Church Camp Chaos (17 page)

“Hamburger or cheeseburger?” the cow asked EJ while the other barnyard animals in the serving line danced and sang multiple verses of “Old MacDonald.”

“Doesn’t that seem a little cannibalistic?” EJ grinned at the lunch lady dressed up as a Holstein.

“
I’m
not eating the beef,
you
are,” the cow answered, laughing.

“Cheeseburger, please,” EJ said, holding up her cafeteria tray.

A chicken served up celery and carrot sticks, a llama gave EJ the option of a cherry or lemon Jell-O cup (she picked cherry), and a horse gave her a carton of milk and a bottle of water.

After going through the line, she looked back when she heard a good-natured argument break out in the middle of a verse.

“Llamas hum!” the cow said. “So it should be ‘with a
hmmm-hmmm
here and a
hmmm-hmmm
there.’ ”

“No—they spit!” the chicken replied. “ ‘With a
pthu-pthu
here and a
pthu-pthu
there.’ What do you say, camper?” The chicken pointed a carrot stick at Macy, who had been standing politely quiet with her tray outstretched, waiting to be served.

“I—uh—,” Macy stammered, obviously surprised to be asked her opinion. “I guess humming seems like a better choice than spitting … you know, around food.”

“I like the way you think, girl.” The chicken added a handful of vegetable sticks to Macy’s tray. “You might have a future in being a camp cook!”

EJ waited for Macy, and they found a spot at a table and sat down to eat. EJ had just licked the whipped cream off her Jell-O cup when Gene started mail call.

“When I call your name, please come up and claim your mail quickly,” Gene said through his megaphone. “My lovely assistant, Susan, will have your letters in hand.”

“Your
lovely
assistant, eh?” a male counselor piped up from across the dining hall. Gene’s face turned a
lovely
shade of red that almost matched his hair. Susan beamed at him.

Gene’s megaphone crackled as he fumbled with the switch. “Don’t forget—anybody who receives a package in the mail must tell a joke in front of everyone to claim said package. It’s Camp Christian tradition.”

Gene started calling out names, and a steady stream of campers made their way up to Susan to claim their letters. Macy got a letter from her mom that she ripped open and started reading as she walked back to their table. Her eyes were bright and she had a strange look on her face when she sat down.

“EJ, you’re not going to believe this,” Macy said, shaking her head as she looked at the paper in her hand.

“What’s wrong?” EJ asked, her stomach clenching with nervousness.

“Actually, nothing is wrong.” Macy smiled and smoothed out the paper on the table. “Mom says we’re
not
moving to Milwaukee after all! The company Dad works for is going to let him telecommute and just go to Milwaukee for a couple of days every other month.”

“Mace, that’s great!” EJ’s stomach gave a little flip. She really was happy for her best friend, but the news reminded her of her own problem.
I’m still moving away, so I’m still going to lose my best friend
.

“Time for the packages,” Gene called through the megaphone. “Anna Baker, EJ Payne, and Wade Thompson—you each have one up here. So come on up when you have your joke ready to go.”

“All right!” EJ pushed her worries about moving to the back of her mind and focused on the task at hand: claiming that package.

Macy looked at EJ wide-eyed. “What joke are you going to tell? I’m glad
I
didn’t get a package.”

“Don’t worry,” EJ said, taking a final swig of milk before wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “I was born for this.”

EJ stood from her seat and walked confidently toward Susan and Gene.
Which joke should I tell?
she wondered.
The one about the magic lamp? Or maybe the talking turtle? Oh well, I’ll just let my instincts take over once I can read the room
.

“EJ, the return address says your package is from your aunt CJ in Chicago,” Susan said, shaking the package next to her ear. “Sounds like there’s some good candy in here.”

“Here you go.” Gene handed EJ the megaphone, which was heavier than it looked, so she had to grasp it with both hands to keep it steady. “Just push this button when you want to talk.”

EJ pushed what she thought was the correct button, except an ear-splitting siren blared out of the thing. It surprised EJ so much she accidentally threw the megaphone and watched it sail—seemingly in slow-motion—in an arc toward the floor.

“Whoa, there!” Gene fisted the megaphone strap and saved his precious contraption mere centimeters from it shattering on the floor. Gene’s miraculous save was impressive, and the campers gave a collective sigh—EJ wasn’t sure if it was relief or disappointment. “Maybe I’ll just hold it for you,” Gene said. “Ready?”

EJ took a deep breath. “Ready.”

Gene held the megaphone at EJ’s level and pushed the button. The megaphone gave a little squeak, so everyone knew it was on. EJ looked out at the sea of faces, all watching her expectantly.

