Chapter Thirty-Eight: Union and Reunion

"Hey, Race?" Blink asked nervously.

"Mmph?" Race swallowed his slightly-stale cookie—an ill-gotten, non-camp gain won in the evening's poker game—and took a swig of coffee. "Yes?" he tried, after he swallowed.

"Uh, can I talk to you?"

Race shrugged. "Sure. The doctor is in, as Lucy Van Pelt would say."

"Great." Blink sat down on the bench next to him, but gazed around furtively. The seniors were mostly milling around the dining hall, everyone feeling almost a little desperate. After all, it was getting close to the end of camp. Race did a quick mental tally and realized there were only four nights left, including the current one, and no one was eager to leave.

A group of girls were getting ready to leave the dining hall for the evening, most of the girls from Murphy One—Slant, Swinger, Smurf, Arrow, and Trixie. Blink looked over at them and Smurf caught his eye and waved just a little. Race raised an eyebrow as Blink waved back, and cast a quick glance around the room. Someone less observant probably would have overlooked the fact that Mayfly was now scowling in Smurf's direction.

Interesting.

"How do you tell a girl you like her?"

Race smirked. "Well, in your case, everyone at the whole camp already knows. Asking her out would probably just work."

"I can't do that." Blink plunked his elbow down on the table so he could rest his hand in his chin. "And what do you mean, everyone knows? I haven't even told anyone yet."

"I'm sorry, is it not Smurf?"

Blink gave him a startled look. "I'm that obvious?"

"Ye-ahhhh," Race said. "But so's she, if that makes you feel any better."

"What? She likes me?"

"Um...and I mean this nicely, duh." Race rolled his eyes. "You two could not be any more obvious if you dipped her pigtails in an inkwell."

"What?"

"Never mind." Race shrugged. "The point is, Smurf isn't Sarah, and you can be pretty sure that if you ask her to go to the dance with you, or hang out or whatever, she'll say yes."

"You really think?"

"Yes, I really think."

"Awesome." Blink smiled, but then it faded. "Except I can't."

"Why not?"

"Because I, um, kind of already told Mayfly I'd go with her. And I'd have to be some kind of jerk to go back on that."

"Yeah." Race nodded. "And you're not a jerk. Except to Smurf."

"And I'm not even a jerk to her anymore." Blink smiled again, and Race elbowed him.

"Man, you are smitten. You're grinning like an idiot every five seconds."

"I am not!" He paused, realizing that probably wasn't true. "Okay, it's just...like, with Sarah I knew she didn't really like me back. And Smurf...I dunno, just..."

"It's a lot different when she does likes you back?" Race suggested.

"Yeah."

"So what are you going to do?"

Blink groaned. "That's what I wanted to ask you. There's not some magic way to get out of a date with Mayfly so I can go out with Smurf that doesn't involve me being a huge jerk, is there?"

"Nothing springs to mind. But look, the dance is tomorrow, and after that you can ask Smurf whatever you want, right?"

"Right. Great. That'll give us two whole days before we go home," Blink sulked.

"It's better than nothing, right?"

"Right, but it still sucks. I can't believe we didn't figure this out years ago."

Race chuckled. "Well, even with all the hating, Smurf wasn't totally wrong. You aren't exactly the brightest crayon in the box."

"Hey!"

"To be fair, neither is she." Race smirked.

*

The only break David got from worrying about dancing was the first hour and a half in the morning—Bumlets had to put together a dance showcase, with a few kids from all age groups, as well as choreographing the show. He'd picked his group of dancers and they spent that time rehearsing to a song by some band David had never heard of.

He was kind of itching to get out of the theater, enough that he debated doing something insane like asking Blink to show him how to sail, or even risking the archery range again. After all, for the last few days he'd basically only left the theater to eat, sleep, and occasionally pee, as there was no bathroom in the theater. But after breakfast when he was about to ask Blink about sailing, Blink ran off to talk to Smurf, though their talking involved a lot of poking each other and laughing and blushing.

