Stuck at Lake Finagle, Waiting on Camp Murphy

Standing on the side of a lake, two adults, barely out of teenagerhood, stood and watched, keeping their backs to the slightly smoking bus. The logic was if the two didn’t look at the disaster, the problem did not exist.

Object permanence disproved that theory immediately and constantly, but for Lifeguard Kevin and Future-Camp-Assistant-Director Carla, looking away was as good a way to deny that the two had a problem if any. So long as the children weren’t actively murdering one another, the two could look out at the lake even if such an action was ultimately futile and only brought to mind the anxiety of existence’s decaying clock.

Killing ennui for lack of better anything to do, Kevin commented with an intent to argue, “Lake’s are just a crappier ocean. Big enough to give you that weird feeling when you see the empty horizon, but too small to have any of the cool waves that you can actually surf on. It’s all existential nihilism without the fun.”

“Now that’s a bit much,” Carla snapped without any real heat. She was just as bored as Kevin, and perhaps a stupid argument would help pass the time.

“Well, I’m sorry I lived on an island all my life before taking on this stupid job,” Kevin crossed his arms with a huff, “Lakes wish they were islands.”

Furrowing her brow, Carla raised an eyebrow as she asked, “Are you implying that islands are the land version of lakes?”

Kevin used his hands to make a turning motion, “Turn that around, lakes are the water version of islands.”

“It’s the same damn thing.”

“Is it?” Kevin whirled to face Carla, eyes wide, “Is it really?”

“Yes!” Carla shouted, throwing her hands up in the air, “Why are we even arguing this?”

Reverting to his casual demeanor, Kevin shrugged, “Because we have nothing else to do while we wait for Sam to get back from wherever the hell she went off to?”

“I thought we were waiting for the tow truck?” Carla asked.

“Well, that, too,” Kevin admitted before muttering, “Stupid pothole taking out the stupid axle; where are our tax dollars going to!?”

“You’re not even a Canadian citizen, damn it.”

“So?”

There was a brief silence as the two watched the pitiful waves lap against the shoreline.

“You know, the sand’s all wrong too,” Kevin added, “It’s pebbles. It’s not supposed to be pebbles.”

Pinching her brow, Carla refused to indulge in the islander’s complaining, “I’m not any happier about this than you.”

Kevin pouted before looking around to ask,“Where’d Sam go anyways? She’s the one with the keys.”

“Something about becoming one with the wilds,” Carla waved a hand in the air, “And something about hiding before the children begin disemboweling one another as the demonspawn worship a pig’s head on a stick.”

“She does realize that we’re just waiting for a tow truck to come tow the bus to camp,” Kevin raised an eyebrow.

Carla was silent.

Pursing his lips, Kevin stared out into the mists hovering above the lake, commenting idly, “Hopefully, she’s back when the tow truck arrives.”

There’s a theory that silence takes about a minute or so to become labeled so. If that is the case, then silence was aborted five seconds prematurely when a voice from the bus called out.

“Hey, Miss Carla! Can we get off the bus yet? We’ve been waiting for an hour!”

Miss Carla sighed.

“Kind of impressive that they waited this long,” Kevin commented, still staring out at the distance, “Back in my day, we would have started punching each other out of sheer boredom.”

“This generation is more likely to plan how to overthrow the authority figures,” Carla muttered.

“We might do that if we have to stay inside any longer!” a different child shouted from the bus.

“Please do,” Kevin shouted.
“Please don’t,” Carla refuted, “I’d hate to fill out the paperwork for that incident. Are you guys going to worship a pig’s head on a stick if we let you out?”

Murmurs arose from the bus before eventually a single voice shouted, “If we say ‘yes,’ will you let us go out?”

“I’d prefer it if you guys said no actually,” Carla asked.

“Well, that’s boring,” Kevin commented idly as murmurs began emanating from the bus again.

“Just go back to staring at the lake, island boy,” Carla ordered dismissively.

“I’m glaring at it,” Kevin grumbled, “Another thing to note about the deficiency of lakes. No salty smell. Needs salt.”

“What are you, Gordon Ramsay?” Carla rolled her eyes.

“Where’s the lamb sa--”

The de facto leader of the children interrupted the banter, announcing, “We’re going to put that down as a tentative ‘no’ for worshipping a pig head on a stick unless we get really bored.”

“There’s a huge lake for you guys to splash around in!” Carla shouted, “You guys don’t have to recreate the Lord of the Flies!”
“Aren’t lakes just crappier versions of oceans?”

“Thank you!”

“Don’t you start,” Carla pointed at Kevin before pointing at the bus, “And don’t you encourage him!”

“When do you think Sam’s coming back?” Kevin sighed, retreating to the bus with the keys to open the doors and set the children free. As the only one with a driver’s license, the responsibility of driving the bus had fallen onto Kevin. More importantly, Kevin was trying very hard not to think about how insurance was probably going to saddle him with the bill for driving the bus into a pothole.

