Really really really long.
While the members of Roanoke cabin were finishing their Living the Plant Life badges and chasing unicorns that day, for example, the other Lumberjane scouts were doing yoga, shingling the roof of Zodiac cabin, learning cross-stitch embroidery, practicing cartography (which is mapmaking), and working on their Guerilla Girl, the latest dance craze going around camp. The Guerilla Girl is not a complicated dance. To do it right, you have to have a really good growl, know how to do the Yoko Ono Slide, and have a general knowledge of the history of women in art.
At that moment, though, it was time for dinner at the mess hall, so the clearing was mostly empty, except for Barney, who had completely forgotten all about dinner, which is something Barney, a member of Zodiac cabin, sometimes did when absorbed in stacks of books.
“Hey, Barney!” Jo, Ripley, Mal, and Molly waved as they headed to the mess hall.
“Hey,” Barney waved back, a bit distracted.
Jen detoured to the cabin to change into a dry uniform. “Please, just this ONCE, go where you’re supposed to go: DINNER.”
Fully intending to EVENTUALLY go to dinner, April wandered over to Barney’s picnic bench, just as Barney was pulling the fifth book of the evening off the tallest of the stacks.
Barney was a recent addition to the Lumberjane camp. When Roanoke first met Barney, they (Barney used they/them and not he/him) were a Scouting Lad. But being a Lumberjane was a WAY better fit, because Barney didn’t feel like they were a lad. Barney was supersmart, with a thick swish of black hair that stuck straight up and out like the brim of a baseball cap. April thought Barney was a dapper dresser, which is not an easy thing to be when you wear a khaki Lumberjanes uniform every day. Actually, Barney was one of the only scouts who wore their uniform every day, because they liked the crispness of the uniform shirt, and the buttons and the kerchief.
“Hey!” April scootched in next to Barney on the bench. “How’s Lumberjane life STACKING up these days?”
Barney gestured to their book spread. “Ha ha. Um. Pretty good! I’m trying to figure out what my next badge is going to be.”
“You must have SO MANY Scouting Lad badges!” April knew Barney was supergood at making all different kinds of things and fixing things, and once they made an igloo, which is a house made of SNOW! “I mean you’re so . . . multitalented!”
Barney flushed, embarrassed. “Um, thanks. I guess. Lumberjane scouts have so many wonderful badges to choose from, I want to catch up. I just need to pick—”
“Oh my gosh!” April threw her arms open. “There are SO MANY Lumberjane badges! Like there’s If You Got It, Haunt It badge, that’s a spooky one; there’s The Mystery of History badge, that’s a great one too, because if you don’t learn history you’re sure as shootin’ going to repeat it.”
Barney nodded. “Truth.”
April tried to think of all the badges Barney could do. There really were a lot. “Also there’s the Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fondant badge, that’s for cake decorating, obviously.” April’s tone clearly indicated this was not her favorite badge. April’s own attempt to get her Fondant badge had turned her off cake for a whole week.
Making roses out of fondant . . . really not as easy as it looks.
Barney sat up. “Cake decorating?”
“Oh uh, yeah.” April turned to Barney’s stacks of books. On top of one was a book about sailboats. Its leather binding smelled faintly of seawater and kelp. April snapped her fingers. “SAILING! You should totally get your Seas for the Day badge! That’s with Seafarin’ Karen! Seafarin’ Karen is the best! Oh my gosh, you’ll love it, it’s so great. You can get your sailing badge and your Knot on Your Life badge and your For the Halibut badge, and you’ll have THREE BADGES!”
“Hmmmm,” Barney said, looking through their stack for another book they’d taken out of the library, Pastry: A Confection.
April was pretty jazzed at the idea of Barney learning how to sail. “Okay!” she chirped. She wrapped her arms around Barney and gave them a big squeeze. “I gotta go eat. I’m so glad you’re a Lumberjane.”
“Me too.” Barney hugged back. Because it is awesome to be in a place where you feel like you can be you. “Hey! What’s that smell?”
