As I watch the flickering lights drift away like tiny souls leaving, I think there is such a thing as Camp Spirit. But it isn’t what Mr. Bob was talking about.

Mr. Bob may think he lit the first candle, but the flame is beyond anything he can control or even comprehend. Passing from hand to hand, the fire becomes new for each person. Camp Spirit is like that too—complex, changing, elusive. I think kindly of fire, its warmth and light, the fire of the hearth. A place where people gather for strength and nourishment. And I think of fire’s power to consume and destroy. A raging force that blasts away the good and bad, the weak and strong, without discrimination, reducing them to their elements. And finally I open my heart to the small flame that flickers out in an instant, to endure only in a brief afterlife of memory. A spirit that exists only so long as it has something to act upon.

Margie takes my candle, and I see it settle on the water. As it drifts off, I deliberately look away. I don’t want to follow its path. When I look at the water again, I can no longer distinguish my candle from the rest. I will never know what happens to it.

In silence, we roll up the hill. At the flagpole, invisible, without shadows, the boys go in one direction and the girls in the other to the places where we will sleep.

*   *   *

In silence, we get ready for bed. After nine nights, it has become a pattern that needs no words. Margie shakes out my dress and lays it across my footlocker. She puts the day’s underwear, T-shirt, and socks in my laundry bag. Tomorrow or the next day, those things will be in my mother’s washing machine, spinning around with the things they bring back from their vacation. Sand from the hills of Camp Courage will mix with sand brought from the ocean.

I sit on my bed and watch Sara get settled for the night. Carole pulls the curve out of her back, and her body-accordion expands. During my time here, I have ended most days watching her draw the night air deep into her lungs. She makes a tiny good-night salute as Carole stuffs two pillows under her bent knees. I’m not angry with her anymore. I want to tell her. In the morning I will.