Patiently Alice by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor Page A

course, was shriek and duck down under the water, swimming a little downriver to pretend we weren’t there, which was ridiculous. And then they were in the water, all their clothes on the bank, and after we got over being semi-embarrassed and silly, we just swam around and talked, and it seemed to me we were pretty grown-up, Gerald included.
    “Was that your boyfriend or your brother I saw you with this afternoon?” Craig asked me.
    “My brother. Les. My dad’s wedding’s been postponed because my new mom’s sister is sick,” I explained.
    “Tough luck,” said Craig.
    “I’m going to feel so much better when they’re finally married,” I told him. “Dad’s been waiting a long time.”
    “Yeah, sure,” I heard Joe murmur, and the others laughed.
    I didn’t say any more about Dad and Sylvia. I didn’t want people guessing about their private lives when they didn’t even know them. So I just dog-paddled around, thinking how strange and exciting it felt to be swimming at night. The sky was cloudy, though, and we couldn’t see much of anything except a ball of white somewhere back on the bank, which I realized, finally, was our ball of underwear in the fork of the tree.
    Both Elizabeth and Pamela were swimming around Ross like sharks, I thought. Gwen and Joe were nuzzling off by themselves, G. E. was talking with Doris, who was sitting on an overturned canoe, and the rest of us were just floating about, enjoying a free swim without the little kids.
    As I watched Gwen and Joe, though, who were now kissing, their lips and who knows what else locked together, I began to wonder if the directors of this camp knew what they were doing. We were running on hormones, everyone said, and here we were, away from home, totally naked, in the dark, and… Maybe they figured there was safety in numbers. G. E. slid into the water next.
    There was a sudden rustling in the bushes, the quick thud of feet, and suddenly, with a loud “Hi- yah !” Jack Harrigan did a cannonball in the river, splashing everyone within ten yards. He was the only one besides Elizabeth and Doris not naked. Maybe the directors did know what they were doing.
    “So how’s the fishing?” he asked, and his voice held a grin.
    “Not so good,” Andy joked. “The babes aren’t biting.”
    “Speak for yourself,” came Joe’s voice, and I heard Gwen laugh.
    “Maybe you’re using the wrong bait,” said Richard’s dad.
    “Hey, we’ve got a river, a breeze, a night, a moon…,” said Ross.
    “No moon,” said Andy.
    “Okay, skip the moon. But…”
    With the guys talking to Richard’s father, we girls felt it was safe to swim downstream, sneak out, and get our clothes. Doris had retrieved our bundle of underpants from the tree and brought them down to a row of bushes, then went back to get the rest of our pants and shirts. We climbed out, one after the other, and dressed.
    “Darn!” said Pamela. “Just when things were heating up.”
    “Ross kissed me!” Elizabeth whispered excitedly.
    “How could you tell who it was? It was dark,” said Pamela, and she didn’t sound pleased.
    “I think he was going around kissing everyone,” I said, trying to defuse a potential quarrel. “Some-body touched me underwater.”
    “Probably Gerald,” said Elizabeth, to take me down a peg or two.
    “It’s going to be hard to go back home with Mom and Dad hovering around all the time, knowing where I am every living minute,” said Elizabeth, zipping up her jeans.
    “Everyone should be so lucky,” said Tommie.
    “Lucky how?”
    “Most of these kids don’t have anyone to hover.”
    “I guess so,” said Elizabeth. “Just the same, tonight was really fun.”
    “Till Richard’s dad showed up, anyway,” said Pamela. “I suppose Richard’s the establishment spy.”
    “I don’t think so,” I said. “He’s too nice.”
    “Then how else did his dad know to come swimming with us? Some body must have told him that the guys were swimming nude