5 DAYS IN SEPIA

The last thing James expected from his crappy summer job as a camp counselor was Katja, the freaky, strangely-attractive, sepia-photo-obsessed fellow-counselor who might just change his life. Forever.

5 DAYS IN SEPIA

 

When you press your hands against a frosty window pain, you will inevitably leave an impression. When you press your hands against a person, you leave nothing. This only furthers my theory that even a windowpane is more impressionable than a person.

            Because, a person cannot be marked. I person can be beaten and burned. A person can feel hate and anger and the deepest of tragedy. But a person cannot be marked. From the time of birth they have one mission: survive until death. Nothing else matters.

            God, I wish it were that simple.

 

 

DAY 1

I arrived at Greenview with a terrible case of the flu, and I think it’s pretty safe to say that I would have rather been anywhere but standing in the middle of a baseball field in the muggy Florida heat.

            But there I was.

            It wasn’t my idea to become some rich kid’s camp counselor, mind you. It was just another crazy scheme my parents thought up to stop me from doing crack or contracting STDs or doing whatever it was my classmates were doing.

            Whatever. I didn’t spend much time with them, anyway.

            So, picture this; there I am, standing in the grass in a pair of shorts that felt far too small (thanks mom) and a bright green camp T-shirt that I was almost sure had been used by several other campers due to the smell (clove cigarettes and sharpie ink) and the ungodly brown stain on the sleeve that I both A) didn’t want to know about and B) was completely disgusted by. And anyway, I’m sort of shifting from foot to foot and trying to ignore this old man standing in the center of the field, talking about how Greenview is one of this most esteemed camp’s in the state, and how these are the summers we’ll remember, and how Greenview has a zero tolerance policy on disrespect and blah blah blah when all of a sudden this girl walks up to me and jabs me so hard in the arm that I think I might vomit right there and then.

            “There’s a counselor seminar in the gymnasium in five minutes,” the girl announces. I can’t actually see her face, partly because she’s several inches shorter than me, and partly because she’s wearing one of those creepy foam visor’s that’s totally obscuring my view.

“At least…” the girl continued. “I assume you’re a counselor. You could also be one of those freaky-tall eleven-year-old’s, I guess. That happens every once in a while.”

            “I" No. I"“

            “" Fantastic. Are you coming to the seminar, then?” she sounded bored.

            Here’s the thing: I hate talking to people when I can’t see their faces. How am I supposed to tell that what they’re saying is true? How am I supposed to know that everything they tell me isn’t some big joke? If I can’t see a person’s eyes, I’m totally lost.

            “Hello… Are you coming?”

            Shaking my head, quickly, I nodded and followed the girl out of the large hoard of children listening to the old man.

            I hoped the gym was air-conditioned.

 

The walk to the gym felt like it lasted forever, probably due to my very-upset-stomach, but I made it despite that. And guess what? The gym was air-conditioned, much to my delight.

            The second I stepped into the cool haven which was the gymnasium, the girl with the visor started screaming hysterically. At first, I panicked. Was she hurt? Then I saw what she was screaming about.

            “O’Malley, you b*****d, you told me you weren’t coming back!”

            The visor-girl squealed with delight, running over to a tall, blonde guy who looked like he’d fallen straight out of the pages of an L.L. Bean catalog.

            “I was just messing with you,” the guy said, in a heavy Australian accent. He laughed, picking up the visor-girl and spinning her around once before putting her back in the ground.

            “You’re so mean!” she shouted, slapping him in the arm. “I’ve been expecting a totally lame summer all year.”

            The girl shrugged, still grinning. “What would I do without my partner in crime?” he asked.

            I felt kind of awkward, standing there, witnessing their little moment, but just as I started contemplating an escaped plan the visor-girl turned to me and said, “over here!” Then she directed me over to some tall bleachers where she and that L.L. Bean guy sat down and started talking.

            “So, what cabin did you end up in?” visor girl asked.

            L.L. Bean groaned. “Two…” he said.

            “That’s only ‘cuz Phil doesn’t like you.”

            “Oh yeah and he reeeeally likes you, Katja.”

            Katja. That was her name.

            Wow. Her parent’s must have been really pretentious.

            The girl" Katja" shuddered. “Don’t even bring that up. I’m staying as far away from that sleez-bag as I can this year. Jesus. Could he be anymore obvious?”

            “Phil’s an idiot.”

            “Agreed.”

            Again, I felt pretty out of place.

            Suddenly, the doors to the gymnasium were wrenched open and three guys paced inside, all looking sweaty and gross.

            I hate Florida.

            “Phil!” L.L Bean shouted. “We were just talking about you.”

