Page 11 of Give Me a Sign
Our group is still digesting the news and too hungry to come up with any thoughts.
“Okay, Ethan will pass around your group assignments. Read through the children’s profiles to identify any dietary requirements and other needs. You have my cell, and Ethan’s, and each other’s. I’m used to good old-fashioned walkie-talkies, but for obvious reasons, phones are a better fit here for a variety of accommodated communication. Text or call me with any emergencies. Oh, and you have our lovely nurse’s number as well.”
“Yes. Hello, everyone!” the elderly, bubbly camp nurse says and signs. She’s sitting at the head of the table beside where Gary is standing. “I recognize many smiling faces. I’m excited to get to know you better when we have our first aid and CPR training.”
I’m surprised there’s finally a nurse with a working knowledge of ASL. Honestly, it should be a requirement for the job, but she is the first one as far as I know.
“Let’s eat!” Ethan says and signs. “After dinner, you’re free for the rest of the night.”
Mackenzie throws both hands into the air to start a round of sign language applause. “My, I just love this,” she says, and wiggles her fingers in the air in silent, overly enthusiastic celebration.
Ethan hands me a deck with the profiles of my campers. Since I’m a junior counselor, I’ve been paired with someone over eighteen—and of course, that happens to be the new staff member, Mackenzie... Yay, me.
While we eat dinner, the two counselors sitting beside me introduce themselves as Bobby and Simone respectively.
Bobby is a former camper with low vision. He’s got a splotch of sunscreen near one of his eyebrows. Still, his attempt to coat his pale complexion was unsuccessful. None of us spent that much time outdoors today, but the sunburn on Bobby’s face grows redder by the minute. His cane is folded up in the pouch of his backpack, presumably because he primarily uses it after dark. But from what I’ve already observed at dinner, despite hovering at least a foot taller than Simone, he likes to default to grabbing onto her arm when he needs a guide.
Bobby is the epitome of clashing colors in a purple shirt and orange shorts, but Simone has the athleisure look down, sporting the latest Old Navy line from head to toe. She’s Black and studying to work with blind and low-vision kids. She and Mackenzie are the only two counselors this summer without a hearing or vision loss.
“So I don’t know how I feel about having randoms wandering around camp,” Bobby says, taking a bite of his sandwich and letting most of the lettuce fall out onto his plate.
“Is this something we should tell parents up front?” Simone asks.
“I’m sure Gary’s on top of that. Gotta keep the children safe. What do you think, Lilah? As the resident child here,” Bobby jokes.
“Come on, I’m seventeen.” But I don’t take it too seriously. I’ve been amused by the banter between Simone and Bobby and am glad to be easily roped into the conversation.
“But not eighteen yet, so where’s the lie?” Bobby says. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“I don’t know... I mean, if people want to see what they’d be donating their money to, that should be fine, I guess.” But then I imagine a squad of four old dudes roaming around on a little golf cart like they’re on a paid safari, clicking away to take zoomed-in photos on their phones. “Okay, it has the potential to be weird.”
Simone agrees. “Yeah,” she tells Bobby. “It really depends.”
“Couldn’t there be another way to bring in the money?” I ask. “Online or something? I mean, seeing how out of date the website is, that’d be a technological challenge.”
“Yeah, this place is————,” Simone says.
“What was that?” I ask.
“This place is getting desperate for money,” she repeats, a bit louder. “Wages could use a lift. I almost had to take a different job this summer.”
“But she wouldn’t dare,” Bobby says, nudging Simone’s arm. He turns toward me. “This financial stuff is probably part of why Ethan didn’t get the promotion.” He pauses, nodding to where the others are sitting. “There aren’t any ears named Gary nearby, right? I’ll fill you in on our off-season drama since last summer.”
I look around. Our camp director and nurse have already cleared their places and are chatting near the door. “You’re good. What happened?”
“I don’t know if you were old enough to really know this the last time you were here, but we didn’t have an assistant director before. They made the position just for Ethan, rather than letting him be the director, ’cause they’d rather keep Gary around.”
“Couldn’t they have been co-directors?” I ask.
“My thought exactly...” Simone chimes in.
“Okay, but Lilah. Do you remember beeper baseball?” Bobby asks, diving into a tangent.
“Ouch,” I say. “How could I forget.” It’s a game obviously meant for the blind, but those of us who aren’t cover our eyes to play. Whoever is in the catcher position watches the pitch and uses a long stick to poke deaf batters to let them know when the ball is thrown. This camp is all about accessibility, which may sometimes be taken to slightly unreasonable levels in the name of a fun challenge.
“I’m gonna destroy everyone in a game tomorrow.” Bobby grins. “I brought plenty of bandanas.”
“I think it’s a little skewed in your favor, with a bunch of blindfolded Deafies in the outfield, but we’ll let you have this victory,” I say.
