Faith Falls

I never really enjoyed going to camp growing up, so I'm not sure why I made the decision in the spring of 1995 to become a counselor that summer. I suppose I could blame it on pressure from my parents to get a summer job, or my dad's insistence that being a counselor could teach me valuable leadership skills before my freshman year of college began that fall. I was about to graduate high school, and the thought of working at a camp and spending a lot of time outdoors and having fun sounded like a much better alternative to working in a burger joint or department store, so I reluctantly agreed. Between that point and the start of summer, I wondered if I had made a bad decision, but I had already made my commitment and I was brought up to believe that keeping one's commitments is important.

During the last few weeks of anticipating summer, I cycled through memories of having been a camper at Faith Falls Christian Camp, which is located in scenic southeastern Pennsylvania. I had trouble finding the good memories among all the sad and depressing ones. I had never been one to make friends easily, and usually the weeklong camp session was not long enough to make any real friends, at least not the kind that you stay in any sort of contact with. So, for the most part, I spent that week each summer feeling lonely and bored, watching the other kids and wishing that I could be a part of a group, one of the "normal" kids that seemed to fit in so easily. To make matters worse, many of the other guys in my cabin would find girlfriends for the week --dubbed "The Great Camp Hook-Up," though generally the "hooking up" consisted of no more than hand-holding and maybe a kiss-- and girls didn't seem to be at all interested in me. I was a pale, awkward kid with no fashion sense or confidence with girls, and though I always hoped there would be a girl at camp who would see through that, it never happened during those many years I attended Faith Falls as a camper.

By the time I graduated high school, I had yet to have had a girlfriend or to have been on a real date. The only "date" I had been on was a double date --a blind date for me-- set up by my best friend Steve and his girlfriend, Tara, who was from another town and attended a different school. They tried to hook me up with her friend Gina, but about fifteen minutes into our date --which consisted of bowling and going to Burger King-- I felt like there was no chance of us connecting on any real level. She was a fairly "typical" girl, interested in the normal, trendy things that I either had trouble keeping up with or ignored. She was pretty, but she seemed to exhibit few traces of a personality. She mostly chewed her gum, talked to Tara, and stared blankly into space. I tried to be funny for her, but she didn't react to it and my confidence was quickly shattered. Tara laughed at my jokes, though, and to this day sometimes I wonder if she and I would have made a good couple. She and Steve broke up not long after that, due to his being a jerk to her half the time, and unfortunately I never saw her again.

I arrived at Faith Falls Christian Camp about two weeks before the first group of campers were to show up. There was a lot of cleaning and organizing to do, as well as some training for the counselors and staff. You had to be eighteen or older to work at the camp, and at eighteen I was one of the younger ones. Many of them had previous experience as well, and they didn't seem too eager to help me learn the ropes. When I was a camper, my memories of the counselors was mostly of them being caring individuals, but apparently they're not that way to you when you're a fellow counselor. This is a lesson I learned on the first day.

For that first evening at the camp, after a day of cleaning cabins, repairing the obstacle course, and who knows what else, the administrators held a "mixer" for the counselors and staff, with barbecue, easy-listening Christian music, and a lot of laughing and conversation. It became clear to me that many of these people already knew each other; either that or they were quick to make strong friendships. I ate at a table by myself, trying to look nonchalant but secretly watching the interactions of the other counselors. Most of the other guys were tan, in shape, and confident, and the girls were tan, pretty, and flirty. I wondered how it seemed so easy for people like them to carry themselves, wearing the right clothes, saying the right things, using the right posture. Every move I made was self-conscious in some way, and when I looked at myself in the mirror I saw a guy who didn't seem to be comfortable in his own skin. I felt like the clothes I wore were outdated and awkward, my skin was blemished and oily, and I slouched too much. No wonder no one wants to talk to you, I thought. No wonder girls don't want to date you, and guys don't want to be friends with you. These phrases were like a mantra to me, and they repeated in my head as I sat there alone in the corner, eating barbecue chicken and drinking weak fruit drink and wondering which of the girls I would want as my girlfriend if I could have any of them.