            Katja hit him in the arm. “Shhhh. I’m trying to avoid him, remember?”

            A short, middle-aged balding man glanced up at the bleachers and sneered at the three of us before quickly, reached up and wiping a generous amount of sweat off of his forehead with what appeared to be a sock of some sort. This man, I assumed, was Phil.

            Another, tall, lanky guy slapped Phil on the back before rushing over to meet Katja and L.L. Bean.

            “I thought you weren’t coming this year,” he noted.

            L.L. Bean shrugged. “Your sister is too gullible. Honestly, where else would I go?”

            That’s when it happened.

            They all seemed to notice me.

            It all started when the lanky looking guy looked over at me and said. “Newbie, huh?”

            And then Katja nodded and said. “There’s always a few of ‘um.” And L.L. Bean laughed and laughed at that, like it was somehow hilarious.

            “I’m James,” I offered, holding out my hand. They all just stared at it and then started laughing again.

            Oh god. Where was I?

            After about five minutes of listening to them laugh and talk, I managed to catch all of their names. The tall, lanky guy was Volker, and he was apparently Katja’s older brother. The L.L. Bean guy was called O’Malley. And I… well, they referred to me as “newbie”, which" in case you didn’t pick up on the vibe before" was really obnoxious.

            And that’s how it went. The seminar went on for about an hour and then we were all sent to dinner. The walk to the cafeteria was silent. No one spoke. I don’t know why really.

            Then all of a sudden:

            “What the hell was that?”

            Katja came running towards me.

            “Dude, are you okay?”

            Slowly, I reached up to my forehead and touched the place where I knew a large welt was already forming.

            “I"“ I stuttered. I still couldn’t see her face. It made it hard to talk to her.

            “I think some kid threw a rock at him,” Volker noted. It was then that I noticed his slight accent. Maybe his parents weren’t pretentious. Maybe they were German.

            “A rock?” I asked, feeling stupid. How had I let some kid throw a rock at my head?

            I frowned, getting to my feet and feeling hot, sticky blood run into my eye.

            “Aww, Christ,” I said, swearing. I have a death-fear of blood and that plus the regular flu symptoms weren’t doing my stomach very much good.

            “I should take him to the infirmary,” Katja said, suddenly, as she grabbed my elbow and dragged me across the field. “Meet me at dinner,” she called over her shoulder.

            O’Malley and Volked both muttered, “okay’s” before walking off in the other direction and then it was just faceless Katja and I.

            “I think I’m going to throw up,” I admitted, hobbling towards the infirmary.

            “Do you want to sit down?”

            I closed my bloody eye, nodding. “That would probably be best.”

            Katja laughed, taking a seat beside me in the tall grass.

            “Do you smoke?” she asked, offering me a cigarette.

            Remembering my parent’s many lectures on lung cancer I shook my head.

            “Suit yourself,” Katja said, lighting up and laying back in the grass. “By the way, when you get to dinner, the other guys are probably going to give you a hard time,” she said. “Don’t worry to much about it. It’s just what they do.”

            I would have raised an eyebrow, but out of fear of more bleeding I decided against it. “What are they gonna give me a hard time about?” I asked.

            “Just being new,” Katja noted. “It makes sense, I guess. Volker, O’Malley and I have been coming here every summer since we were seven. We’ve seen people come and go, and no one ever sticks around long. It’s like… we’re sick and tired of these newbie’s showing up and then whining to us about how their mommies made them come here and how all they want to do is go home. It’s not like we want to be here, either, you know? We all just want to go home.”

            I nodded then, decided not to tell Katja or the other guys about the circumstances that lead up to my arrival here at Greenview.

            “Anyway, I just thought I’d warn you. This place can get pretty weird.”

            I nodded. “Whatever,” I said. “Weird is good, sometimes.”

            Katja shrugged, standing up and stomping out her cigarette. “I guess,” she shrugged. “Now let’s get you to the infirmary before you bleed to death.

 

Day Two

Nothing all that important happened until the next day, when I woke up to the sound of" I kid you not" trumpets. I guess Greenview likes to stay really traditional, but I’ll admit, I was getting some serious boot-camp vibes out of this place.

            Anyway, I jumped out of bed and glanced around at the muggy room I was stuck in. I had twelve kids in my cabin and I got the feeling that none of them were morning people. Delightful.

            Slowly, I walked into the showers and tried to get as clean as I possibly could before the hot water ran out. Then, I paced back into the room and announced that everyone needed to wake up.

            No response.

            There was a knock at the door.

            Quickly, I dashed over to the doorframe, ready to explain why no one was up just yet when I noticed that the person waiting at the door was Katja.