He scowled. Not that he wasn't reasonably pleased that Blink had somehow managed to work out that his relationship with Smurf was a cliché that all but necessitated them falling for each other, but every time he saw them awkwardly flirting and trying to pretend that wasn't what they were doing, all he could think about was when he and Jack had been awkwardly flirting and pretending the weren't. Though he hoped they'd been a lot more subtle about it.

David took a deep breath. Maybe not sailing, and he was still a little afraid of archery. He had rotten memories of tennis, but it might be a nice way to kill some time.

"Hey!" Stage came bounding up to him.

"Hi," he said.

"So we need you in the theater first thing. We're going to go through the vocals of Close Every Door, while Medda works with the kids' chorus, okay?"

David sighed. So much for that.

"Okay?" Stage asked.

"Okay." At least it wasn't dancing.

*

Smurf took a deep breath and downed a glass of fake Kool-Aid. It was lunchtime on Thursday, and she had to do something. The whole crush situation was going to kill her. Especially now that the chorus was rehearsing in the theater all the time, so she couldn't even escape from the theater. Which meant she was around Blink all the time.

It was really getting annoying. She liked spending time with Blink fine, never mind the annoying, smug looks from Trixie and Arrow all the time. In fact, spending time with Blink was easy, and she didn't even have a problem upholding their truce. They joked a lot, even made fun of each other, and it was just generally a good time. What was killing her was that she liked him and she wanted to tell him, because she was pretty sure he liked her back. But if he did, why hadn't he done anything about it? According to Trixie and Arrow, she was completely obvious.

Well. Fine. All the flirting was doing was making her crazy and she wanted to do something about it already, so she would.

Everyone filed out of the dining hall after the meal ended, and began to head back to their cabins for awhile. Smurf jogged a little and saw Blink starting up the main path with Race and David. She hesitated for a second, then called, "Hey, Blink!"

All three of the boys paused and she was pretty sure they exchanged some quick conversation, then Race and David started walking again, and Blink walked over to her. "Hey, Smurf," he said.

"Um." Deep breath. She'd decided to do this, after all. "I was just thinking, um...about tonight. About the dance tonight."

Blink stared at her. His expression resembled nothing so much as a deer caught in headlights. But she was already pretty much in this, so there was no running away.

"And I was thinking—"

"Smurf, hang on, I—"

"No, one sec, I just was thinking, maybe you and me...like, we could go together or something."

There, she'd said it.

And he didn't say anything back, not for a few seconds, and then the silence got longer and they just stared at each other.

"Just as friends," she added lamely.

"Look, Smurf, I...Um, I..." He swallowed and trailed off.

"If you don't want to, whatever. That's cool."

"No, I—It's just, um, I'm kind of already going with someone. Mayfly."

"Oh."

"It's just, she asked me a few days ago."

"Cool. Okay." She took another breath. She'd known Mayfly had a crush on Blink—everyone knew that. She just hadn't realized Blink liked her back. "Well, whatever. I just meant as friends anyway. No big deal."

"It's not that I don't want to go with you," he said quickly. "I'm sorry, I'm really—"

"Okay, well. Never mind then. I've got to go...I've got to go meet Trixie, so I'll see you."

"Yeah, definitely. I'll see you. I'm really sorry," he said, and he did actually sound apologetic.

Smurf hurried off, noting in a detached kind of way that she was never going to trust anything her best friends said about boys again, ever. But the less detached part of her was trying really hard not to cry, because as stupid as it was to care that much about some summer camp dance, and even as annoying as Blink was and never mind how long she'd spent hating him, she'd actually really, really wanted him to say yes.

*

"You know, if certain people saw you two sharing clothes, there would probably be a lot more gossip," David mused, watching Blink and Mush prepare for the dance. He had already resigned himself to a night of being a wallflower, or maybe hanging out with a few friends. He had less than no interest in even pretending he cared about the dance.

Blink, on the other hand, had actually asked for Mush's help with dressing up. "You want to impress Mayfly?" Mush asked, raising an eyebrow.

"No! I just want to look nice. It's an occasion, or something." Blink scowled. "She's mad at me."

"Mayfly?"

"No. Smurf."

"Well, yeah," Race put in reasonably. "You didn't so much explain to her what had happened as reject her, and that tends to piss girls off."