And her mind went completely blank.

Well,
almost
completely blank. There was one joke that remained. The one joke she promised herself she’d never tell because she’d heard it too many times in her life already. The joke that made her roll her eyes and was hugely annoying because
everyone
laughed at it, even though she didn’t think it was funny. At all. But what other choice did she have? She really wanted whatever was in that package from Aunt CJ.

“Knock-knock,” she said.

“Who’s there?” the crowd asked in unison.

“Noah.”

“Noah who?”

EJ gulped. She couldn’t believe she was about to deliver this punch line:

“Noah good joke?”

EJ closed her eyes, sure she’d be booed back to her seat. But after a moment of silence, a loud burst of laughter exploded from Gene and rippled through the crowd. EJ opened her eyes to see laughing faces all across the cafeteria and joined in, relieved.

Isaac’s lame joke saved the day. Who would’ve thought?

EJ wondered if maybe she should give her little brother more credit for being funny.

Nah
.

July 23

Mom says that one way to set yourself up for success is to make sure your outside matches what you want your inside to be like. So I’m wearing my very favorite pair of Converse All-Stars (the red ones with the glitter that’s almost worn off because they’re so old), a red Camp Christian T-shirt, and my oldest and comfiest pair of jean shorts.

Why am I trying to make sure my outside matches my inside? Today is the one day of camp I’ve been dreading: day camp. Busloads of five- and six-year-olds (all of whom are probably “space invaders” to their older brothers and sisters) will swarm the campground like a plague of locusts with their high-pitched voices, sticky hands, runny noses, short attention spans, and spaz-tastic craziness. And us older campers have to help herd them around all day as their big buddies!

But I’m going to try my best to enjoy camp today, Diary. And if I think about it for a half second, I remember having such a fun time at day camp. I especially liked hanging out with the big kids. It made me feel so grown up. So maybe I can be the cool friend to one of these little ankle biters.

EJ

“All day campers should stay seated until you are paired up with your camp buddy,” Gene barked through his megaphone, hardly being heard above the excited yelling, chattering, squealing sound of 150 day campers sitting on the grass of the rec field.

Well, they were
supposed
to be sitting. Mostly the boys were running around or pummeling each other or wrestling on the grass. And the girls were dancing or practicing cartwheels or picking dandelion bouquets. And there was a line of day campers being herded to the restrooms by camp counselors. (EJ thought she remembered reading somewhere it’s a scientific fact that kindergarteners have the world’s tiniest bladders.) Isaac was in his own little world, running through clusters of day campers and flexing his muscles. This would’ve been weird enough, but he was also wearing two oversized green Incredible Hulk fists and shouting, “Hulk excited! Hulk go to camp!”

“Who’s the crazy day camper who’s Hulking out over there?” EJ heard Cory Liden ask. “Oh wait, I recognize him. That’s EJ’s little brother.”

“You think
that’s
crazy?” EJ piped up. “That’s nothing.”

“He looks like fun,” Cory said, grinning.

EJ and her fellow fifth-grade campers stood along the edge of the rec field, overwhelmed and amused by the heightened energy of the mass of little bodies in front of them. Three loud, crackling pops came from the megaphone. EJ assumed Gene must’ve jacked the volume control up to eleven—as high as it would go.

“Day campers!” Gene’s voice boomed louder, but everybody knew he was fighting a losing battle. Nobody under the age of six even looked at him. “Hello? Is this thing on?”

“Gene, let me take a swing at this one,” Susan said. Then she winked at EJ, Macy, and the handful of other campers near them. “Join in if you know this—just a little something I learned during student teaching.”

EJ looked at Macy to see if she knew what was happening, and Macy shrugged. Susan started a very distinctive rhythmic clapping pattern—one that EJ, Macy, and the other campers from Spooner Elementary recognized as the “Zip Your Trap, It’s Time to Clap” rhythm that all of the teachers used to get students to sit down, be quiet, and pay attention.

EJ couldn’t help but wonder how this was going to work with
so
many kids, but she quickly joined in on the clap, keeping time with Susan. Macy and several other fifth-grade campers started clapping as well, and in a matter of seconds, the eyes of the little day campers looked toward the noise. A cluster of kindergarten boys in the middle of wrestlemania heard the clapping and—as if on cue or hypnotized by the sound—stopped beating on each other, sat down, and joined in the clapping. The swell of sound grew as more people joined in, and soon even the campers and counselors who didn’t know the rhythm at first caught on to the simple beat.