            “Hey, is everyone up?” Katja asked, peering over my shoulder at the eleven sleeping fifth graders. She sighed. “You didn’t get them up yet?”

            I stared down at her group of fifth graders, all dressed and ready to go, and felt a bit discouraged.

            “Let me in,” Katja said, pushing past me.

            In about five minutes, Katja had every fifth grader in my cabin dressed and ready for the day’s activities, a task I was both too weak and too fearsome to take on myself.

            “Honestly, James, you just have to tell them there’s food,” Katja sighed. “They’re fifth graders not ninth graders. They don’t really need as much sleep as you’d expect.”

            She was probably right. I didn’t remember much of fifth grade anyway.

           

When we got to breakfast, Phil was already talking about all of the things we were gonna do, and how all the kids were supposed to listen to their counselors and how they all had to eat their vegetables and blah blah blah blah. So, I just took a seat next to Katja at the counselor’s table and ate in silence.

            I didn’t eat any vegetables.

            “So what’s the plan for today?” Katja asked Volker and O’Malley. “Someone"“ she glared at me, “" made me miss the first fifteen minutes of breakfast so you should probably try to catch me up.”

            “You didn’t have to help me you know,” I snapped, feeling irritable. I hardly knew her and she already had a grudge.

            “Yeah she does,” Volker pointed out. “Our cabins are… buddied up, I guess. My cabin and O’Malley’s cabin and your cabin and Katja’s cabin. You have to do everything together.”

            Great.

            “Anyway,” O’Malley said, pulling me back into the conversation. “Today is swimming and art,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Should be entertaining enough.”

            Katja laughed. “We’ll see…”

 

Note to self: trying to teach twenty-two fifth graders how to do the breast stroke without actually getting in the water yourself, is pretty difficult. Even with another person.

            “We should just get in and show them,” Katja said, as we watched the kids doggy paddle back to us. “They’re failing miserably.”

            “Really?” I asked, swatting a couple of mosquitoes away. “I didn’t notice.”

            “So, do you want to get in?” Katja asked.

            “What?” I asked. “No. I already said no. I told you, I have the flu.”

            “Wimp,” Katja said. “But whatever. I guess this is a good thing. You can hold my camera.”

            And with that, Katja reached into her pocket and retrieved a small digital camera, which she placed in my hand.

            “Don’t get it wet,” she said, sounding harsh.

            Then, she jumped in.

           

I sat like that on the dock for what felt like hours. I turned the camera on and looked at the pictures. Katja saw me, I’m sure but she didn’t seem to mind. She told me lated that she wasn’t to be a photographer. It’s kind of cool, too because she’s really good at taking pictures. Likes… for example, she took a picture of the baseball field where we all gathered when we first arrived and… I dunno what she did but… she actually made it look… interested. Her hand was in the picture, holding a lit cigarette and all the smoke was curling up around it and making it look really interesting and… yeah… I guess it was just really cool.

            There was only one thing I didn’t understand.

           

“Hey, Katja?”

            “What?”

            She was drying her hair on a towel, looking tired.

            “Why are all your pictures all… yellow?”

            Katja laughed, holding out a damp palm for her camera as the kids ran all around us fighting for towels to keep them warm in the cool shade.

            “It’s sepia. It’s a setting. Like black and white. It makes things more… interesting, I guess.”

            I nodded, slowly. “But… I mean, I thought photographers liked color?”

            Katja shrugged. “Some do, probably. But I like sepia. I think sepia is one of the most underrated colors of all time. For instance…” she fiddled with the camera. “Here.” She snapped my photo.

            “Hey, I didn’t say you could"“

            “" Oh stop whining and look,” she said, holding out the camera for me to see.

            There it was, an embarrassing photo of me looking like an idiot with a big bandage on my head. In color.

            “I don’t get it,” I said.

            “Wait,” Katja commanded, fiddling with a few more buttons on the camera screen.

            She handed it back to me.

            It was in sepia.

            “There’s a difference, see? Sepia dulls everything a little bit… takes the edge off of the resolution. It makes things different, you know? Makes you look like less of a dumbass.”

            I agreed.

           

Art was even worse than swimming, we all just had to sit around and help kids glue some macaroni to some cardboard.

            I thought I would die of boredom.

            Volker and O’Malley showed up about half way through to bring Katja a coke. They didn’t bring me anything. Not that I expected it.

            “Here,” Katja said. “You can have it. I’m not thirsty.”

            I stared at the coke can in her hand and took it gladly, even though I was having a hard time believing that she wasn’t thirsty, since she’d been the one swimming whereas I only say.

            Still, I was parched.

            Gulping down the coke, I suddenly felt like I was being watched.