"At least she didn't cry," Mush agreed. "Though I can't really picture her crying. Kicking you in the nuts, maybe, but not crying."

Blink groaned. "Just find me something to wear already."

He still had to wear the khakis he'd had at the last dance, because no one else really had pants that would fit him. But Mush then produced a light brown, button-down shirt and the same red tie he'd loaned to Blink last time. "How do I look?" Blink asked, glancing down at himself.

"You'll do," Mush said.

David looked at Blink critically and realized he was actually checking Blink out. Oops.

Skittery sat down next to him. "Well, at least part of the rumor about you seems to be correct," he noted. "Straight guys rarely stare at each other like that."

Blink blushed and David shrugged. He wasn't really in the mood to argue, and everyone would think what they wanted anyway—they clearly already did.

Finally, Sneakers walked into the bunk, dressed up a little himself—the only person other than Blink who was wearing a tie. "Aw, you have a chaperone date," David said.

"Shut up." Sneakers handed out index cards to everyone.

"Huh?" Blink asked.

"Dance cards." Sneakers grinned. "A lovely little idea Paint had when she realized that basically no one actually put together dates this session. Like, two of you."

That was true, David noted, glancing around. Only Blink definitely had a date. Snitch was pretty sure he did—he'd asked Swinger, but hadn't understood her answer. Judging by tone, though, it probably had meant yes.

"Dance cards?" Mush answered, looking horrified.

"Yes, I suspect yours will be pretty full." Sneakers grinned, then rummaged around in his things and produced a digital camera. "It's gonna be a fun night."

"For some people, maybe," Blink muttered.

David couldn't have agreed more. But still, they all trooped downhill towards the theater, meeting the boys from Ferguson on the way. Snitch and Blink hung out outside on the theater porch, waiting for their dates, while everyone else filtered in. Mark had reappeared with his DJ equipment and shot Race a quick wave; Race nodded back. David wandered over to the where the benches had been shoved at the side of the wall and sat down. At least he'd be able to watch the night's hijinks.

*

"Chin up," Snitch said encouragingly, as the girls approached. He picked out Swinger from the crowd and grinned at her.

"Hey, gate, you're togged to the bricks," she greeted him.

He blinked. "Yeah, you too?" he guessed. But she grinned at him and they walked inside hand-in-hand.

The first figure Blink picked out was Smurf's; she was wearing a denim skirt and a purple halter top with her hair up in a clip. Which was pretty startling, since he was pretty sure she didn't own any of those clothes—in fact, he was almost certain the skirt was Arrow's and the shirt was Trixie's—and he'd never seen her with her hair anything other than in a pony-tail. But then she glanced at him, then looked away completely, chin lifted, and brushed past him into the theater. He recognized that posture well enough; after all, he'd spend the better part of the last four years doing things that pissed her off. That was her very specifically ignoring him. Damn.

But then Mayfly appeared. She'd traded in her usual glasses for striking blue contacts, which were set off by a low-cut blue dress. He tried not to gape. She stood leaned over and kissed her cheek.

"Hi," he said.

"Hey." She grinned.

"We're just here as friends, right?" he found himself asking, even though his brain had already informed him that it was doubtlessly the stupidest thing he could possibly say.

She sighed, clearly irritated. "Yes, of course, that's what I said, right?"

"Yeah, just...just checking." And he knew he'd kind of offended her, so he tried to make it right by putting an arm around her shoulders as they walked in. "You look really nice."

"Thanks. You too," she said. "That's Mush's shirt, isn't it?"

"And tie."

"Aww, you dressed up for me." She laughed, sounding a little happier.

Inside, Mark the DJ was handing out pens to the girls. "Now, I know it's traditional for guys to ask girls to dance," he explained, "but let's face it, we've got a lot of assertive young women here, so let 'em have their way. Or be a jerk. It's up to you."