My eyes traveled from girl to girl, and for the most part I would say to myself, "Out of my league," and move on to the next. One of the girls I looked at and quickly wrote off for that reason was Hannah Rose, who stood in a group with several other girls. On that night she wore a ponytail, a baggy red shirt, and basketball shorts that accentuated her curves. She was stunningly beautiful, and that was enough of a reason for my mind to write her off. My eyes soon settled on Jessica Harper, who was not overly attractive but she had a pretty face and what looked like a new perm. I felt that she was probably the only girl in the room I might have a chance with --and who the other guys might not swarm over before I even had an opportunity to introduce myself-- so, for the moment, she became my focus.

The next day, as we were scrubbing the canoes down by the lake, I made an effort to be as close to Jessica Harper as I could. When she looked in my direction, I nervously introduced myself.

"Hi, I'm Tim," I said, holding my hand out to shake. Jessica looked at my hand and kind of smirked.

"I'm Jessica," she said reluctantly, but she didn't shake my hand. She turned away and went back to what she was doing.

Undeterred for the moment, I tried to make conversation.

"Have you been here before? Er, I mean, as a counselor?" I said, stumbling over my words.

"Yeah, I was here last year. Most of us were. We don't really know who you are," she said, with a voice that almost sounded disgusted.

"Yeah, I know. I'm new here."

"Really? Because I was here last year and I would have known if you were here. Duh!" Jessica said sharply, and one of her friends nearby giggled. Great, I thought. Only my second day and I've humiliated myself.

I decided not to talk anymore, for the time being.

For some reason, Jessica talked to me a few times over the course of that afternoon's work. Sometimes she acted nice, and other times she would put me down. I wasn't sure what to think of her. At this point in my life, being a very naive eighteen-year-old, I assumed that girls who weren't very pretty tended to make up for that deficiency by being nice. Jessica Harper was the reality check that taught me that this isn't necessarily so. Still, for the early part of my time as a counselor at Faith Falls Christian Camp, she was one of the few people who would talk to me, so I stayed close to her when the opportunity presented itself.

During meals, she often invited me to sit with her and her friends. She made me the butt of her jokes, and managed to pick up an impersonation of me that her friends found pretty funny, but I was finally feeling comfortable and, in a way, accepted, so I laughed it off. Some of the girls responded to my self-deprecating style of humor, and making them laugh, even at my own expense, made me feel normal, in some way.

Before the first round of campers even arrived, there were multiple hook-ups among the counselors, something that was officially discouraged by the camp administrators but in reality was tolerated and even encouraged by the fact that the male and female counselors had many opportunities to find "alone time." Since I wasn't in the loop, so to speak, I didn't know the extent of what went on among the counselors at that camp, but I heard enough hearsay to make me blush on more than one occasion. Then again, at this age, I was immature and idealistic, having been raised in a strict Christian household and clinging to a strong and traditional set of morals.

During a hike through the woods on the outskirts of camp, on the day before the first campers were to show up, Jessica confessed to me that she had been a part of one of these hook-ups the previous summer, with a guy named Dan that hadn't returned to the camp, according to her.

"He was older. Thirty-two," she said, almost proudly.

"He was still single?"

"Yeah, but he could have been married if he wanted to be. He just wanted to play the field before settling down." Jessica sounded almost defensive, as if I had accused her of playing around with some sort of loser.

I didn't push the conversation any further, but it was obvious that Jessica either wanted to get something off her chest or brag to me about her experience.

"We did so many things," she said, and I looked at her face and she suddenly seemed ugly to me. I think she expected me to ask for details, but when I didn't, she pouted a bit and then took the opportunity to jab me. "You have no idea. You've probably never even done anything like that. You'll be a virgin 'til you're thirty-five."

My face burned and I pouted a bit, hurt by what she said. Sex wasn't the sort of thing that I thought about a lot, because I was determined not to do it until I was married. Marriage, however, seemed like a distant possibility to a guy who hadn't even had a girlfriend or any girl who expressed interest in him.

"He put his hands all over my tits. He even sucked on them," she said. "Have you ever sucked on a girl's tits? I'm sure you haven't."

I didn't respond. Jessica sort of laughed at me. As much as she was annoying me, though, I started to get an involuntary hard-on.