            “What?” I asked, looking at Katja.

            “Oh nothing. I was just taking a picture.”

            “You were" what? Wait a second, Katja, you have got to ask me before you do that, I mean"“

            “" Shhh… James. Calm down,” Katja said, switching the settings on her camera.

            “No, I’m serious. I get really paranoid when"“

            “" James, please shut up,” Katja groaned. “I’m going to take your goddamned picture when I want to and you’re just going to have to live with it because that’s my thing.”

            “Your thing?” I asked, skeptically.

            “Yes. Everyone does at least one thing that’s really, really obnoxious. Something that they won’t stop doing even when someone begs and pleads with them. That’s their thing, you know? I take random pictures and you…”

            “I what?”           

            “Well, I haven’t figured it out, yet, James. I think your thing might be your constant no-ing.”

            “No-ing?” I asked, growing weary of this game.

            “Yep,” Katja said. She was helping some kid with their macaroni now. “You say no to everything, James. I think that might be your thing. But I’m not sure.”

            Later that day, while walking back from art I made a decision.

            I didn’t want that to be my thing.

            I had to change it.

 

Day Three

Have you ever had someone knock on your window at three-thirty in the morning? I bet you haven’t.

            It’s scary as hell.

            “Huh? What? What’s happening?”

            Knock.

            Quickly, I turned to the window beside my bed to see a familiar visor waiting for me.

            “Katja?” I asked, opening the window. “What the hell are you doing here?”           

            “I’m inviting you out with us,” Katja explained. “I convinced the guys that you’re cool enough to join us.”

            “Join you where?”

            “Oh come on James. Don’t say no. Don’t let ‘no’ be your thing. That would be really lame.”

            Sighing I got up and grabbed a pair of pants before climbing out the window.

            “What are we doing?” I asked, as I followed Katja out from around the edge of the cabin.

            “We’re just going to the lake.”

            I frowned. “Are you kidding me? There’ll be all kinds of bugs out now. They’ll eat us alive.”

            Katja rolled her eyes. “You’re such a wimp,” she repeated.

            I followed her reluctantly to the edge of the lake, where Volker and O’Malley were waiting, cigarettes in hand.

            “We’re going night swimming,” Katja informed me, more of a statement than a question.

            “Are you serious?” I asked, glancing over my shoulder at the cabin. I was supposed to be sleeping now. “What happens if one of the kids wakes up? What happens if"“

            “" Now I think your thing might be reluctance…” Katja said and I frowned. “You never just do anything. You’re always all, ‘are you sure? What happens if…’ and you totally bog me down.”

            “Well, I don’t mean to,” I say coldly as we approached the water’s edge.

            “Smoke?” Volker asked, holding out a cigarette. I knew I should probably say yes. If for no other reason than to be friendly but… I wasn’t in a very friendly mood.

            “I don’t think so,” I shrugged. Volker lit the cigarette for himself.

            “Katja, I told you he shouldn’t come here,” O’Malley laughed, handing her what appeared to be one of those eco-friendly reusable water bottles. She took a drink, quickly.

            “I dunno,” she shrugged, wading into the water. “I think he has potential.”

            “Potential for what?” I demanded, feeling irritable.

            She dragged me out of bed three-thirty in the morning just so her little friends could hate on me? This sucked.

            “Stop worrying and get in the water,” Katja sighed, motioning for me to follow her into the lake.

            “I said, I had the flu and"“

            “" Just come on.”

            “No.”

            “No,” Volker mocked, waving me off. “Let him go, Katja. He’s obviously too good to hang out with us.”

            Angrily, I flipped them all the bird before retreating back into my cabin.

            I couldn’t deal with them.

            Not this early in the morning.

 

Katja woke me up the next morning.

            “Listen, I know you probably want to give me the cold shoulder and everything but I can’t do that today, alright?”

            Rubbing my eyes sleeping I stared at her.

            “Katja. What are you doing?”

            “I’m waking you up. I already walked your entire cabin to breakfast. Can we have a truce?”

            I glanced around the cabin. Everyone was gone.

            “Listen, Katja. I’m not sure"“

            “" Just forget about my brother and O’Malley, okay? They’re both dumbass’. They don’t like anyone I like.”

            “You… Like me…?”

            Katja rolled her eyes. “You read way too much into things, James,” she said, slapping the mattress.

            I felt my cheeks get warm. “Yeah. Whatever. Truce.”

            Katja grinned, and turned towards the door.

            Before she could go, I had to ask her something.

            “Hey Katja?”

            “Hmm?”

            “Can you please take off that gaddamn visor so I can see your face?”

