Page 27 of Lady and the Camp
Normally, I’d consider this pretty dull myself, but he had my attention with the healing and medicinal stuff. Lucas had a way of talking about foliage like it was hot juicy gossip. Okay, maybe less hot and juicy, but his excitement made me care.
He positioned himself closer to the ground, in a one-knee kneel, holding a leaf upward.
“Ew!” A camper with an armful of friendship bracelets pointed at the leaf. “There’s abugon it.”
“It’s an inchworm,” the braided hair girl stated. “They’re cute.”
“No, icky!” The bracelets girl shrieked and ran in circles. “Icky icky icky!”
A frenzy of squealing erupted. One little blond jumped onto the stump and screamed at the grass like it was hot lava.
Whew. “Dramatic.”
Amy beside me must have heard. “Yeah. This happens at least twice a day when it comes to bugs.”
Only the girl in braids seemed un-freaked by the leaf bug. Lucas appeared frustrated again, his face twitching as a real eardrum-piercer ripped through the air.
“Let me see.” I walked toward him, the leaf, and the worm.
I hated worms. I’d been that girl the kids on the playground taunted with worm threats, once having one flung at me in retaliation. For what, I couldn’t remember. But I’d been convinced the thing would build a nest in my hair. I could not be consoled by the teacher who insisted worms did not nest, and nothing lived in my hair except for hair follicles. Which sounded just as disgusting at the time.
I felt at a deep level why these girls shrieked. But if I shrieked with them, I’d give Lucas further proof I didn’t belong here. I wouldn’t let nature best me.
Besides, my whole brand revolved around butterflies. An insect. And those were beautiful.
I approached the leaf, closing in on Lucas’ space. A teeny, lime green worm scrunched and flattened, scrunched and flattened. Itwascute. Ish. “Isn’t that the cutest? I can see little Wormy accessorizing with a pink or purple hat.”
“Ahat?” The girl in braids repeated. “That’s dumb. It’s a worm. They don’t wear hats.”
A few of the shriekers crept up behind me.
“Maybe sunglasses,” I suggested. “It’s sunny out.”
A giggle sounded somewhere. “Let me see.”
“Inchworms are technically caterpillars, not worms,” Lucas said. “And most don’t like sunlight, so those shades might come in handy.” He winked at me.
A direct hit landed with that wink. I stepped aside to gather my wits. How was he suddenly the sexiest man I’d ever seen? The gentle kneel, the rolled-up plaid sleeve, the exposed forearm holding a leaf with such care.
Sexy, really, Hudson?MaybeIneeded adult supervision. This was the least romantic place I could imagine. We were surrounded by children and a creepy crawly caterpillar. And I was covered in DEET.
We moved on from the clearing to a well-worn path. Lucas started a game of I-Spy: Leaf Edition—the actual name he said out loud—where the girls called out leaf shapes which he stopped to examine and identify.
Beside me at the back of the group, Amy sighed and looked at her watch. “I’m so ready for lunch.”
“You hate it here, huh?”
She shrugged. “No. I’ve heard all this before. We’re a weekly camp, so it’s the same leaf stuff. Same crafts.”
“Oh.” I hadn’t realized the campers switched out each week. The movies I’d seen made it seem like summer camp lasted the whole summer. “You do the same activities every week?”
She shrugged again. A go-to response, it seemed. “Mostly.”
“What would you rather do?”
“Watch YouTube.”
I nodded. “I hear that.”
