Streetlights Like Fireworks by David Pandolfe Read Free Book Online Page A

tuition if they don’t work a summer job.
The counselors are not just stuck here for a week—they’re here for the summer.
I have a really bad feeling about this but I keep telling myself it won’t
happen to me.
    Suddenly, a megaphone blast squawks across the lake.
“Counselor for cabin sixteen! Tony! Can you hear me?” I recognize the voice as
belonging to Rick, one of the other counselors.
    Naturally, our counselor, Tony, is in the canoe out
front. His team has a slight advantage in that Tony is nineteen and built like
the cover of Men’s Health . He cups his hands around his mouth and calls
back, “Yo, what’s up?” Which, for Tony, is a fairly complex response.
    Rick’s megaphone sounds again. “We need Jack Atkinson!”
    “Who?”
    “Jack Atkinson! He’s one of your LITs!”
    Tony hasn’t bothered to learn my name. We’re not exactly
soul brothers. He looks around. “One of you guys Atkinson?”
    I raise my hand and wave from our canoe.
    “Found him!” Tony calls back to Rick.
    “Someone from his family is here!” Rick says.
    “Okay, I’ll tell him!”
    “Tony, I’m using a megaphone! He knows already!”
    “Okay!”
    “Send him back!” Even through the distorted megaphone, I
hear Rick’s frustration.
    My young charges give me death stares on the way back as
if I’ve caused us to lose a race that technically wasn’t taking place. On top
of that, we were running  dead last. But it isn’t like I care. All I keep
thinking is that if someone from my family is here, it must mean some sort of
emergency. We paddle toward shore and I keep searching for my mother or father
but it’s still just Rick standing there with his megaphone.
    We bump against the pier and I jump out of the canoe. I
don’t look back as I drop my oar, hopefully on someone’s head. “What’s going
on?”
    Rick won’t look me in the eye. “It doesn’t sound good.”
    Suddenly, I’m cold all over. “What happened?”
    “I better let your sister tell you.” Rick turns and
starts walking.
    “My sister?”
    He points toward the camp administration building. “She’s
waiting for you. Okay, well, sorry. Good luck.” With that, he veers off and
leaves me to trek the rest of the way alone, my brain buzzing with confusion.
    I open the door, heart pounding, to be met with the
sympathetic gaze of a middle-aged guy I’ve never seen before. He must be one of
the camp administrators.
    “Are you Jack?”
    I nod.
    “I’m Mr. Wilhite.” He points across the room to an office
door. “Your sister’s inside waiting.”
    I walk toward the door and Mr. Wilhite follows. If
Caitlin is here, it could only mean that something has happened to our parents.
But who’s with her and how did she get here?
    Lauren stands waiting inside the office, dressed in tan
slacks and a green blouse, her hair—no longer streaked with color—tied back
into a ponytail. She wears lipstick and light makeup. She looks like somebody’s
administrative assistant. Before I have a chance to speak, she says, “Jack,
it’s Mom. She had an accident.”
    I stand there blinking, trying to process.
    “She fell down the stairs and hit her head. She’s in the
hospital.”
    “Do you mean—”
    “Right. Mom. Who else would I mean? Do you need to sit
down?”
    “Maybe you should sit down, Jack,” Mr. Wilhite says. “You
look rather pale.”
    I always look “rather pale” but, of course, Mr. Wilhite
can’t know that. All the same, I sit in one of the chairs. Mr. Wilhite takes
his seat behind the desk while Lauren remains standing off to the side.
    “Can I get you anything?” Mr. Wilhite says. “Do you need
a glass of water?”
    I hear him but don’t respond. I keep staring at Lauren,
trying to figure out what she’s doing here.
    Lauren’s eyes actually glisten as she says, “Dad can’t
get a flight until at least tomorrow. You know how it is with Dubai. The whole
Middle East, for that matter. Anyway, he called me so I could come get you. I
left