Mayfly grabbed a pen and triumphantly wrote her name on Blink's card—in letters big enough to take the whole thing up. She handed it back to him, smirking, and he laughed. This was actually a little bit fun—he'd never really gone to one of the camp dances with anyone before. It was nice and low-key, no pressure, really. If it hadn't been for the fact that Smurf was pointedly signing other boys' dance cards and ignoring him, he'd probably really have enjoyed it. Instead, as the DJ stuck on a ballad, he tried not to groan as Smurf began dancing with Swifty, of all people.

So naturally, when he and Mayfly walked past her, he muttered, "You look ridiculous. He's too tall for you." Never mind that Blink himself was half a head taller than Swifty.

"Bite me," Smurf replied.

Swifty gave them a confused look, but didn't get involved. Mayfly all but yanked him away into the crowd. He wasn't much of a dancer, but did his best for the next couple of songs. Mayfly seemed to enjoy herself, anyway. Finally, he said, "I'm gonna get some punch. You want any?"

She followed him over to the refreshments table. He grabbed a plastic cup and then glanced up and saw that Smurf was now dancing with Ian. "I kind of thought he was gay," he mumbled aloud.

Mayfly followed his gaze. "Ian? He's bi. What do you care?"

"I don't."

"Don't have a crush on him like you do on Mush?" She grinned. "So are you going to pour that punch or what?"

"Oh, yeah, sorry." He looked away, irritated that Smurf hadn't even glanced over at him, and poured them each a cup of punch. They stood around and ate handfuls of chips for a few minutes, and finally the dancing began to die down. People wandered off towards the walls to chat, and Blink let out a sigh of relief. Mayfly began gabbing with friends and he zoned out a little, watching.

Race was still dancing, though he looked a little grumpy about it. That was definitely amusing—Blink had a suspicion that Race's dance card was probably more full than he'd expected. Spot also seemed to have had a fair amount of girls sign up for his, but he was standing and scowling by now, having completed dances with Quotes, Sodapop, and Winger.

And Smurf was doing something that resembled grinding with a very confused-looking Itey. Blink scowled.

Mush stepped up next to Blink and grabbed a cup of punch, then noted quietly, "You know she's only doing that to make you jealous, right?"

"Huh?"

"Um, Smurf's outfit and her ignoring you and dancing with people I'm pretty sure she's never even talked to?"

"Oh." That hadn't occurred to him. "Then...Damn." He sighed.

"Shouldn't that be a good thing?" Mush asked. "It basically means she likes you."

"But I'm still here with..." He nodded at Mayfly, who was still busy gabbing with friends. "And it would be totally unfair to her to do, well...anything." He shot Mayfly another look. He'd been more than happy to go with her, as friends...and he liked being friends with her. So in order to not be a jerk, there was no diplomatic way to tell Smurf he liked her until after the dance—there was no way to get her alone for a few minutes that he could think of, and even if he managed to, he wouldn't be able to do anything other than say how he felt. And considering everything from Daisy to the concussion to the dance, he wouldn't blame her if that just wasn't enough.

As the night wore on, the dance became much more about chatting than dancing. Blink didn't mind too much, though—Mayfly was friends with the theater girls, which meant Blink got to hang out with Mush almost by default. And Mush pulled over David, who was also friends with the theater girls, so it wasn't like the night was a total wash. Blink just couldn't help but think that if there was a way for him to talk to Smurf alone for even two minutes, it could be so much better—she'd know the truth, she'd stop being mad at him, and maybe she'd come hang out, at least.

An hour or so into the dance, the DJ came on the microphone. "Well, folks, we had some great dancing in the beginning, but just look at the dance floor now." Blink looked. It was empty. "So come on, you guys, this is a dance not a...uh...chat.

"You all know the drill. I'll pick a couple to start us off, and when the music freezes, you pull on another dancer. Let's see..." He peered off into the crowd, and pointed at the throng of campers where Blink was standing. "Hey, eyepatch, grab your date and get dancing."

Blink didn't have to do any grabbing—Mayfly took his hand excitedly and everyone cleared the way. A slow song began to play and Blink tried not to look around at the room. He couldn't help but feel a little silly with everyone watching him, but then perked up a tiny bit—everyone was watching him. That definitely had to include Smurf.

