The Kids Aren't Alright

Chapter 32: Finn

In the trees, someone bellows, "FISHER!" Or maybe they said: "FISH!"

After this, several things happen very quickly. Clancey flies out of the forest like a bullet, hurtling towards the same pond that Becca dived into. Then I see the black cloud following close behind. It takes my brain a moment to process this, and to realize that the cloud isn't a cloud— it's a swarm of bees. No, they're hornets, just like Becca said.

I blink a few times. The swarm is still moving towards us.

"Jump, you idiots!" Giselle shouts.

At the sight of the hornets closing in on us, Matt, Giselle, Ronan, Clancey, and I forget all about winning or losing the game and throw ourselves into the murky waters of the pond.

For a few seconds, the world is nothing but a swirling, silty brown haze, punctured by the occasional muffled shout. A foot kicks past my face, churning up even more mud. My eyes start to burn. I press my lips firmly together, sure that if I open them, I'll inhale either a mouthful of tadpoles or some mutated strain of flesh-eating parasites. Some slimy underwater plant tickles my leg another tickle, and I have to repress a scream.

I stay underwater for as long as I can, and then, when my lungs are finally begging for air, I tentatively raise my head above the surface.

The hornets, thank God, are gone. Next to me, Ronan is wiping mud off his face, black eyes blazing with fury. Giselle emerges a few feet away, hacking up pond water. Matt is already sloshing his way towards the bank. Becca is pushing through the cattails, water streaming off her camp shirt and down her tan legs. The only person missing is Clancey.

For a split second, I worry that the flesh-eating parasites got him and already chomped their way through his brain (which can't be that big to begin with); but then the surface of the pond splits apart as Clancey shoots out of the water with the same amount of rage with which he dove into it. His expression is crazed, but I doubt it's because of parasites.

He scrambles towards the edge of the pond and drags himself through the cattails onto dry land. Even coated in a thin film of pond muck, I can see the welts on his skin— he ran pretty fast, but apparently not fast enough to escape the hornets.

I start laughing. I can't help. Seeing Clancey all beat-up is more satisfying than winning a week of guaranteed no-kitchen-duty.

"Get a grip, Fish," Ronan growls at me, wading past. He's also a mess, and his poor chinos (which I'm sure cost more than what I'd make in a summer of working at Bobby's Burger Shack) look beyond salvageable. The sight of his ruined pants pushes me over the edge. My laughter turns hysterical, and I keep laughing all the way to the edge of the pond, where I finally drag myself out of the water and onto terra firma once more.

The combined commotion of (a) angry swarm of hornets and (b) six campers jumping into a pond has attracted quite the crowd. A good dozen or so campers stand watching us shake the pond water out of clothes and hair, their expression a spectrum of amusement and horror. Somehow, the counselors haven't arrived yet. It makes sense— they're always there when you don't want them to be, and never when you actually need them.

Becca turns to Clancey. "Ouch," she says.

It only takes this one word to change his expression from angry to murderous. "You did this to me," he growls, as if the realization has finally dawned on him.

"You did this to yourself," Becca replies. For someone who just sprinted a good mile though the Alaskan wilderness, outran a swarm of hornets, and performed an Olympic worthy dive into a muddy pond, Becca looks impressively calm and collected. "Don't blame me for your own fuck-ups."