Wilderness Tips Read Online Free Page B

Donny in the ribs with his elbow. Does he know how much it hurts, is he rubbing it in?
Donny loves Ronette
. The ultimate grade six insult, to be accused of loving someone. Donny feels as if it’s he himself who’s been smeared with words, who’s had his face rubbed in them. He knows Monty will repeat this conversation to the other boys. He will say Darce has been porking Ronette. Right now Donny detests this word, with its conjuring of two heaving pigs, or two dead but animate uncooked Sunday roasts; although just yesterday he used it himself, and found it funny enough.
    He can hardly charge out of the bushes and punch Darce in the nose. Not only would he look ridiculous, he’d get flattened.
    He does the only thing he can think of. Next morning, when they’re breaking camp, he pinches Monty’s binoculars and sinks them in the lake.
    Monty guesses, and accuses him. Some sort of pride keeps Donny from denying it. Neither can he say why he did it. When they get back to the island there’s an unpleasant conversation with Mr. B. in the dining hall. Or not a conversation: Mr. B. talks, Donny is silent. He does not look at Mr. B. but at the pike’s head on the wall, with its goggling voyeur’s eye.
    The next time the mahogany inboard goes back into town, Donny is in it. His parents are not pleased.
    It’s the end of summer. The campers have already left, though some of the counsellors and all of the waitresses are still here. Tomorrow they’ll go down to the main dock, climb into the slow launch, thread their way among the pink islands, heading towards winter.
    It’s Joanne’s half-day off so she isn’t in the dining hall, washing the dishes with the others. She’s in the cabin, packing up. Her duffle bag is finished, propped like an enormous canvas wiener against her bed; now she’s doing her small suitcase. Her pay-cheque is already tucked inside: two hundred dollars, which is a lot of money.
    Ronette comes into the cabin, still in her uniform, shutting the screen door quietly behind her. She sits down on Joanne’s bed and lights a cigarette. Joanne is standing there with her folded-up flannelette pyjamas, alert: something’s going on. Lately, Ronette has returned to her previous taciturn self; her smiles have become rare. In the counsellors’ rec hall, Darce is again playing the field. He’s been circling around Hilary, who’s pretending – out of consideration for Ronette – not to notice. Maybe, now, Joanne will get to hear what caused the big split. So far Ronette has not said anything about it.
    Ronette looks up at Joanne, through her long yellow bangs. Looking up like that makes her seem younger, despite the red lipstick. “I’m in trouble,” she says.
    “What sort of trouble?” says Joanne. Ronette smiles sadly, blows out smoke. Now she looks old. “You know. Trouble.”
    “Oh,” says Joanne. She sits down beside Ronette, hugging the flannelette pyjamas. She feels cold. It must be Darce.
Caught in that sensual music
. Now he will have to marry her. Or something. “What’re you going to do?”
    “I don’t know,” says Ronette. “Don’t tell, okay? Don’t tell the others.”
    “Aren’t you going to tell
him?”
says Joanne. She can’t imagine doing that, herself. She can’t imagine any of it.
    “Tell who?” Ronette says.
    “Darce.”
    Ronette blows out more smoke. “Darce,” she says. “Mr. Chickenshit. It’s not
his.”
    Joanne is astounded, and relieved. But also annoyed with herself: what’s gone past her, what has she missed? “It’s not? Then whose is it?”
    But Ronette has apparently changed her mind about confiding. “That’s for me to know and you to find out,” she says, with a small attempt at a laugh.
    “Well,” says Joanne. Her hands are clammy, as if it’s her that’s in trouble. She wants to be helpful, but has no idea how. “Maybe you could – I don’t know.” She doesn’t know. An abortion? That is a dark and mysterious word, connected with the