“Oh.” April put her sleeve to her nose and gave it a sniff. “It’s probably just a bit of leftover eau de unicorn. Unicorns smell like three-week-old chip dip. It’s okay, I have three other sweaters just like this. Bye!”
And with that, April ran off to the mess hall, where chili night was already in full swing.
CHAPTER 8
The Lumberjanes Mess Hall was a big log cabin with long tables and benches that stretched the length of the room. At the front was a massive set of antlers and the Lumberjane crossed axes. On the west wall hung the banners of all the cabins. The east wall of the mess hall was covered in plaques commemorating Lumberjanes dining milestones, which were always evolving.
Current lauded achievements included:
Most Broccoli Eaten in One Sitting: Devineau Porcupine
Least Broccoli Eaten in One Sitting: Bichoo Porcupine
Biggest Pie Baked: Jenny Barry
Biggest Pie Eaten: Jenny Barry
Most Questions about Food Ingredients in One Meal: Marcey Max
Longest Continuous Spaghetti Slurp: Florence McNally
Ripley was up there a few times for pancake achievements, including Most Pancakes in One Sitting (14 3/4).
Also the recipients of the Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fondant cake-decorating badge, the Kebab’s Your Uncle badge, and the Gourmet It Over With badge had photographs of their great feats tacked to the wall. Which included a picture of Marvis McGonnall’s four-tiered chocolate chocolate chip cake shaped like a fire-breathing dragon—which breathed actual fire, and so was never actually eaten.
Rosie, camp director at Miss Qiunzella Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s Camp for Hardcore Lady-Types, sat at the back of the hall, at the table closest to the kitchen next to her pair of titanium pepper-handling gloves. Rosie was as tall as a tree and wore big, thick, horn-rimmed glasses and, almost always, some form of plaid. She had a pile of red hair, secured with a red polka-dot handkerchief, which in addition to being stylish is just a handy thing to have around. Rosie liked to keep her sleeves rolled up and was the most hardcore person most people had ever met. She liked a good-quality belt to hitch things onto and boots that were good for getting around. She had an anchor tattooed on her neck, which April heard had been tattooed with real silver squid ink.
As the scouts braved their chili, Rosie whistled and whittled at her table, carving what looked like a bird beak out of a giant stump of wood with the blade of her ax.
By the time April burst into the mess hall, Jo, Mal, Molly, and Ripley were already seated in front of steaming bowls of Rosie’s signature Vegan Inferno Six-Bean Chili, made from a secret recipe (which curiously involved seven beans) chock-full of spices so spicy at least two of them could actually blow your eyeballs out if mishandled.
“Hey!” April sang, plopping down in her seat at the Roanoke table. “Is it just me or is it a little CHILI in here?”
“Careful,” Jo warned, “it’s crazy spicy today. I think Rosie might have harvested some new peppers from her garden.” She plucked a ruby-red pepper from her spoon and held it up. “Some sort of new species,” she mused.
Molly pulled her long blonde hair up and tucked it under her raccoon. Two spoons in and her neck and cheeks were flushed cherry red. Molly’s parents didn’t put anything but salt and pepper on their food. Sometimes not even pepper.
Molly’s mom said pepper was “flashy.”
Mal gulped from her glass of soy milk. “What the Ella Fitzgerald?!” she gasped. “I think my teeth are melting.”
The noise of the mess hall, as usual, was deafening. It was the sounds of a camp full of hardcore lady types talking about what they did that day and what they were going to do tomorrow, which can get pretty loud.
Walcott cabin were busy plotting their strategy for the next dodgeball tournament, which Walcott pretty much always dominated.
Roswell cabin, infamously obsessed with really hot food, were having a contest to see who could eat the most raw chilies dipped in chili.
April took a teeny-tiny bite of chili, really just the edge of a bean. A thick wave of what felt like actual fire flooded her face, neck, and, curiously, feet. A single tear dripped down her cheek. “Good,” she managed hoarsely. “A little spicy.”
“Good evening, scouts.”
The girls all looked up. Rosie stood next to their table with a handful of Living the Plant Life badges, which she lobbed onto the table. “Congratulations. It’s not an easy badge to get.”