            Katja smiled, turning in my direction. Slowly, she reached up and pulled off the odd, green, foam visor that had been attached to her head since our very first meeting.

            And ohmygod. She was hot.

           

I skipped breakfast that day. It was fine. I never ate breakfast at home, anyway.

            Instead, I headed straight for fishing.

            Yes, you heard that right; the Greenview activities coordinator thought that fishing would be a good camp activity.

            They were wrong. So very wrong.

            I spent the majority of the day trying to stick hooks through worms while fifth graders complained about this and that. Katja was a pro, of course. She knew exactly what she was doing, and she was more than willing to help me out.

            I didn’t want help, though.

            “Oh come on, just let me help you,” Katja whined about half way through the fishing day.

            “No,” I snapped, as I attempted to spear a small, flailing worm with a fishing hook. “I can do this.”

            Katja frowned. “James,” she said, plainly. “No you can’t.”

            After another two minutes of struggling, the fifth grader who had asked for assistance was starting to get fidgety.

            “Hurry up,” he complained, shifting his weight from foot to foot. “There aren’t going to be any fish left.”

            “There will be plenty of fish,” I told him. This was a lie. The camp counselors had been informed way ahead of time that there were" in fact" no fish in the great, manmade Lake Greenview. If the boy’s were lucky, they might catch a minnow.

            But it wasn’t likely.

            “Hurry up…” the boy complained.

            “Listen, kid,” I said, getting agitated. “I am doing the best"“

            “" Here you go.”

            Katja held out a fishing rod" worm and all" the kid. He grinned.

            “Thanks lady,” he said, before running off.

            “Thank lady,” I mocked, sticking out my tongue.

            “Oh stop being such a wimp,” Katja said, leaning back against a tree trunk. She paused for a moment. “This moment needs a picture.”

            “What?” I asked, glancing down at my dirty, worm gut-stained Greenview T-shirt. “Are you kidding me?”

            Katja shook her head. “Turn this way.”

            I almost protested, but then I remembered what she said last night.

            I didn’t want to be reluctant.

            Katja took about twenty million pictures over the course of the next five minutes. She made me stand up straight and lean against a tree and sit by the lake and lay in the dirt and all kinds of things. After a while, I became convinced that half of the photos she was snapping didn’t include me at all, so I just sort of got up and walked away. She was distracted.

            Whatever.

           

Later that day, towards the end of our little fishing trip, Phil, the camp leader showed up with instructions for tomorrow’s bus ride to the beach.

            At first, I didn’t pay any attention. Phil handed Katja a stack of papers and then he walked around the edge of the lake and yelled at a couple of kids for attempting to eat worms.

            And then…

            “What the hell, Phil?”

            I turned around, slowly, putting down the lunch I’d been eating. Katja was staring at Phil, rage burning in her eyes.

            “What’s going on?” I asked, as I walked over towards them.

            “Nothing,” Phil said, quickly. He was staring at Katja.

            “Get out of here,” she snapped, before turning to me. “James, tell him to get out of here.”

            I glanced between Katja and Phil for a moment. Phil looked at me harshly.

            “I"“ I began. “Katja, I don’t really think I should say"“

            “" Oh whatever,” Katja shouted, throwing something into the grass. “Screw you,” she said to Phil. Then she turned to me. “Screw you both.”

            And then she stormed off.

            “What the hell was that about?” I asked, awkwardly, once she had left.

            Phil shrugged. “PMS or something, probably.”

            I frowned. “Probably.”

 

That day at dinner, Katja didn’t talk to me at all. I started to get pissed after a while because, honestly, what was I supposed to do?

            It wasn’t like I could just tell Phil to go away. He would send me home, and then I’d have to face my parents and try to explain why Greenview had sent me away. I didn’t want to do that! I barely knew Katja. She wasn’t really worth getting in trouble for, was she?

            … Was she?

            Anyway, I had no idea what happened with Phil. Maybe it really was just PMS or something. Maybe she was just really irritable.

           

Volker and O’Malley came to my cabin after dusk and asked me if I knew what was wrong with Katja. I didn’t say anything about Phil. I figured she would tell them what she wanted them to know. Besides, those guys were b******s. I didn’t owe them any kind of explanation.

            “We’re just really worried,” O’Malley explained when I asked him what they were all so worked up about. “She isn’t usually like this.”

            “Thank for the help,” Volker said, patting my arm.

            Oddly enough, I think he meant it.

 

Later that night, I was sitting in bed, reading, unable to sleep after the day’s event, when I saw the beam of a flashlight cross my windowpane.

            I looked over quickly, pressing my hand against the glass and watched steam form around my fingertips.

            I didn’t see anything.

            I turned back to my book. I was probably seeing things.

