cruel summer. [ rini au ]

chapter six.

Nini looked up from her clipboard to see an excited looking brown haired girl walking towards her, carrying a duffle bag two times the size of the girl, on her back.

"Adelaine Brown," the girl told her, setting her duffle bag down on the ground. Nini scanned her list for her name.

"There you are," Nini say, highlighting that Adelaine had arrived, "You have such a pretty name!" She told the girl, trying to make her feel welcomed. Nini finds her name tag and hands it to her.

"Thank you, but you can call me Ady, because sometimes Adelaine is way too long!", the girl says with a giggle.

Nini points along the grass area to another girl with blond pigtails, pushing a suitcase up the stairs to the porch. "If you want, you can head on over there with your bags and you and Rylee can choose what bed you want!"

The little girl hurried off with a smile on her face, with her duffle bag bouncing on her back. Nini looked around the campsite and saw Emma helping a camper getting her bag out of the car. Dave and Cam seemed to be trying to break up a fight between two twins and Charlotte was looking over a group of boys, the majority holding basketballs in their hands. Nini just hoped that they wouldn't be in Ricky's cabin, he would make them into his little minions by the end of the summer. Nini looks and sees Hunter talking to a little girl with short curly brown hair and then he points towards Nini and the girl heads on over.

"That boy told me you're my camp counsellor." The girl said, in a very boring manor, "I'm Sofia Marshell." Nini looked at her list and grabbed a name tag for her.

"Nice to meet you Sofia! I'm Nini!" She says, trying to put a smile on the girls face. The girl looked unimpressed. "If you want, you can head towards the cabin over there and put your stuff inside."

"Why do I have to be at this dumb summer camp, I wanted to go to a dance camp but my parents sent me here instead." Sofia said, walking with her suitcase towards the cabin. For some reason, Nini was getting Gina vibes from this little girl. Sofia reminded Nini of the hardworking and dedicated dancer back home. Plus she could definitely pass as Gina's younger sister with the similar hair and face features.

Nini took one last look at her clipboard and saw that all of her campers had arrived, so she turned to Bella, Paisley and Grace who were sitting on the grass playing all different sorts of hand clapping games.

"Hey girls! Everyone is here now, so let's go back to the cabin and get everything organized there!" Nini says, as the younger girls stand up and walk with her back to cabin three.

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Ricky crossed his arms and paced the grass in front of where his six campers were lined up, out in front of their cabin. With Ricky's hunter green camp issued t-shirt, his aviator sunglasses and lanyard around his neck, the younger boys were taking Ricky more serious than anything in their lives.

"We do NOT go anywhere without a buddy!" Ricky called out.

"Yes, sir!"

"We do NOT leave our garbage on the dining hall tables!"

"Yes, sir!"

"We do NOT forget to put on sunscreen!"

"Yes, sir!"

"We do NOT kiss any girls behind the cabins!"

"Ewww, sir." The boys all say with a laugh.

"Alright, now it's time to go play some ball!" Ricky says with a smile as the boys run off to the outdoor basketball court.

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Nini and all of her girls made their way to the basketball court with their hands full of sunscreen cans, water bottles and Nini's secret item to pass time quickly, embroidery string. Rylee, Ady and Grace had wanted to play a game of basketball and almost all the girls except Sofia, agreed. Nini was just going to let the girls shoot some hoops and have fun, and whenever they would start to get bored, she could pull out the string and have them make some friendship bracelets.

As they walk past the walls of the mess hall and the outdoor basketball court comes into view, Nini sees it's already occupied by another cabin. As they continue to get closer, Nini realizes that those campers belong to no one other than Ricky Bowen.

Just her luck.

At the same time, when Ricky was trying to teach Eli, one of his campers, how to do a free throw, he saw the brunette walking with her campers, right to the basketball courts. At first, he saw this as an issue but then realized this could be his shot to fix things with Nini and apologize to her.

"Yo, Nini!", he shouted out as she and her campers reached the court, "Do you wanna organize a game?"

Nini sighs and then replies back, "It's okay, us girls can just find something else to do. We don't want to bug you guys."

"But, we really really really want to play!!" Grace said, extending out the last 'really'. Rylee and Ady walked up behind her, nodding their heads, trying to convince Nini.

"Nini, c'mon, it's fine, no worries at all." Ricky said, trying to get her to say yes. "Look, I'll be in charge of it all, you can just sit down and relax. Think of it as some sort of apology." He say with a desperate look in his eyes.

"Okay, fine!"

"Yes!!!!" All of the girls, along with Ricky shouted out. Normally, Ricky wouldn't be so keen on spending time with Nini, but with what he said to her last night, he was trying to mend things with her a little bit, before they get back to their regular bantering.

Ricky got all of the attention of the campers, except for Sofia, as she was practicing back walkovers along the grass beside the court. Nini saw that he was about to shout at her to come and sit with all the campers, but she caught his eye and just nodded no, because it was no use in trying to get the dancing queen to dribble a ball.

Nini just sat back on the grass and watched the game unfold while Ricky was playing referee and trying to not let any fights break out. After a couple minutes, Paisley and Bella got tired of the game and Nini helped get them started on making some friendship bracelets. Nini has to admit, that it was a pretty nice move of Ricky to take the lead on helping with the basketball game, as she was just enjoying the peace and relaxation of twiddling her fingers while making a bracelet. She still hasn't forgiven him completely yet for yesterday, but maybe it was a start.