Jo, whose tongue was fully singed, nodded.
“Thanks,” Mal managed through the smoke collecting in her mouth.
Rosie leaned on the handle of her ax. “I came to my love of the botanical world late in life, but it is crucial Lumberjane know-how. A plant could save your tail.”
April nodded, her brain flooded with images of flying heroic plants.
“Because of the medicinal qualities,” Molly guessed.
“Sure. That too.” Rosie slipped off her glasses and gave them a polish on her shirt. “The key thing to remember is, a Lumberjane is always prepared, and part of preparation is knowledge. Knowledge—of flora, fauna, basic mechanics—can be all that stands between you and a night on a frozen lake with a half-eaten canoe.”
April’s eyes popped open. HALF-EATEN CANOE? WHAT EATS A CANOE?
Fortunately, Mal missed that moment because the flames that seemed to be shooting out of her ears distracted her. Mal probably wouldn’t have wanted to think too much about the possibility of having her canoe eaten on the edge of a frozen lake. Because lake.
Rosie slipped her glasses back on, giving them a quick tap up onto the bridge of her nose. “I’m sure you’ll be fine. Like I always say, Lumberjane scouts are made of strong stuff.”
Jen walked over to the scouts, pleased to find them where they were actually supposed to be. For the moment.
“Jem!” Rosie trumpeted, clapping Jen on the back. “How are you? Good day?”
“It’s Jen,” Jen corrected, smiling back. “And yes, thank you, it’s been a real humdinger of a day.”
“New badges for all your scouts,” Rosie continued, as though she hadn’t heard. “A good day I would say, Jeanette.”
“Jen,” Jen repeated, raising an eyebrow. “It’s always JEN.”
“All right, scouts,” Rosie said, adjusting her glasses, “much to do, the day is young, much to do.”
And she turned and marched out of the mess hall.
CHAPTER 9
Dinner was over. The scouts cleared their tables, washed up, and headed into the world of nighttime. Outside, the air was dusk mauve.
As April, Jo, and Mal went back to the cabin, Molly took a moment to stand under the stars.
Little lightning bugs looped around, flashing bits of green in the night, like dizzy flashlights.
Molly wandered past the fire pit, past the volleyball courts, into the forest on the edge of camp. She didn’t go far, just along the edge of the tree line, so she could still see the cabins but feel a bit apart from them.
It wasn’t that Molly took these walks because she missed being alone; that was actually a pretty crappy part of being at home, sitting in her room by herself, playing solitaire, reading or doing homework. Mostly doing homework. Molly’s parents were obsessed with this idea that she wasn’t doing well in school. Or well enough. Molly’s parents were pretty convinced she wasn’t doing well enough at a lot of things.
Molly pressed her hand against the bumpy bark of a big fat pine tree. Pine trees are amazing because like most trees, they really just do not care about stuff like homework. They just are.
Molly loved camp, and being with everyone—it was just sometimes she needed a moment to breathe. To feel space around her. To feel a tree.
“Hi there, tree,” Molly sighed.
The lights in all the cabins were almost all off. Molly imagined all the Lumberjanes curled up with books, their flashlights glowing. She could hear the fabric of the Lumberjanes flag flapping in the breeze.
It was nice being with all the campers, feeling like a part of something, even when it was just a lot of people getting ready to sleep.
There was a rustling.
Molly turned.
A crouched figure waddled through the trees, snapping twigs in its path.
Molly squinted, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the soft light of the moon.
It was Bearwoman!
Bearwoman wasn’t Bearwoman’s actual name, and it wasn’t a name she liked, but since she wasn’t willing to tell the Lumberjanes her real name, that was what she was called. Mostly because in addition to being a grouchy old woman who wore thick layers of bulky coats, Bearwoman sometimes transformed into an actual bear, a big brown grizzly bear, to be specific. She appeared in camp sometimes, but it wasn’t always clear from where. Or where she went when she disappeared. Also, as she’d often told them, it was none of their business.