            Then I heard it.

            Someone was yelling, out in the fields. Someone was yelling and shouting and screaming about something.

            I got out of bed, quickly and tiptoed to the door, being careful not to wake up any of the kids as I crept into the cool night.

            “Damnit. Damnit. Damnit.”

            It was her. It was Katja.

            I raced through the tall grass, towards the lake. I could see her standing there, hunched over and searching through the grass for something.

            “Hey,” I said as I approached her.

            “Damnit,” she muttered, not even bothering to look at me.

            “Hey are… you okay?” I asked, slowly.

            “No!” she shouted, finally meeting my gaze. “No. Do I look okay to you?”           

            She was crying. Oh god. She was crying.

            I’ve never been good with crying. When I was eleven my grandpa died and my mom was in hysterics for a whole day. My dad was great about it. He made dinner, hung out with me and just let her kind of… chill out for a day.

            But I could never be like that. I’m too… high strung.

            I think I figured out my thing.

            I think I have a hard time accepting things. Anything, really. I just can’t accept anything.

            And I can’t accept crying.

            “What happened?” I asked, slowly, as I edged closer to her. She was still searching for something. “What are you looking for?”

            Katja sniffled. “I’m looking for my camera.”

            I frowned. “Your camera?”

            Katja nodded, looking greatly disturbed. “I threw it, remember? When I was trying to get away from Phil.”

            I nodded now. “Oh yeah,” I said. “I do remember that.”  

            “Yeah well,” Katja sniffled. “I dropped it and I left it here and now I can’t find it and I think he took it.”

            “Wh" what do you mean?” I asked, frowning. “Why would Phil take your camera?”

            “He’s a pervert, okay?” Katja screamed. “Every single goddamn year he’s all over me! When we were standing here earlier today, he stuck his hand in my back pocket. I swear to god, James! I swear…” she rubbed her eyes. “Maybe I’ve overreacting.”

            I stared at her. I couldn’t really process what she was saying.

            I didn’t really know Phil. I’d only met him a few times. He seemed fine to me.

            But this wasn’t fine. This was not okay.

            “Why don’t you tell someone?” I asked, walking towards her.

            “Because I don’t want to leave, James!” Katja cried. “If I tell someone they’ll make me leave. I don’t ever, ever want to leave this place, do you hear me?”

            “But you said before"“

            “" I don’t care what I said before,” she cried. “I was lying. This is the only place I want to be. I wait all year to come here, James. To get away from my parents and that" that is why I hate newbies so much. They all want to leave this place… none of them appreciate it.”

            “I still don’t understand,” I admitted, feeling awkward. “But… I appreciate this place,” I said was a shrug. “At least… I think I do.”

            Katja laughed, still sniffling. “That’s why I like you, James,” she said, smiling. “You might be a newbie but… you get it.”

            And I think I do get it. Sort of.

 

Day Four

I know what I have to do.

            The next day, after I walked all the kids to breakfast, I made some lame excuse to Katja about how I needed to have the nurse look at the wound on my forehead.

            And then, I walked to the administration building.

            I knew he’d be there.

            I knew he had it.

            Sure enough, as soon as I walked into the building, he was there. He looked like he’d been waiting for me. Maybe he was.

            “You have to give it back,” I said, trying to keep my voice as steady as I could.

            “Give what back?” he asked me. He was sneering.

            God. I wanted to kill him.

            “Katja’s camera,” I said, seriously. “I know you took it. You have to give it back.”

            Phil frowned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

            I stood and stared for a moment. I wasn’t quite sure what I was supposed to do now. Was I supposed to like… ransack his things or something? Or threaten him? Even though he was probably three times my age, I think he probably could have taken me in a fight (my upper body strength is minimal at best). What was I supposed to do?

 

Twenty minutes later I was standing next to O’Malley and Volker. I’d told them the whole story. Everything.

            I hoped Katja wouldn’t hate me for this.

            Volker looked horrified. “Newbie, are you saying that all those times my sister joked about Phil… she was serious?” his eyes were wide.

            I nodded. “That’s what it sounded like,” I said, sighing.

            “I’ll kill him,” O’Malley hissed. “I will kill that b*****d.”

            “She’s not even your sister,” Volker said. “If anyone’s gonna kill him it’s gonna be me.”

            O’Malley looked at him, sadly. “She’s as good as,” he whispered. “God, what are we gonna do?”

            Volker glanced at me. “You say he has her camera?”

            I nodded.

            “Well we’re gonna go get it back,” he said. “I mean common…” he looked at O’Malley. “You me and the newbie" James"“ he corrected himself. “We could totally take him. Easily. We’ll get that camera and then…”

            “And then what?” I asked.

