Restless

Campfire Songs

The sun had began setting when we decided to start the fire, to cook dinner. Hot dogs and chips.

"Hand me a hot dog stick, Drayton." Ben said from next to me. I leaned over and grabbed one of the remaining sticks we had saved for cooking. They were long enough for us to sit at a distance and had a sharp point at the end. Beside me, was the package of hot dogs, so I picked one up and placed it on the end of his stick.

"Here you go, Bro." I said, handing him the stick. I repeated the process on my own stick, then held it over the fire. The fire glowed brightly in the darkness that surrounded us. When we sat around the fire, the cold summer night, felt warmer. Safer. I watched as my best friends held their sticks next to mine in the fire. Then Zach smacked his hot dog against mine. I looked over at him and smiled. "What are you doing, Zach?"

"Beating my meat." He chuckled. We all laughed and continued to roast the weiners.

"This is nice. I crave this friendship time." Ben said, rotating his stick to cook the other side of the hot dog.

"I'm glad we kidnapped you, Zach." I smirked at Zach who was smiling.

"I just needed a push. Thanks for dragging me out into the middle of nowhere, guys. I needed this." Zach sighed, looking up at the stars. Because the population was low in this town, the stars lit every inch of the sky.

"Zach you might want to flip yours." Ben said looking at Zach's flaming weiner. Zach immediately pulled out and waved his stick around, extinguishing the fire. We laughed at the sight of what remained on the stick. His hot dog was completely black and was steaming hot. He just shrugged and grabbed a hot dog bun from the bag. He looked through the bag, then at me.

"Did you get any ketchup?" He asked. It was then that I realized what I had left. Condiments. I shook my head and Ben laughed.

"When I went back into Walmart, to shut off the power, I grabbed some mustard, when I saw you had forgotten it." Ben said standing up and walking towards his tent.

"You're a lifesaver, Ben." Zach said when Ben returned with a large bottle of mustard. We pulled our sticks out of the fire and set them inside some buns. Zach passed the bottle when he was done and Ben did the same.

"I wish we had some music.." I grumbled.

"I got this." Zach said, jumping up after he took a bite of his meal. He started dancing around humming a tune while he chewed. we all joined in and danced around the fire in a line. Our shadows danced with us like a tribe of indians. We ate our food then danced back to our seats, around the fire.

"Drayton, didn't you say something about a river?" Zach asked eating a handful of chips.

"Yeah, if we walk in that direction, we'd come out at the river in five minutes." I said, pointing at the dark forest. The river was calm and I played there with my cousins. I remembered catching Crawdads in the shallowest part of the water and throwing them in a bucket. We would take them home and boil them if they were big enough. I missed my family deeply, remembering my childhood fun.

"Those were some good weenies." Ben said patting his belly. He still had some mustard left on his cheek, but I didn't say anything. We sat around that fire for what seemed like hours. Eventually, we all said goodnight and entered our tents.

"Someone put out the fire, if we're all going to sleep!!" I called out to Ben and Zach.

"I got it!!" Zach replied. After I zipped my tent closed, I laid down and got comfortable in my bed, listening to the silence that surrounded me. Nothing but the crackles of the fire pit, filled the air. I could feel sleep overcoming my mind as I shut my eyes. Then sleep came. I can't remember it clearly, but I had a dream that night. The images were fuzzy, but I could see a shape in the distance. It was long, curved and grey, like the top of a ladder. Then I saw something large and covered in grey fur. I didn't know what kind of animal it was but it was surely up to my waist. I thought I could hear someone screaming. Then it was quiet. All until morning.