"I'll bet you want to see them, don't you? You're probably getting hard just thinking about it," she smirked. "Yeah, I touched his dick, and he shot his white stuff all over the leaves. And he put his hand in my underwear. He knew just what to do to make me feel good all over. He put his fingers inside me. Inside my ass, too. That really got me wet."

My face was surely beet-red by this point, and I tried to walk more quickly to get away from Jessica. My dignity couldn't take any more beatings from this girl, and I wished more than ever that I had never come to this camp.

"Why are you walking so fast? Wait, Tim, wait!" Jessica walked fast to catch up to me, then pulled on my shirt collar with a fat hand.

"Don't be mad, Tim, I'm just messing around. Boy, you need to grow up!" she said, and I finally looked into her eyes, hoping she would see how angry I was and back up.

"Don't tell me what I need to do!" I said, gritting my teeth. "I don't want to hear this... this... SHIT!"

I yelled the last word with a surprising amount of conviction, considering I rarely swore and never around people at this point in my life.

"Calm down, boy, calm down. I was just teasing you," Jessica said.

"Sometimes it seems like you hate me, like everyone here hates me! Why do you even want to hang around with me, if all you ever do is make fun of me?" I hoped that I wouldn't cry, though my eyes became wet as I spoke these words.

"I'm just trying to bring you out of your shell!" Jessica said, her voice now fierce to match mine. "You come out here, from Who Gives A Fuck, Pennsylvania, nobody knows who you are, and you don't talk to anyone. I'm just trying to make you more normal, so you'll fit in here. So people won't think you're so weird."

"Maybe I am weird. Maybe I don't fit in with this stupid place," I said, and I started to storm off. Jessica chased after me and found that she had to get in front of me and physically stop me.

"Will you stop walking off, stomping your feet like a spoiled baby?" she said. I stopped and just looked at her. We just stood there for a few minutes, not speaking. Her eyes and face softened. I started to think about her talk about the guy who sucked on her breasts and put his hand in her panties. My hard-on returned. It was uncomfortable in my shorts, and I tried to adjust it nonchalantly. Jessica noticed, and looked straight at the bulge in my shorts.

"You're not hard now, are you?"

I shook my head, but then I saw the look in her eyes, a look that almost appeared to be... arousal. I decided to be honest with her.

"Yeah." My face turned even redder. My legs felt weak.

"Why?"

"All that stuff you said."

She just looked at me, as if wanting me to be more specific.

"Um, about the things that that guy did to you."

"Really?" she said, "That turned you on?"

"I guess. I've never heard a girl talk like that."

Jessica took a step closer to me. She was looking in my eyes. "Can I see it?"

"What? No!" I said, but my resolve was weak. I felt desperate, like I had an opportunity here that I might never have again.

"Why not? I'll show you something," she said.

"Really?"

"Yeah, I'm not shy about it. Do you want to see my tits, or my pussy?"

"Uh, I guess... uh... both?"

Jessica smiled. She bit her lip, and then lifted her shirt and bra. Her rather large breasts, with suitably large nipples, popped out of her shirt. It was the first pair of breasts I had seen in person, at least that I could remember. They were pale white, with dark pink areolas. Her areolas were not nearly the same size, and --if I think about it honestly, years later-- they were actually rather unattractive breasts. But to me, in that moment, it was a revelation. The first time a girl had thought enough of me to show me what she had under her clothes. I wanted to touch them. I stepped closer to her. She backed up a step and lowered her shirt. She shook her head, turned away from me, and fixed her bra. I wasn't sure what to make of all this. I turned towards what I thought was the quickest way back to camp and began walking fast. Jessica called my name a few times but didn't walk after me. I realized why she didn't follow me later on when I arrived back at the camp and saw that she had gotten there quicker than me, and I understood that I had actually taken the long way back. She didn't speak to me any more that day, and I thought that maybe I had ruined my one chance with a girl that summer.

At one point during dinner that evening --which I ate by myself-- I looked over at Jessica's table and one of her friends caught my glance. The friend said something to Jessica and the other girls at the table, and they laughed loudly. I wondered what Jessica had told them, if anything.