He watched for her and saw her standing in a corner, looking pointedly out a window. But he smiled, because he got to pick his next partner, and since he couldn't dance with Mayfly again, there was no reason not to grab Smurf. And even though they only had a few seconds before they'd need to switch partners again, he thought it would be long enough.

But when the music paused, she'd disappeared from her corner and he couldn't spot her. And he had to grab someone quickly. The nearest girl to him was Slant, who looked a little startled when he grabbed her arm, but didn't object any. As they moved, he looked out at the crowd again, but couldn't see Smurf anywhere. Slant grabbed Racetrack to dance with and Blink reached out towards Birdie, but gazed around and around the room, looking for Smurf. He finally spotted her, pushing her way towards the door. The music froze just as she reached it, and he practically sprinted over to her.

"I don't want to dance with you," she snapped, as he took her hand and tugged her back towards the dance floor.

"Too bad. I mean," he corrected quickly, "I'm sorry. About earlier."

"Whatever. Look—"

"I really like you," he blurted.

"What?"

"I do. I told Mayfly I'd go with her as friends a few days ago, and I didn't want to...you know, hurt her, so I—"

"You are such an idiot!" Smurf exclaimed, and punched his shoulder, albeit playfully. "You should have said something earlier!"

"I wanted to! You didn't give me much of a chance," he squawked. "But yeah, I'm glad you asked me that thing earlier, because like I said..."

"You like me." She smirked.

"So, um, do you...you know, like me back?"

"I—"

The music stopped, and the DJ announced, "Good job, guys! Now keep it up!" The snowball dance had ended and another song began, and Mayfly popped up at Blink's side. She grabbed his hand.

"Hey, let's go dance! Oh, hi, Smurf."

"Yo." Smurf didn't sound any happier about being interrupted than Blink himself felt. But he didn't know what else to do, so he just followed Mayfly's lead and found himself with his arms around her.

"She's got such a thing for you," Mayfly laughed. "And to think, everyone thought you two hated each other..."

"We don't anymore," Blink answered. "Actually, she's pretty cool."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, uh..." He laughed nervously. "You know, if you hadn't asked me here first, I'd probably have...well, I definitely had thought about asking her."

Mayfly stopped dancing. Blink winced. She looked kind of upset; he definitely hadn't intended for that to happen.

"Do you like her?" Mayfly asked.

"Umm..." Blink took a deep breath. Lying was the polite option, but he somehow doubted Mayfly would believe anything. Finally, he nodded towards the door. "Do you want to go talk?"

"I guess."

They stepped out of the theater onto the front porch and sat down on the steps. They didn't talk for a minute; Blink could hear both the music pumping inside and the crickets out in the field.

"So..." Blink finally said. "I...I mean, look, I do like Smurf. But I kind of figured that...I mean, I know you asked me to go with you as a friend, but I thought...maybe you liked me."

"Yeah," she said softly.

"And...I didn't want to hurt you." He took a deep breath. "I mean, I know it sucks when someone you like doesn't like you back. And I didn't want you to feel like that."

"But you don't like me."

"I like you as a friend," he said quickly. "Of course I do. If I didn't, I wouldn't have said yes at all. I knew I could have a good time with you tonight. And I have."

Mayfly rested her chin in her hand. "Well, this kind of sucks."

"I'm really sorry. I didn't want to hurt you, I really didn't."

"I know." She sighed. "You're so stupid."

"You know, people have told me that before."

Mayfly laughed, but it was a little awkwardly.

They sat in quiet again. Finally, Blink said, "You know what, I came here with you. So let's go dance some more."

Mayfly hesitated. "You don't want to go hang out with Smurf?"

"Nah." That was a lie, but he'd already decided it was more important to him to be nice to Mayfly. He remembered Sarah rejecting him all too clearly, after all.

She glanced over at him and smiled. "Thanks, Blink. See, this is why I like you. You're too nice."

"Oh, yeah, a real perfect gentleman." He laughed. "Besides, I couldn't dance with Smurf much anyway. I'd develop a hunch."