            Volker sighed. “And then we figure out what to do from there, okay? I just have to help my sister right now.”

            I nodded, feeling oddly… accepted. Like they were finally including me in something.

            Weird.

           

By the time the three of us arrived at Phil’s office, he was already gone. He was probably busy getting together plan for today’s activities.

            “Go through his desk drawers,” Volker commanded.

            I walked slowly over to Phil’s desk and opened a couple of drawers. At first, I didn’t see anything. There were some cigarettes. Some gum. Paperclips. An activity schedule.

            And then, when I got to the third drawer, I saw them.

            Photographs.

            “Hey, guys, come over here and look at this,” I said, motioning for Volker and O’Malley to join me.

            “What are they?” O’Malley asked, peering over my shoulder to get a better look at the pictures I was holding.

            “They look like… Katja.”

            And that’s what they were. In my hands were forty candid photos of Katja, each slightly blurred, as if they had been taken from a far distance.

            “W" Where is she?” I asked, my heart racing. “Where were those pictures taken?”

            Volker swallowed hard and closed his eyes. “That’s our neighborhood,” he said. “That’s our goddamn neighborhood!” he slammed his fist on the desk.

            “He’s stalker her,” I said, my breathing shallow.

            Volker sighed. “And god knows that else.”

           

I had to tell her. I had to tell Katja. I couldn’t just stand by and wait for him to make another move. Besides" we never found the camera. And I had to say something.

            I knocked on the door later that day to find Katja sitting on her bed, typing like crazy on a laptop.

            “Katja?” I asked. She looked up at me and grinned. “I have to talk to you.”

            Katja frowned, slowly putting down her computer. “Okay…” she said, slowly, sensing the seriousness in my tone.

            She followed me outside. I couldn’t believe I was doing this. I couldn’t believe I had to.

            Volker and O’Malley had their own ways of dealing with this. They had plans to “fix the problem”, which, if I guessed correctly, probably meant that they were just going to beat up Phil.

            I, on the other hand, wanted to talk to her.

            She deserved to know the truth.

            And… maybe it’s just because I’m distanced from the situation… Maybe… well, maybe it’s just because I don’t know Katja as well as the other guys do but…

            I figured she’d want to know, as well.

            So, when she was outside, standing across from me I closed my eyes tightly and I said it.

            “He’s stalking you, Katja. He’s stalking you and there are pictures of you by your house in his desk and he’s been following you around and I think he’s very dangerous.” I said the words so fast that for a moment, I feared she didn’t understand what I’d been saying.

            “H" how did you"?” she started before cutting herself off. She rubbed her eyes, sadly and I knew she was about to cry.

            “We found the pictures, Katja,” I said. “Me and Volker and O’Malley. We"“

            “" You told Volker and O’Malley about this?” Katja shouted, tears welling in her eyes.

            “I"“ I began. “I was just trying to help…”

            “Help?” Katja demanded. “James, I don’t need your help. Do you think I don’t know he’s been following me? Do you think I’m unaware?”

            “I don’t… understand,” I admitted, giving a small shrug.

            “This is none of your business, James. It has nothing to do with you!” she spat. My heart sank.

            “Listen, Katja. He’s dangerous. I told you"“

            “" Stop,” she cut me off, holding up a hand to silence me. “Just… stop, okay? You have to let me handle my own problems. And I know that being completely un-understanding is your thing and all but… Just leave this alone, alright? Leave me alone. It’s hard enough as it is.”

            And with that, she walked inside and slammed the door closed, leaving me to watch her go.

 

I couldn’t sleep at all that night. I kept waking up and thinking about what she had said. She knew about Phil, and yet… she didn’t do anything about it. Why? Could she really love this place so much that she was willing to let him do this just so she could stay? Surely, that wasn’t her reasoning.

            That couldn’t be possible…

 

Day 5

“Get up! Get up! God damnit, did you hear me? I said get up!”

            I opened my eyes.

            It was Volker.

            He was crying.

            “W" What’s happening?” I asked, sitting up in bed.

            “She’s gone!” he sniffed. “She’s gone, okay?”

            At this point every fifth grader in the cabin was awake and staring at us.

            “Volker… what are you talking about?”

            Volker sobbed. “She’s gone. She’s gone. Oh god, she’s gone. He did it! He did it to her! God damnit, Phil did something!”

            I jumped up quickly, grabbing his arm and pulling him to my feet.

            “Show me,” I hissed, still unsure of what there was to show. “Show me.”

            Volker just sobbed, shaking his head.

            “Show me or I swear to god"“

            The door was wrenched open.

            “James? Are you James?”