I didn't see much of Jessica the following week, because the first group of campers arrived for their weeklong stay, and at this point the male and female counselors would not see much of each other, except when around the campers. I was just fine with not seeing her, though, because I was annoyed with her. Yet part of me wanted her. Part of me hoped I had said "your pussy" in response to her asking which part of her I wanted to see, just so I could know what that looked like, if hers was covered in hair, and, if so, what color the hair was. I guessed it was black because of her dark hair, but I didn't know for sure. I scolded myself for thinking like this. Before our hike, I hadn't really ever thought of Jessica in that way, and I probably would have been contented not to. But now the thoughts were unchained and began to occupy my mind, no matter how hard I tried to push them out.

On Wednesday of the first official week of camp, my cabin and another boys' cabin were scheduled to play a game of kickball with two girls' cabins. This was one of the few truly mixed-gender activities the camp had, as the boys and girls were often kept separate, residing on opposite sides of the lake, and even eating meals on opposite sides of the cafeteria. I was one of four supervisors of the game, along with the counselors of each of the other cabins: a guy named Mark, a girl named Julie, and Hannah Rose. Mark and Julie knew each other already, so they chatted away while the game was in progress. I was feeling kind of deflated at this point, so I stood back and kept to myself, at least until Hannah approached me.

"You're Tim, right?" she asked. She was soft-spoken, and I hadn't expected that.

"Yeah, Tim Marsh," I said.

"Hi, Tim Marsh. That's a nice name. You look like a Tim," Hannah said. At first I thought she was poking fun at me, but there was no indication of that in her smile.

"Thanks," I said, suddenly feeling shy and looking away. "Jessica makes fun of my name. She'll fill her mouth with food and say 'I'm Tim Marsh!' because she says my name sounds the same whether or not a person has food in their mouth when they say it."

I wasn't sure why I said all this to a girl I hadn't even spoken to before, but I think I was venting some of my hurt feelings. I looked down and began staring at a groove I was kicking into the dirt.

"Wow," Hannah said, "that doesn't sound nice at all."

I shrugged my shoulders.

"I'm Hannah, by the way. Hannah Rose. No calling me Hannah Banana, okay? Everyone does."

I looked up at her and saw that she was smiling sweetly at me. I had encountered so much enmity at Faith Falls so far that I was actually shocked to see a kind face.

"Hannah Banana? That's not very creative," I said, and she giggled.

"No, but everyone thinks they're so clever when they say it, like they're the first ones to realize my name rhymes with 'banana,'" she said.

I laughed but didn't know how to respond. I noticed now that Hannah might actually be a little shy, because she noticed me looking at her and looked away, almost as if embarrassed.

"But it's okay. I'm used to it now."

"It doesn't sound like you're used to it. Because why would you include that 'No Hannah Banana' stuff as part of your introduction if it didn't bother you? I'll bet it's eating away at you as we speak," I said this last bit with a mock serious voice so she would know that I was only teasing. Hannah laughed and continued to smile at me.

"You're right, Tim. I think I'm going to go jump off a bridge now," she said sarcastically, but there was no bite to it. Her voice was as gentle as the breeze, her smile as warm as the June sun above us.

"I notice that you spend a lot of time by yourself, Tim," she said after some silence, "but I don't know why. You seem like a nice guy."

"I don't know... I mean, I hang out with Jessica sometimes," I said, a little defensively.

Hannah paused for a few seconds, as if trying to decide whether or not to tell me something.

Then she said, "I don't want to say bad things about someone, but Jessica was here last year, and so was I, so I think I know her kind of well. She's... not really a nice person. I could be wrong, maybe she's nicer once you get to know her, but I just..." Hannah paused again, trying to find the right words, "I get a bad impression of her."

"Is it because of Dan?"

"Dan? Who's Dan?" she said.

"Jessica told me she knew a guy last year at camp named Dan. She said he was like thirty-two."

"I don't..." Hannah paused as if searching her brain's memory banks, "I don't remember anyone like that. Are you sure she's not lying to you?"

"I don't know," I said, burying my head in my hands in frustration, "I can't figure her out at all. Sometimes it seems like she likes me, and sometimes she's mean to me. Why are girls like that?"