“The Beginners are ready,” Marcos says, waving Alan, Vance, and Owen out to meet Briggs. The boys (Beginners?) haul gray knapsacks over their shoulders on their way out into the sunshine. Before vanishing around the corner, Alan—the tall Beginner with the dangling wrist—leans back to sneak one more peek at me. Cool—I’ve been cruised by a tween. This cabin is full of kids with eyes in constant states of looking and not looking, like roving prison lights. I’ve only been here half a day and I’m already so self-conscious, I don’t even know where to put my attention anymore.
Still looming in the doorframe, Briggs cocks his eyebrow. “Hop to it, Mr. Major. You don’t get a lie-in, even on your first day. Twenty minutes ’til departure.” With that, he stomps down the stairs, leaving the screen door drifting open in the lakeside breeze.
Completely open.
My heart boils to even consider such an immediate, simple escape, but I force myself to remember the facts: it’s not smart to run. What if Ricky tried to run?
“You’re new?” a nasally voice asks behind me. I turn, coming face-to-face with the final camper my age—the annoyingly handsome surfer.
“Connor Major,” I say, shaking his hand, which is muscular but somehow soft as cotton. His Nightlight tee fits snugly across his lean, defined chest. Hot boys—like, Instagram hot—make me nervous to death. How can they stand themselves?
“Drew Schreiber.” He slings his own knapsack carelessly over his shoulder. “I’d chat more, but I’m always the first shower of the day.”
Drew Schreiber…the missing Calvin Klein model. Ario’s sister pops into my head with her amazing, four-eyed face. “He was taken. Some place where they do mind games to make you straight.” A woman was raising money through GoFundMe to find her nephew, this missing model right in front of me. Ario’s sister is looking for Nightlight. I want to gush about everything: his aunt’s website; the money I donated; the whole internet—from LA to Illinois—searching for him. They’re going to find him. They’ll find us both.
“Drew Schreiber?” I repeat.
“Yeah…?” he asks, likely unsettled by my silent grinning.
“Uh, good to meet you.”
Drew rolls his blue slushy-colored eyes. “Look, don’t try to sit with me at breakfast, okay? I really can’t make that clear enough.”
Once Drew leaves (slinks away is a better phrase), Marcos rushes up, carrying two knapsacks. “Morning,” he chirps as the toothbrush sticking out of his mouth falls to his hand. “New boys always want to sit next to Drew.”
Oh, so Drew doesn’t want anyone sitting with him because he gets flirted with too much—Oh no, I don’t get to kiss his perfect peach of supermodel ass over toast and eggs? All I was gonna do is let him know that someone loves him and is trying to find him.
“I gotta watch you make your bed,” Marcos says in a Sorry-for-Being-a-Nudge tone.
“Sure, fine,” I groan.
I pout all the way to my bunk—I couldn’t care less about a well-made bed right now. I shake out the rumpled twin sheet, lay it on the mattress, and smooth it out in one long stroke of my wingspan. There, done. Marcos nudges his glasses as he inspects my bed’s uneven lumps, its untucked ends, and the pillow with its case half yanked off. “You’re such a guy,” he giggles, dropping his knapsack. In under thirty seconds, he redoes my bed properly using sharp, precise tugs.