As if summoned by Kevin’s question, Sam emerged from the water. Her head popped out, her chest followed, and by the time her entire body was out, Kevin and Carla stood transfixed and horrified at the realization that Sam was standing upon something.

What Sam stood on emerged out of the water bodily, and Sam spread her arms as if she was Christ crucified to shout, “I HAVE TAMED A MOOSE!”

Her back thumping against the bus, Carla slapped the bus a few times in panic, stammering, “Kevin, please tell me that’s not actually a moose!” When no reply came, Carla turned her head to search for her compatriot, “Kevin?”

Sticking his head out above Carla, Kevin snapped, “What are you still doing out there, fool!? Get in!”

Next thing Carla knew, she was inside a bus and sharing a blanket with a child. Taking a few deep breaths and one last nibble on the blanket corner to stave off panic, Carla stood up and addressed the children on the bus. Carla was a veteran camp counselor, damn it. Carla was going to bring a semblance of order and some calm back.

“So what have we learned today?” Carla asked, smiling brightly, trying to keep calm and not panic because of a moose.

“Miss Sam is terrifying,” a boy murmured, burying his face into a blanket, “Why’d Mom send me back to Camp Murphy!? I still have burns!”

Another boy with a too-large smile raised a hand, and paying lip service to the idea of being called upon, shouted, “Lake’s are crappier oceans.”

Carla ignored Kevin’s smug smile. Carla was planning on punching the lifeguard later if the smugness remained. Carla also really needed to  learn the camper’s names as soon as possible. Carla’s plan had been to do an icebreaker at the campsite instead of sheltering inside a bus, hiding from a maniac and a temporarily tamed  moose.

“The tow truck company sucks,” said a girl dressed in pastel puffiness with the air of a veteran goth, a headache inducing contradiction that Carla studiously ignored..

“Mooses can dive up to six meters underwater,” a girl with glasses informed, pushing her glasses up her nose.

“All very correct and--” Carla cut herself off, eyes wide, “Wait, what!? Why!?”
“Got to get at that seaweed, Carla,” Kevin chuckled, a teaspoon’s worth of hysteria creeping into an otherwise monotone voice.

“I have no time for jokes. Sam’s on a fuc-- fudging moose!” Carla scowled, pointing outside, “Moose don’t eat seaweed!”

“Moose actually eat kelp,” the girl with glasses nodded, “Incidentally, this is why killer whales are one of the moose’s only known predators.”
“Wow, an interestingly horrifying fact,” Kevin cackled,  a few tablespoons of manic energy slipping into Kevin’s shaking body, “Nature’s humor is either dead or ten steps ahead of mine because I was making a weed joke.”

The girl with glasses continued, pointing one hand outside, “I mentioned the moose fact because Miss Sam just got dragged under by the moose.”

All on the bus pressed against the windows and saw that, yes, Miss Sam was being dragged under by the moose as if a moose was a Canadian version of the Scottish kelpie. Sam was putting up an admirable fight though, even fighting the moose, the mammalian version of a goose.

“...And we’re not even at the camp yet,” Carla sighed in heavy disappointment.

“I blame the lake,” Kevin nodded with self-assured confidence, “Nothing good comes out of lakes. Horror movies taught me that.”

Carla remained silent.

Poking her side, Kevin whispered, “I was hoping you were going to say something to defend lakes.”

Shrugging her shoulders in defeat, Carla thunked a sweaty forehead against the bus’s window, “Seeing as the moose is trying to drown Sam, I’m starting to think you’re right about lakes being crappier oceans. At least oceans don’t pretend they’re anything less than dangerous.”

The girl with glasses pointed at the drowning scuffle outside, gently reminding, “Shouldn’t you stop that?”

“Oh, right, yeah,” Carla pursed her lips and clicked her tongue, “we should totally do that. Kevin!”

Kevin sighed, taking off his jacket and shirt while exiting the bus, “Yeah, yeah, send the lifeguard out. I trained to fight sharks, not meese.” Kevin then waded into the lake, crying, “Lake’s are just as cold and uncaring as the ocean!”

One moose bite, one Sam bite, and a memorable mouth-to-mouth resuscitation during which Kevin successfully saved the moose, the tow-truck finally came to drag the counselors and the campers to the campsite where the group would find that the camp director was not on-site, but would be supervising through a combination of cameras and Zoom meetings.

Camp Murphy was off to an excellent start compared to last year’s freak meteor strikes.

---

AN:

Some of my writings for my english class that I thought was funny enough to share on hear. WIll go public in 1-2 weeks.

...This may actually be slightly illegal now that I think of it, but... eh, it's mine. This one's just silly dialogue.

MY english professor hated pronouns, so I had to delete a bunch and reword them and ARGH! still annoyed about that.