Meteor Shower

An essay by Ellen Sowerbutts for her English class at school

The year is 2007, although it could have been almost any other. Three bulbs light the clustered wooden cabin, our home for the month.  It is night time, and the dim light makes the decorated walls feel even closer.  The ten of us are perched wherever there is space: on one of Rachel's twelve pieces of luggage, on the drum we found here on opening day, amongst the signatures on the floor, on someone's lap.

This cabin, Tavern (or TavTav as we call it) is the biggest, reserved for the oldest age group - Scotchpines.  We barely believe that it is our turn to live in TavTav, to keep our lights on until ten thirty, to have our age group all together in just one cabin. Tavern: we have waited so many years to see inside.  I have waited seven years.  The walls and floor hold secrets for a Scotchpine's eyes only, the eighty-year old cabin holds memories that only a Scotchpine can make.  We have waited a collective fifty years for it to be our signs on the trees surrounding TavTav and its bathroom, Can Opener.  They read "Scotchpines Only Beyond This Point," and, with the exception of staff members, not a soul disobeys them.

Our easy conversation is littered with a laughter and careful teasing that comes only from living together for a month over several years.  We may not know each other's phone numbers, or hometowns, but we know how to make each person smile with only a few words, we know how to make each laugh with only a quick twist of our expression.  We know each other so well; we are sisters.  

Underneath our green and white clad exterior we are all unique and different.  I don't think some of us would be friends if we'd met at school or elsewhere.  But here we have the same pine needles in our hair, the same dirt on our feet, the same pinecones around our necks.  We love camp and that makes us closer than anything.

I go to Can Opener, and when I return, I find everyone pulling on sweaters.  

"Come on," they say, "there's a meteor shower tonight.  We're going to the archery field."  We leave a note for Steph and Nail (our counselors) but plan to be back long before them, as what we are doing is forbidden.  I pull on my hoodie, and picking my way over scatterd belongings, join the eight girls waiting at the the door.

"Flashlight!" someone hisses, and Liz grabs one.  We turn off the light, and with a creak of the hinge and a muffled giggle, leave the cabin.

It's dark and cold, but luckily we all know every rock and root, every path.  Quietly we make our way past the darkened cabins at the end of the alley, whispers and giggles floating out to us through the screen windows.  Once past Music Box, the little light there was leaves us.  We are at the edge of camp, only forest to the right of us, and the distant bleat from farms beyond.  Past Wreck (a disused Scotchpine cabin), up a short slope, and we reach the archery field.  The trees clear, and above the relatively small field we have a perfect view of the sky.  The clearing is suffused in silvery light, and I can see the silhoueetes of my friends. 

"We forgot Tori!" someone whispers.

"She'll see our note," came the reply, "and she's not scared of the dark."

We lie down on the grass, a tangle of arms and legs.  Someone whispers and a "shhhhhh" spreads through the darkness. Presently Tori comes to join us and we are all together again.  Above me the sky is bruised, the stars like suspended silver confetti, all framed by the dark silhouettes of pine trees.

"It's beautiful."  I whisper, "I want to stay here forever."

"Shhhhh." Someone breathes in reply.

The wind sweeps over me and I flatten myself into the earth, now silent.  I am not cold.  I don't think I've ever been quite so content.  My sisters next to me, meteors falling across the sky, a peaceful silence in the air.  I'd never simply lain and looked at the stars before. I regret that.  After a while I can feel the curve of the earth beneath my back and we all begin to breathe as one.

Then: a flash of light, a footstep.  Quick count - ten, all of us are here. More footsteps. "Run," we hisss, and grabbing our belongings, we scatter.  We beat the earth until we are back in TavTav.  Into bed.  Silence except for a few muffled giggles.

"Shhhh!" But no one comes.  We let out our caged laughter, and make fun of each other's scared faces.

We're quiet once more.  A few whispered good nights fly around the cabin, and then we snuggle under our blankets. Liz, who dove into May's bed upon our return, falls asleep there.

I fall asleep listening to the beginning rumbles of Tori's snore, to the breathing of one very large family. I fall asleep smiling.