She giggled and Blink stood to lead her back inside. And even though things were awkward after that, he didn't mind too much. They alternately danced and chatted, and he shrugged at Smurf in passing. She didn't say anything, but she didn't ignore him anymore, either. And when he caught her eyes and they managed to share a gaze for a few seconds, she was smiling. Which had to be a good sign.

An hour and a half later, the DJ came on the microphone again. "Well, kids, it's been a long night...But let's get out on the floor one last time. Come on, it's a slow song. Grab a partner and let's get going."

Blink glanced over at Mayfly, but to his surprise, she shook her head. "You know what? You were really nice to me tonight," she said, and then leaned up to kiss his cheek. "So yeah, don't worry about me. Go ask her to dance."

He smiled. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

He gave her a grateful look. "Thanks, Mayfly. I really, really owe you." And with that, he looked around for Smurf and saw her sitting on a bench at the edge of the theater. He hurried over to her and paused, then held out a hand.

"You never answered my question earlier," he pointed out, as he pulled her to her feet.

"I'm dancing with you, aren't I?" She smiled.

He smiled back. "I'm sorry about all the times I've been a jerk to you."

"Gosh, for the last four years?" She laughed. "I'm sorry too. It's all good now, though, right?"

"Right. I just wish we'd made up before almost the end of camp."

"Yeah, me too."

He gave her a hand a squeeze and the music played on. They didn't talk, just danced for a minute—and he did have to hunch over, and she was more or less dancing on her tiptoes, but Blink still couldn't stop grinning. Even when Snitch and Swinger, who seemed to be jitterbugging despite the fact that the song was an early-90s Bryan Adams ballad, practically ran them over, he didn't mind; even though they weren't talking, and he was pretty sure they'd never been quiet together before, he didn't mind. Because it felt nice.

When the music ended, the theater's overhead lights came on. The counselors who were chaperoning tried to usher everyone out. Mayfly walked by them and gave them a wry smile, then hurried out. Hand-in-hand, Smurf and Blink held back, and were the last people to leave the theater.

Outside, everyone had broken into cliques. Race, David, and Mush were standing a few yards away, looking interested. Trixie and Arrow were waiting where the path split to lead to the girls' section of camp. Arrow waved and Smurf waved back with her free hand.

"So..." Blink said quietly.

"Yeah." Smurf smiled. "Good night, I guess."

"Yeah, I guess." He squeezed her hand again before they let go. "Uh, goodnight," he added.

She shot him a quick smile and stared off a few steps, but then paused and glanced back at him. He stepped forward and gabbed her hand again, leaned down, and kissed her.

He barely heard the round of cheering and shouted catcalls, though, because Smurf kissed him back.

Then, blushing brightly and positive he was grinning like a complete dope, he strutted up the path towards his friends.

*

Mark appeared at breakfast the next morning, sitting at the table with his parents. "Morning," Racetrack mumbled, as he joined them at the table.

"Yo." Mark was smirking.

Racetrack frowned.

"Aww, how can you be so grumpy when you had such a good night last night?"

"What are you talking about?"

Mark made a big show of pulling a battered card out of his pocket and showing it to their mother. "Tony's turn into quite the heartbreaker, Mom." He raised an eyebrow. "You left your dance card behind last night, Tony."

Race groaned.

"Let's see," Mrs. Higgins said, and began reading the card. "Slant, Arrow...Winger, Two-Bits, Lyrics, Zodiac, Birdie... And most of these girls, more than once."

Race shot a glare at Mark. "You couldn't just have kept that to yourself?"

"And missed the chance to torture you? Don't be silly, bro."

"I hate you."

"Now, now, Tony," Mrs. Higgins chided. "I doubt that's the attitude that made so many girls fall for you."

"I'm never going to hear the end of this, am I?"

At the other end of the table, Mr. Higgins raised an eyebrow. "Probably not, no."

Race groaned.

*

Friday morning was the first fully costumed, propped, set-using, stop-free run through of Joseph. The role of Pharaoh still hadn't been filled; Maverick was singing it from the audience and Bumlets was filling in with the on-stage dancing, but the cast had been assured that the actor would be able to do the dance without having run through it with the cast. David was skeptical, but then, David was still working hard not to trip over his own feet for much of the show.

