But I was raised in the Reverend’s hellfire. This is nothing to me but another Sunday morning. When the Reverend’s Rolex-clad grip lands on my shoulder, Marcos jumps an inch off his pew, but I hold the man’s gaze as well as my breath. “Which of you will not return?” the Reverend asks, peering over his glasses.

The memory of his sugar plum tea wafts back to me.

I can’t go it alone forever, away from my family. I can’t pretend to be straight, but I can’t just say “peace, y’all” and leave my mom for good. She and I are going to be close again—this is temporary. Which means I can’t escape; I need to leave here on good terms. I’ll fake whatever I have to. I’m going to be the best camper Nightlight has ever seen.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

THE BIRTHDAY BOY

After service, the Reverend stays in the chapel while Briggs, Ramona, and the gray-shirts return us to the South Pacific Gulch. No one speaks. The world has become so silent—this is the most walking I’ve ever done without earbuds. Ninety percent of Nightlight’s program is nothing but mind-numbing routine; they’re going to shuffle me from one hotbox to the next until I finally shout, “I give up! I’m straight!”

Without stopping, Marcos and Darcy lead the campers back inside the Gulch, but Molly and I are blocked by a pair of friendly faces: Ramona and Briggs. “Hey, newcomers,” Ramona says, swishing the filthy hem of her frock. “Y’all ready to jump into the nitty-gritty of your first day?”

“Yes, ma’am,” I report cheerfully. Molly tosses me a flash of scorn before she, too, agrees to accept whatever is coming next.

“We appreciate your new attitudes,” Briggs says.

“I am tickled pink to present you with the most important belonging you’ll ever hold in your hand,” Ramona squeaks, thrusting a brand new composition book at each of us. EXPULSION DIARY is written across the top. “It’s your new best friend!”

“Before your first class with Ramona,” Briggs says, “there’s a very important—and private—conversation we need to have. Mr. Major, you’re with me. Miss Partridge, follow Ramona.”

There isn’t a moment to ask questions before Ramona disappears with Molly into a grove of trees disguising the cafeteria’s eastern wall. Greenery brushes against Molly’s hair like a beaded curtain as she anxiously follows Ramona into the unknown. At the opposite end of the courtyard, Briggs and I arrive at the base of an enormous treehouse—a cabin, standing sentry at the edge of Pura Vida’s cul-de-sac and raised three stories off the ground on taller versions of the floodwater stilts protecting every structure in Nightlight. A zigzagging staircase ascends through the jungle ferns, not much higher than Karaoke Bill’s watchtower; and the two structures are so close, I could hang a clothesline between them.

Briggs’s furry, Clydesdale legs make short work of the climb, while I’m sweating off five pounds. The worst part about Nightlight so far is how my damn eyes won’t stop roving and thirsting at every single adult male I see. Can I stop being such a gay monster for two seconds? The higher we climb, the deeper the island’s floor sinks beneath us. A long way to fall, Major. A rebellious urge to run back to Molly and hop aboard her boat-hijacking plan seizes me. But I wait and remember my own strategy.