At the moment Bearwoman was in human form, an old woman with a face that looked like it was carved out of wood, a pile of black and silver hair knotted on the top of her head, spectacles as thick as pop bottles perched on her nose, and what looked like turtle-shell kneepads. Bear-woman’s face always looked like someone had just told her something really annoying.
Molly stepped forward into Bearwoman’s path. “Hey,” she said politely. “Nice evening.”
Bearwoman looked around, as though considering this idea. “Good as any other night,” she muttered. Molly, along with Mal, had actually had some adventures with Bear-woman, not that you could tell by the way Bearwoman talked to her whenever they ran into each other.
Tonight was no exception. “What are you doin’ out here? Shouldn’t you be in bed? That camp director of yours jus’ lets you all go willy-nilly where you please in the middle of the night?”
Molly shrugged, “No. I just . . . I was just going for a last-minute but very short late-night stroll.”
Bearwoman rolled her eyes and pushed past Molly. “Stroll,” she grumbled. “STROLL. Ha! In my day, a Lumberjane had no time for strolling no way. When I ran this camp, there was no strolling at all! There was walkin’ and runnin’ and that was it! STROLL! A likely story.”
Molly looked at Bearwoman curiously. “Where are you going?”
“None of yer business,” Bearwoman barked. “I got stuff to do and it’s nothin’ to do with you or any of you all.”
“Oh, I—”
“So bug off.” And with that, Bearwoman shifted; in a puff of sparks, her shape twisted into the tall, furry, lumbering bear shape of her other form. As a bear, Bearwoman was as big as a house. Or at least a small cabin. She slammed against a tree, shaking down a hail of pine needles, and galumphed away.
Molly smiled. There was something about Bearwoman, something so cool. She was, like, this crabby old woman who could do and be whatever she wanted. It sounded pretty awesome to Molly. Plus being able to turn into a bear!
Of course, Bearwoman wasn’t the only one wondering what Molly was doing out in the woods.
“Hey.” Jen stepped forward out of the dark, her telescope case hanging off her back. “What are you doing out here, Molly?”
“Oh,” Molly said, suddenly flustered, suddenly aware that she was walking around alone in the woods like the beginning of a horror movie. “Just getting some quiet time.”
“Excellent! Now we can all get some quiet time. In the cabin. Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 10
By the time Jen and Molly got back to the cabin, Ripley was fast asleep, making a snoring noise that sounded like a big fuzzy cat purr. Mal was reading a comic book, Jo was trying to read a book on quantum physics, and April was sitting on Jo’s bunk talking about Rosie.
“You just KNOW, right, like everyt
hing Rosie tells us, there are like a million other details she leaves out.”
“There’s an entire encyclopedia of stuff we don’t know about Rosie,” Jo agreed, not looking up.
April was an avid collector of stories about Rosie. Like the story of that time when Rosie was a scout and she maybe possibly rescued a family of centaurs.
“I bet you when Rosie was a scout, she discovered a new creature every day. I bet she discovered a whole menagerie of new and mysterious beasts. I bet whatever I can think of, she’s done it.”
Jo flipped a page of her book. “That sounds exhausting.”
“But cool!” April noted.
“But pretty cool.”
April curled up in a little ball of April deep thought, her arms clasped around her knees.
“Why is it other people’s bunks are so comfy?”
“Science,” Jo said.
“Hmmm.”
“You know,” Jo added, dropping her book on her lap since reading was clearly not going to happen, “we’ve had some kick-butt adventures. And today, we found unicorns. So . . . pretty adventurous.”
April nodded. “Oh, I know. I mean, yeah, totally we have.”
“And who knows what we’ll find tomorrow? We could stumble on another dimension on our way to breakfast, given our track record.” Jo was fine with this, as Jo was not really all that into breakfast.
“That would be pretty wonderful.” April sighed.
“As long as it’s not a watery dimension, I’m good,” Mal added from her bunk.
“Okay,” Jen said as she opened the door, and Molly scooted inside and jumped onto her bunk, where Bubbles was already curled up and fast asleep.
“Lights out. Flashlights only.” Jen switched out the light and dropped onto her bunk, content, for the moment, that everyone was in one place (where they were supposed to be, even!) and safe.