But his stumbling through dance moves aside, the rehearsal went better than he'd expected.

"Good job, my little loves," Medda declared afterwards, as everyone gathered at the front of the stage for her acting and singing notes, with Bumlets on one side to critique the dancing and Worm on her other side, her stage manager's clipboard in hand, to give notes about transitions and props that hadn't been handled correctly.

Notes took a much longer time than David had hoped. Then they ran just transitions, so everyone would get a better idea of when to exit and enter and which flats had to be moved on when, then they ran several of the numbers and did more notes. By lunchtime, he was already exhausted. But they were meeting back at the theater directly after lunch—they wouldn't have time to rehearse the next morning, after all, because parents would be there all day and want to see the rest of camp. Demonstrations of swimming and boating activities were first in the morning, then archery and tennis; after lunch was a big riding show, and finally that evening would be Bumlets' dance show and then the musical. Then, David was told, a bonfire on the boating beach, where everyone had one last chance to roast marshmallows, sing songs, and be together before everyone checked out the following morning.

They didn't even have the full afternoon to run the show again. Some parents were arriving that evening, especially ones who were from far away or who hadn't been able to make it on the first changeover day. David's parents were planning to show up that evening and take him and Les to dinner; they'd rented a cheap motel room for Friday and Saturday nights.

So after lunch, it was back to work first thing. They ran act two first, since they'd rehearsed it less over all, then did notes, then ran act one. It was four o'clock when they finished: "Just enough time to do it all again!" Medda said.

David downed an entire bottle of water. Any illusions he might ever have held about theater being glamorous were gone. It was repetitive and dull, a lot of the time; everyone being locked in a room together all day meant that it was not only hot and sweaty, but that everyone was on everyone else's last nerves; and David was not only tired of standing up and moving, but his throat was even more tired and sore. He already knew that by the time his parents arrived, he'd be deeply cranky. They'd probably lecture him for it, too.

When the run through finally ended, David practically collapsed on to the stage. Everyone else did, too—after the big final dance number, everyone was out of breath a little. And Medda started straight in with her notes—and as the lead, most of them were for him. Be more confident in the dances (Yeah, right, he thought, as he nodded in agreement), try not to go flat in his solos, try to look intimidating in the second act, try to look intimidated at the end of the first. And on and on. He did his best to take it all in and remember it, he really did, but considering that the show was the next day, there wasn't much he thought he'd be able to do.

A heavy sensation formed down in his stomach. He still wasn't entirely clear on why Medda had cast him as Joseph, when he was really pretty inexperienced. He couldn't dance. They'd only been working on the show for a week...and there were a lot of people in it, a lot of people who were counting on him to not screw up and make them all look bad. David was used to responsibility, but he was also far too used to self doubt.

"Cheer up," Mush whispered to him, when Medda turned her attention to the girls who played the Narrator. "It's just a camp show, Dave."

"Yeah," he agreed. It was true. "But everyone has worked so hard."

"And you've worked harder than anyone," Mush said. "So it'll all be cool."

"I hope so."

"Gentlemen!" Medda admonished. "Just because it's the end of the day doesn't mean there is time for goofing off! Now, David..."

He tried to listen, he really did. But just as he managed to get focused, his parents arrived. Mrs. Higgins had walked them down to the theater, and seeing that they were there, Medda finally gave up on her lecture. Les bounded from his seat with the younger kids over to hug their parents, and David stood and stretched and waved. His dad, with Mrs. Higgins standing next to him, gestured him over.

Well, he hadn't seen them in a month. David supposed some hugging wouldn't kill him. He walked over to his folks and got kissed on both his cheeks by his mom, and a firm but short hug from his father. "We have a surprise for you," his father added, as they started outside.

"Oh, yeah? I hope it involves...food..."

David trailed off, distracted. Because leaning against the railing of the front porch was Jack, grinning ear to ear. And it was like the lights dimmed, like the world moved in slow motion, as Jack drawled calmly, "Hey, Dave. How you been?"

[End Chapter Thirty-Eight.]
Chapter Thirty-Nine: Linger