Just Like Me by Nancy Cavanaugh

Author:Nancy Cavanaugh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc
Published: 2016-02-02T05:00:00+00:00

18

Once all the water was cleaned up, we still had to finish scrubbing all the pots and pans, drying them, and putting them away. By the time we put that last pot into the cupboard, my fingertips looked like raisins, my feet felt heavier than bricks, and my muscles ached like someone had used me as a punching bag.

With the flashlight we’d found under the sink in the camp kitchen, the six of us walked back from the mess hall by ourselves in the dark. The air felt cool, and if we hadn’t still been wet from our water fight, it might have felt refreshing. But after being in the hot, humid dish room for hours, the chilly night air made me shiver.

It was late and camp was deserted, except for Sarge Marge sitting in the bulldog chair waiting for us.

“Well, ladies, since you like water so much, you’ll be seeing a lot more of it. Tomorrow during morning activity, you’ll be washing the entire mess hall floor on your hands and knees,” Sarge Marge said. “It will likely be just as exhilarating as free swim, which is what all the other campers will be doing while you’re making that floor sparkle.”

This was not good news. The mess hall was huge, and the floor in the mess hall was disgusting. I would rather swim in the shallow water with a thousand life jackets on during morning free swim than wash that floor.

“Sleep well, ladies.”

But as terrible as the news was, we were almost too tired to comprehend it. Today had been a killer day, as Becca would say—the soccer game, the cabin argument, the water fight, and now the filthy mess hall floor to look forward to in the morning.

Inside the cabin, we peeled off our wet shorts and T-shirts and let them lie right where they landed on the sandy concrete floor. I knew our clothes would smell by morning if we didn’t hang them up, but none of us cared. We all jumped into our pj’s and were zipped up in our sleeping bags faster than Becca had gotten her first penalty in the lane soccer game that afternoon.

Even faster than that, steady sounds of sleep filled the cabin, but my tired body wasn’t strong enough to put my restless thoughts to rest. I grabbed my Ms. Marcia journal and my flashlight and ducked inside my sleeping bag.

Dear Ms. Marcia,

I don’t want anyone to know what I’ve been pretending with the blanket because if I told the truth, I might have to confess to everything I’ve been pretending.

Like, that on nights when I lie awake in bed with my blanket, I sometimes whisper things to my birth mom. Things I wish I could tell her about me. Things I wish I could ask her about herself.

And even though I don’t ever wonder if my adoptive mom loves me (that’s a question I don’t have to do any research to answer), I do wonder what she would think about all this pretending.

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