calling to me. I picked my tray up and joined the rest of the Birch Trees.
"Jess," Tony said. "Get a load of this."
He belched. The rest of the Birch Trees tittered appreciatively.
"That's nothing. Listen to this." Sam took a long swallow of Coke. He then let out a burp of such length and volume, diners at nearby tables glanced over in admiration. Although pleased by this, Sam modestly refused to take total credit for his accomplishment. "Having a deviated septum helps," he informed us.
Seeing that Dr. Alistair, the camp director, had glanced our way, I quickly steered the conversation in another direction—toward the new Birch Tree Cottage theme song, which I soon had all of them singing heartily:
Oh, they built the ship Titanic
To sail the ocean blue.
They thought it was a ship
No water could get through.
But on its maiden voyage
An iceberg hit that ship.
Oh it was sad when the great ship went down.
Chorus:
Oh it was sad
So sad
It was sad
It was sad when the great ship went down
To the bottom of the—
Husbands and wives, little children lost their lives
It was sad when the great ship went down
Kerplunk
She sunk
Like junk
Cha-cha-cha
Everything was going along swimmingly until I caught Shane, between verses, shoveling down all of Lionel's ice cream—the one food item of which there were no second helpings served at Camp Wawasee, for the obvious reason that, without this restriction, the campers would eat nothing but mint chocolate chip.
"Shane!" I bellowed. He was so surprised, he dropped the spoon.
"Aw, hell," Shane said, looking down at his ice cream-spattered shirt. "Look what the lesbo made me do."
"That's three, Shane," I informed him calmly.
He looked up at me bewilderedly. "Three what? What are you talking about?"
"Three strikes. You're sleeping on the porch tonight, buddy."
Shane sneered. "Big deal."
Arthur said, "Shane, you dink, that means you're going to miss out on the story."
Shane narrowed his eyes at me. "I am not missing out on the story," he said evenly.
I blinked at Arthur. "What story?"
"You're going to tell us another story tonight, aren't you, Jess?"
All the residents of Birch Tree Cottage swiveled their heads around to stare at me. I said, "Sure. Sure, there'll be another story."
Tony poked Shane. "Ha, ha," he teased. "You're gonna miss it."
Shane was furious.
"You can't do that," he sputtered at me. "If you do that, I'll—I'll—"
"You'll do what, Shane?" I asked in a bored voice.
He narrowed his eyes at me. "I'll tell," he said menacingly.
"Tell what?" Arthur, his mouth full of fries, wanted to know.
"Yeah," I said. "Tell what?"
Because of course I'd forgotten. About Shane barging into my room the night before, and catching me with Taylor's photo. I'd forgotten all about it.
But he wasted no time reminding me.
"You know," he said, his eyes slitted with malice. "Lightning girl."
I swallowed the mouthful of pizza I'd been chewing. It was like cardboard going down my throat. And not just because it was cafeteria food.
"Hey," I said, attempting to sound as if I didn't care. "Tell whoever you want. Be my guest."
It was a feint, of course, but it worked, taking the wind right out of his sails. His shoulders slumped and he studied his empty plate meditatively, as if hoping an appropriate reply would appear upon it.
I didn't feel the least bit sorry for him. Little bully. But I wasn't just mad at Shane. I was peeved at Lionel, too. How could he just sit there and let people pick on him like that? Granted Shane outweighed him by fifty pounds or so, but I had bested far bigger adversaries when I'd been Lionel's same age and size.
After lunch, as we were walking toward the music building, where the kids would continue their lessons until free play at three, I tried to impress upon Lionel the fact that, if he didn't stand up for himself, Shane was just going to keep on torturing him.
"But, Jess," Lionel said. He pronounced my name as if it were spelled Jace. "He will pound on me."
"Look, Lionel," I said. "He might pound on you. But you just pound him back, only harder. And go for the nose. Big guys are total babies when it comes to their noses."
Lionel looked dubious. "In my country," he said, trilling his r's musically, "violence is looked upon with disfavor."
"Well, you're in America now," I told him. The other Birch Trees had disappeared into their various practice rooms. Only Lionel and I remained in the atrium, along with a few other people.
"Look," I said to him. "Make a fist."
Lionel did so, making the fatal error of folding his thumb inside his fingers.
"No, no, no," I said. "Hold your thumb outside your fingers, or you'll break it, see, when you smash your knuckles into Shane's face."
Lionel moved his thumb, but said, "I do not think I want to smash Shane's face."
"Sure, you do," I said. "And when you do, you don't want to break your thumb. And remember what I said. Go for the nose. Nasal cartilage breaks easily, and you won't hurt your knuckles as much as if you went for, say, the mouth. Never go for the mouth."
"I do not think," Lionel said, "we have to worry about that."
"Good." I patted him on the shoulder. "Now go to class, before you're late."
Lionel took off, clutching his flute case and looking down, a little warily, at his own fist. From the other side of the atrium, I heard applause. Ruth, Scott, and Dave were standing there with, of all people, Karen Sue Hanky.
"Way to discharge that volatile situation, Jess," Ruth commented sarcastically.
"Yeah," Scott said with a snicker. "By teaching the kid to throw a punch."
Dave was feigning thoughtfulness. "Funny, I don't remember them teaching us that particular method of conflict resolution in counselor training."
They were joking, of course. But Karen Sue, as usual, was deadly serious.
"I think it's disgraceful," she said. "You teaching a little boy to settle his problems with violence. You should be ashamed of yourself."
I stared at her. "You," I said, "have obviously never been the victim of a bully."
Karen Sue stuck out her chin. "No, because I was taught to resolve my differences with others peacefully, without use of force."