The Burnt S'more (Camp NaNoWriMo July 2016)

1. The Flight to My Doom, Also Known As Camp Wasserfest

My last day of the dreaded junior year wrapped up only yesterday, but already I feel like my summer is over. My black-sequined suitcase is clutched tightly in my right hand as I haul it across the airport, which feels like the length of three football fields. I have a matching duffel bag weighing down my other arm while my phone is securely wrapped in my palm, as I look out the windows behind me and say goodbye to Manhattan.

"Are we seriously doing this?" I turned to complain to my parents for about the millionth time. I spent the last few months of my junior year planning out my summer with my two best friends, Georgina Love and Addison Lewis. We had parties lined up, a list of clubs that we would sneak into, and a whole bunch of potential lovers and one night stands in mind, but that was all whisked away when my father suggested that we spend our entire summer in his hometown of Hayesville, Pennsylvania. To make my agony crystal clear, I should emphasis that it is this little village in the middle of nowhere — the closest mall is a forty minute drive away and, of course, I don't have my license. Living in Manhattan gives you the luxury to just hop on a cab and hit up that club twenty blocks away, so there's no need to have a license. Except this summer, I'm being forced to ditch the glitz and glam for a camping bag.

"Alicia Michaels, stop complaining! The camp opened up ten years and has furnished cabins that are more like cottages; three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, and a living room. Plus, there is television and wifi," my father said, like he were trying to convince me that this is a good thing. Nice try.

I stuck my nose in the air, visibly upset by the damper on my summer plans. "It is not the penthouse."

My mother gave me a warning glance with her eyes squinted ever so slightly. Her eyebrows arched up, as if daring me to challenge her. "Keep complaining and we will make you sleep in a tent outside." I rolled my eyes and clamped my mouth shut, knowing full well that she wasn't kidding.

Okay, so maybe I did not literally need a camping bag, but the exaggeration still has some merit. This summer is going to hardcore suck.

At best, I'll probably learn how to start a campfire, which won't even be a necessary skill back home, seeing as how Manhattan has electronic fireplaces. Besides, what even is the point of camping? I predict that by 2040, campgrounds will be no more, as there is no point. Who voluntarily subjects themselves to the wilderness and an overwhelming amount of bugs? Maybe psychopaths, but that's it. Campgrounds take up so much potential land for malls and cafés.

I lugged my suitcase through terminal A and into the security line, hoping that this was all just a huge joke and that my parents would surprise me when the plane lands at LAX. I traveled to so many places — Paris, Barcelona, Chicago, Toronto, Madrid, Milan, London, Orlando — the list goes on and on, but I have never visited California before. Not once. It's completely annoying, since I've only been drying to visit there since forever. The heat, the beaches, the movie stars. California is an actual dream land that I am determined to one day visit.

Eventually, we made it past all that annoying security stuff and other typical airport procedures, and boarded the plane. My parents grabbed the two seats in front of me, while I went to move to the window seat with an empty seat next to me. While there is only three of us in the family, my parents always buy four tickets — two for them, one for me, and another ticket that's either for a friend, or so that I don't have to sit next to some stranger. I love having an empty seat next to me for not only the convenient of a comfortable flight, if I want to lay down on both seats, but so that I have a place to put my purse that isn't the floor.

And so I slid into the window seat and dropped my newest Louis Vuitton on the seat next to me, preparing myself for the flight to my doom. Part of me just wished that the plane would undergo turbulence, so I could fake sick and get to go back to Manhattan. I don't know if that plan would really fly — LOL, get it? — with my parents, but at this point, I was beyond desperate for a way out.