            I looked to see a police man in the doorway.

            Oh my god.

            I nodded. “Yeah,” I said, gulping. “Yeah, that’s me.”

            The policeman nodded. “Come with me, son,” he said, taking my hand.

            As I walked out of the doorway, I saw Volker collapse on my bunk and begin sobbing.

            Oh my god.

            “James, when was the last time you saw her?” the policeman asked. I didn’t need to ask who.

            “I" I" yesterday,” I stuttered. “She’s slammed the door in my face… I" I didn’t have a chance to talk to her. Where" where is she?”

            The policeman rubbed his eyes. “Katja Dönner was found in the lake this morning.”

            I froze. “Is she"?“

            “" She’s not dead,” she policeman said. “But son, she’s in a coma. It’s not likely she’ll wake up at this point.”

            My knees went weak. I’m pretty sure I would have collapsed on the ground if the policeman hadn’t reached out and grabbed my arm the way he did.

            “I’m sorry, son,” he said.

            And then he left.

 

“They knew it was Phil,” O’Malley told me later. “He even confessed. Once he found out she wasn’t dead. Well… he kind of went nuts, you know? Told the cops everything.”

            I nodded, pretending I understood.

            I didn’t understand any of this.

            How could someone who was so alive not ten hours before just suddenly… cease to exist? Not alive anymore… Not dead, really. Just gone. Absent. No longer someone you could talk to.

            “It’s our fault really,” O’Malley went on. “We beat up Phil. That’s how he knew we were on to him. I guess he got mad and… he went after Katja.”

            I didn’t say anything.

            “They found her camera on him. He had it in his pocket. They made copies of all the files and gave it back to me… If you wanna have a look?”

            I nodded. I wanted to see this. I wanted to see her again.

            There was the photo with the cigarette. There were several of me. There were a few of the fifth graders on her cabin, and a few of herself but… something was… off about them… I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

            “They had to revert the photos back to color,” O’Malley said, as if he were reading my mind.

            “Oh,” I muttered.

            No more Katja.

            No more sepia.

            Seemed kind of sensible, really.

            Nothing ever lasts.

            I thought about that for a moment. I thought about the few interactions we had. I mean… I didn’t even know her all that well. There were kids back home who I knew better. Back home I had parents… friends… people who I knew better and probably cared for more than I had ever cared for her.

            And yet… this meant something different.

            There is something odd about losing someone you barely know. Especially when it’s a person you wish you knew better…

            You just get this… terrible pain and longing to go back to a time when that was possible.

 

O’Malley never asked for the camera back so I just kind of kept it. I changed all the photos back to sepia because I knew that’s how she would want them and then and then I attempted to sleep. It was only noon but… I think sleep was the only way I knew how to get through that day.

 

Later…

I saw Katja in the hospital the next day. Her parents had flown down to be with her but for the most part, they stayed away. They didn’t want to see their daughter like this. Volker and O’Malley were both complete train wrecks.           

            I was the only one holding it together here.

            I felt kind of bad about that.

            “Are you family?” a nurse asked, raising an eyebrow when I attempted to enter her room.

            “Uh… yeah,” I nodded, lying. “I’m her brother.”

            The nurse nodded, smiling at me sadly. She patted my arm. “Go on in.”

            I saw her then, lying in bed, completely still and silent. She looked dead. She wasn’t even breathing on her own.

            “Hey,” O’Malley said, waving as I entered. “You came.”

            I glanced around the room. Volker was holding her hand. O’Malley standing beside her, looking sullen. And then there was me. The newbie. I was out of place here but… I needed this.

            I needed closure.

            For my own sake.

            I looked down at her and grabbed my camera.

            “One final picture,” I said, smiling.

            I set up the camera at the foot of her bed and snapped her photo, immediately setting it to sepia.

            “How does it look, James?” Volker asked.

            I showed him the photo.

            “She would like that,” O’Malley said. “It’s… interesting. Kind of… emotional. Real, you know?”

            I nodded. I knew exactly what he meant.

            I was ready to go now. Slowly, I trudged over to the doorway, tossing one more glance over my shoulder.

            I could see her. I could remember her.

            I would miss her.

            I think that might be my “thing”. I think I might have trouble with change. In fact, I knew it.

            Because I couldn’t leave that room. In that last second when I looked at her, I raced to her bedside and in that instant, I cracked.

            I sobbed. I cried.

I barely knew her.

            But I couldn’t let her go.

            And so ends out 5 days in sepia.            

             

 

 

           

           

 

Author's Note

Kind of outdated. Wrote this about six months back. Hope you like it anyway. Please ignore simple grammatical mistakes, as this was only a 1st draft.