Ann Martin - Mary Anne And Camp

When all the campers had eaten their dinners and helped clear things away, it was time for games. It had been a long day and everyone had eaten a lot, so the games were easy, relatively quiet ones. Logan led a round of Simon Says. Then the campers and the counselors sat in a circle and played a game of Gossip. Claudia whispered a crazy sentence into Marilyn's ear, who was sitting next to her, who whispered it to the next person. When it came to Matt, Haley, who was sitting next to him, signed something quickly. Matt looked surprised, then laughed. He signed something to Jessi, who was sitting next to him on the other side.

"Really?" said Jessi. "Okay." She leaned over and whispered into David Michael's ear.

Of course, the sentence was completely twisted around by then. What Claudia had whispered was, "Hats are nice on sunny days." But the sentence ended up as "Cats like mice and bunnies, please."

Then Ricky said, "Ghost stories! Ghost stories!"

"It's not dark enough yet," objected Karen.

The longer summer day was still very bright. The sun was just beginning to go down.

Natalie looked nervously over her shoulder. "How dark is it supposed to be?"

"We'll tell the ghost stories in the barn,” said Dawn, jumping up. "That way it will be dark, but it will still be light outside."

But first some of the campers insisted on putting on their pajamas which they had brought so they could pretend that the cook-out was a real campout. They looked pretty cute, too.

As we headed for the barn, Karen cleared her throat loudly.

"What about the," Karen lowered her voice to a loud whisper, "Barn Ghost."

"It doesn't come out until after midnight," said Logan quickly. "That's hours from now. You'll be at home asleep. And," he added, anticipating Karen's next comment, "the ghost can't follow you home. It can't leave the barn. It's only the ghost of a barn mouse, you see. A small mouse."

Giggling and talking, the campers went into the barn. Dawn and I had pulled out old blankets and sleeping bags and pillows to spread around on the hay in the barn, and the kids sat on those.

Logan sat next to me and nudged my shoul-

der with his. I smiled. Having Logan near made me feel a little better, a little less lonely and left out. I knew he sensed that I wasn't feeling good about something. But I also knew he'd wait for me to tell him.

And I wasn't sure there was anything I could tell him.

Dawn lit a lantern and set it in the middle of the ring of campers while Kristy slid the barn door almost shut.

Immediately the barn grew much darker.

Karen whipped a flashlight out of her backpack, turned it on, and held it under her chin. It made her face look scary and her glasses look shiny and ghostly in an owl-like way.

"Ooooooh,"moaned Karen.

Kristy held up her hands. "Let the ghost stories beginnnnnnn," she intoned in a creepy voice.

Everyone giggled and whispered and snuggled closer to one another.

Logan cleared his throat. "Okay," he said. "Once upon a time there was a man who always wore a yellow ribbon around his throat…"

"And when he took the yellow ribbon off his head fell off," said Charlotte briskly. "We all know that one. Tell us something good and scary."

"Yeah," said Ricky. "Super scary."

Logan was speechless.

Claudia giggled.

Then Mal cleared her throat. She told a ghost story that really was chilling. She filled it with bloody footprints and headless people. And she ended it with everybody dying.

We looked at Mallory in amazement. Was she able to tell such a gruesome story because she was going to be a writer? Or had growing up in the Pike family given her a ghost-storytelling edge?

But if Mal's fellow counselors were disconcerted, none of the campers were. "Oooh," said Karen. "That was a good one!"

Logan stood up and whispered something in Kristy's ear. She looked thoughtful. Then both of them stood up and stepped away from the ghost-story circle.

When they returned, Karen was in the midst of a standard Karen-brand ghost story, full of wild flights of imagination and extra scary details, involving a cave full of vampire bats and a man whose digital watch kept beeping.

After that, we all took turns telling truly gruesome ghost stories. I told one about a ghostly cat (something that had sort of happened to Dawn). Some of the others were so

outrageous that they were funny. The campers shrieked — and giggled.

Logan leaned over. "I'll be back in just a minute." I nodded, caught up in the ghost-story spell.

Then Kristy looked at her watch. "Time for one more story. Then we're going to make s'mores and then it's time for everyone to go home."

Silence fell over the group.

Kristy said, "Once upon a time, there was a ghost that hated cookouts. In life, he'd never been allowed to go to camp. He'd always had to stay home. So when he became a ghost, he vowed that he would haunt camps and cookouts forever. One night, he saw a group of campers go into an old, old barn ..."

"No!" squeaked Natalie, in a thrilled tone of voice.

Kristy's voice sank to a whisper. "Yes."

Suddenly, a strange moan came from the back of the barn.

"Who's there?" cried Kristy, jumping up.

All the kids leaped to their feet, too.

And Logan leaped out from behind the edge of an old stall.

"Eeeeeh,"several kids cried out.

Several others began to laugh.

"Gotcha!" said Logan.

"That was great,” said Karen.

"Good one, Logan,” said Kristy. "Great idea!"

Everyone began to laugh and talk at once. Dawn blew out the lantern carefully. The campers and counselors went back outside. (Sharon had been keeping an eye on the camp-fire from the house.)

The s'mores were excellent. Logan helped Jackie assemble a double chocolate, single marshmallow s'more (with the marshmallow totally blackened). He helped Matt make a s'more out of Reese's Pieces that Matt had brought just for the occasion. He made a couple of chocolate-only s'mores with the marsh-mallows on the side.

And he ate about a zillion marshmallows himself. He said he felt a little like he imagined Pow might have felt if Pow had come to the cookout.

Soon it was time for the kids to leave. One by one the campers' parents arrived. Jackie went home with Kristy and Karen and David Michael and Andrew. His mother would pick him up at the Brewers' house later.

Logan went home still laughing to himself. He'd been afraid he was going to scare the campers to death with his story. And even when the story had been a bust, he'd been

worried that his idea to "haunt" the barn would be too scary.

But he'd been wrong. The members of Camp BSC — and Jackie Rodowsky — were a lot cooler than he'd given them credit for.

In fact, Logan said, he almost felt sorry for any ghost that they might ever happen to meet!

Chapter 10.

"Hey, campfire ghost!" called Dawn, waving. She and I were sitting on the front porch the afternoon after the cookout. It was a hot July day and Dawn had turned her face up to the sun. I pulled on a cap, but I was enjoying the sun, too. And enjoying not doing much of anything.

Although I admit that I couldn't help thinking there was a lot that Dawn and I could be doing. Such as cleaning the house.