Ward Z: Revelation Read Online Free

that you get the most out of your stay. Nothing gives us greater pleasure than to see your smiling faces each morning.”
    The man next to her – a slightly older gentleman with a pasty face and a comb-over – nodded an acknowledgment to the crowd.
    “Now before anyone hauls me over the coals,” Crystal continued, “I want to say that yes, I do know that this is the twenty-first century, and I also know that we're in good old Great Britain, and not somewhere out in the United States. Camps like this have much more of a tradition in America, but we're hoping to import the idea over here. After all, we can't let the Americans have a monopoly on enthusiasm and optimism, can we?” She took a deep breath. “I know some of you might also be a little cynical about the way this particular group has been brought together, so I just want to reassure you that nobody here at Camp Everbee is going to patronize you just because you're sick.”
    “God forbid,” Lizzie whispered, glancing at the girl next to her and hoping for a smile. No such luck.
    “The truth is,” Crystal added, “it's not just the campers here who have cancer. I can inform you that Dean and myself are also afflicted. That's why I set up the Camp Everbee experience several years ago. We wanted like-minded people to come together and share their experiences, while also having a common background.” She paused for a moment, with a hint of nervousness in her eyes. “I hope everyone will feel free to discuss their condition with their cabin-mates. If anyone doesn't want to go into detail about the type of cancer they have, perhaps because they like to keep things private or because the problem is in an intimate area, feel free to simply say that you'd rather not be specific. Myself, I have no trouble being truthful. I have breast cancer. Stage 3b, for those who would like to know.”
    She turned to Dean.
    “I'd rather not be specific about mine,” he said awkwardly.
    “Okay,” Crystal continued, forcing another smile. “Before you all go and get settled into your cabins, I think we should continue this introductory meeting by singing the official Camp Everbee anthem! Dean will hand out lyric sheets, and the words have been set to the tune of one of my personal favorite songs, Yellow River by the great Jeff Christie!”
    “Oh God,” Lizzie whispered, looking up at the clear blue sky. “Take me now.”
     
    ***
     
    “Leukemia,” the brown-headed girl said as she dropped her bag on the bunk and turned to Lizzie. “Hairy cell, actually. It's a subtype of chronic lymphcytic leukemia.”
    “Lizzie,” Lizzie replied, with a smile and a frown, as she reached out a hand. “Lizzie Miller.”
    “Oh, sorry,” the girl continued, shaking her hand, “I thought... Yeah, my name. Beth. Beth Bondell.”
    “Did you say hairy cell ?” asked the blonde girl who was unpacking over on the other side of the cabin. She'd spent the past few minutes arranging a huge selection of make-up products on the windowsill, and now she seemed to be putting them in a specific order. “Like, seriously? Hairy cell?”
    “It's the proper name for it,” Beth replied, turning to her. “It's because of how it looks under a microscope.”
    “I would not want anything called hairy cell ,” the girl said, scrunching her nose up. “It sounds gross.”
    “It's not gross,” Beth replied, a little defensively. “Honest, it just got that name because of how it looks down the microscope. You can look it up if you don't believe me.”
    “Oh, I believe you,” the blonde girl muttered, tipping another vast collection of cosmetics onto her bed. “I just think it's gross.”
    “Well I like the name,” Lizzie said. “I mean, it does sound gross, that's true, but at least it's better than most of the names they give these things.”
    “What do you have?” Beth asked.
    “Well,” Lizzie replied, “actually, I -”
    “That's so rude,” the blonde girl said as she began to line up