Page 9 of Lady and the Camp
But we were open. And we’d hung onto our camp accreditation. We were deemed safe; we just weren’t exactly popular.
“Sounds like she has marketing experience,” Twila went on. “A real smart cookie. Graduated from U of M.”
My head throbbed from the lack of caffeine. I’d need to head into town sooner rather than later. The thrift shop by the diner had a rack of household appliances. That would do the trick.
“Are you even listening?” Twila asked.
I rubbed my forehead. “Sorry. Coffee.”
Twila loudly huffed and rolled back her chair, which knocked against the knotty pine wall behind her desk. She moved to the kitchenette in the adjoining room. She banged open a cupboard and pulled out something crinkly. “Instant coffee. For emergencies. I’ll heat up water.”
I could have sworn the wordsyou babyfollowed, but the microwave door slamming shut clipped the insult.
The hiring thingwasimportant, which I’d ignored. Not intentionally. I didn’t want to be doing any of this office management stuff. It wasn’t Twila’s fault I’d gotten stuck with administrative tasks when every breath of my being screamed to be outdoors. Out in the woods. Or on the lake. Eventually, I’d lead hikers on mountain trails in Colorado.
I needed to be patient.
I cleared my throat. “Bring the hire in for an interview. Make sure they get the background check or it’s a waste of time.” I coughed. “Please.”
“Already on it.” She handed me a chipped Camp Junebug mug with a liquid smelling vaguely related to coffee.
I sipped and winced. “Thank you.”
“She should be here at any minute.”
“Sorry?”
“The new hire. She’s on her way.”
Talking to Twila frequently felt like time traveling, as if entire conversations occurred in some past reality.
The door burst open. Maggie, the head counselor, nudged in a camper wearing tie-dye from head to toe. Even the canvas shoes had the funky print. “We’ve got another one asking to call home.”
Twila edged out the stool beside her desk. “Sit here, darlin’. I’ll ring up your folks. How’s that sound?”
The little girl’s lip trembled as she nodded.
They said you’d build leadership experience. They said you’d be outdoors every day.Some days, the big mountain sky seemed further and further off.
Maggie, now momentarily free of her charge, walked over to me. She had an imposing presence at nearly six feet tall and a sense of directness demanding respect. “You found a hire yet? I don’t know much longer I can take it. The girls are undoing all of my restorative energy work.”
As I tried to make sense of that, she continued. “Not the campers. Theteenagers. Sixteen and seventeen-year-olds should not be trusted as authority figures. They don’t listen. It’s like herding cats who are also stuck-up and obsessed with themselves. So, I guess, cats.” She blinked. “I miss adults. Rational, trained adults.”
“You’ve got adults out there.”
She narrowed her eyes. “College students. They’re all children as far as I’m concerned.”
Point taken. Legally speaking, age eighteen or older meant adult status, which mattered for our camper-to-staff ratio. Which could not dip below regulations or we’d all be out of a job. “Twila’s got someone coming in.”
We only had the budget to hire one more person. We needed another adult out there with the campers and teen counselors, despite Twila asking for support in the office. It pained me not to hire another body for the office since I was desperate to get work off my desk. More like ditch the desk altogether.
Office work involved calls from parents. I liked trees. Trees didn’t talk back.
The list of camp maintenance tasks came to mind. I’d need to get going to finish everything—
“Are you even listening?” Maggie looked at me, her pale freckled arms folded.
Wow, was I bad at this. “I’m repairing the roof over the rain shelter.” It’s why I’d gone into the storage room in the first place, to fetch my tools, only I’d gotten sidetracked daydreaming of being anywhere else.
