Chapter 11 - Oh, what caffeine can do...
Grandview Gas ‘n’ Go was the name of the truck stop that was located just outside the little town of Pasha. It was a place for fuel as the truckers headed through to the city, or to by pass it to get to smaller towns... and a place where a good hot meal was always ready to be served up.
The little eating establishment was nearly empty, only two truck drivers were at the main counter, watching a sporting event on the television. The owner, a nearly bald man in stained apron was watching with the two. They seemed to be totally engrossed in the game that was on, swearing away almost in unison as it seemed the team they were cheering for was not quite doing good at the moment.
As the three cheered away, the only others in the place was three young women from the Summer camp down the road had came in. They had quietly set themselves down, after ordering up some coffees from the man who then seemed overly irritated to be bothered while the game was on.
Mandy sat next to Sunny in a booth next to the window, her dark skinned friend named Karen who also worked at Pawa, sat across from them. Each had a steaming cup of coffee in front of them and they were engaging in small talk as they sipped away. Dispite the heat that the day had held, it seemed to please each woman to have this quiet time with the hot beverage... but there was this hanging feeling of tension between them.
Karen was talked away, explaining about a fire that had happened when she was working in the kitchen of Pawa. By the sounds of it for both Sunny and Mandy, this fire was almost one to be worried about.
“ I’d say that there was a whole lot of excitement goin’ on in there...” Commented Sunny, as the woman had finally stopped talking.
“ It was... just one of those damned things, ya know...” She smirked, placing her cup back down. “ I have been one of the cooks at Pawa for three straight summers now, and every single year there has been a grease fire or something that ended up exploding at some point.”
“ Perhaps all of these things happening is sort of like firing up the Olympic torch... maybe it the place symbolizing it’s opening.” Said Sunny dryly. “ Almost as if it’s announcing that it is ready for the summertime.”
Karen laughed and made a funny face at the woman who had made the wisecrack.
“ Only you would end up thinking up something like that...” She said back.
“ Why Karen... Thank you for those kind words...” Smirked Sunny playfully, looking at Mandy who had loudly exploded into laugher as she listened to the repartee of the two women.
The dark skinned woman gazed over at Mandy for a moment, then shifted her gaze back at Sunny. Karen’s way of looking at her was a unusual look, one that had made Mandy stop her laughing and to stare at the lady.
“ Don’t worry... I was just was noticing just what it was that Sunny was saying about your laugh...” She smiled. “ I see why it struck her like it did, it is full and honest.”
Mandy was stunned by the words. She regarded the woman for a moment, curious to why Sunny had said something like that.
“ Pardon?” She asked.
“ I think I have said way too much...” Said Karen, smiling sheepishly and looking over at Sunny.
“ Said too much? About what?” Mandy asked.
Karen took a nervous look over at Sunny for a second while Mandy waited for someone to answer. It seemed like the two women were communicating back and forth without saying a word between them. Mandy waited, listening to the two’s silence.
After a very uncomfortable few seconds, Karen sat back into her side of the booth’s seat and lifted one palm up..
“ I ain’t saying a word for you... Sunny, the floor is yours...you might want to take this time to explain things...” The woman said flatly.
Sunny seemed to lightly blush as she took a deep breath. She ventured a slow look over at the very puzzled Mandy who was sitting there with some confusion in her eyes.
“ I was telling her about you and your great sense of humor I could see when we met this morning... and how I liked it.” She said, almost meek-like.
“ You liked my sense of humor?” The small framed woman said, shocked at the revelation that had just fell out of nowhere.
“ I don’t normally find myself noticing these type of things of people right off the bat like this...” She said, almost as if she was being shy about it. “ It was like...” Her voice trailed off from there.
Mandy blushed and looked down, her shyness appearing quickly as her mind spun. Karen giggled and shook her head, seeing the girl acting shy
“ Perhaps I need to explain after all...” She said “ It was all about you that she could not stop talking about after she met me this morning... The sense of humor that you had and the way you seemed to be and everything like that... it had a marked impression on Sunny here” The Ebony skinned lady said, with a gleeful tone. “ How you have so totally giggled at us, I can see why it leaped out at her like it did....”
Sunny seemed to take a long breath, as she looked at the young councilor next to her. She seemed almost flushed, nervous and even seemed to be trembling at this point.
“ I hope that this won’t end up scaring you right off, Mandy... I am usually quite a blunt person to begin with... But I find myself not being able to be as direct as I usually am... ” She said, her voice having a very prominent waver in it. “ I am so very attracted to you, and I have to say that it was right off the bat.” She smirked a little. “ I hope this don’t make you feel weird, but I felt something with you right off and I wanted to say it right off when you finally sat down with me in the smoking area.”
“ She was afraid to say anything all night long about how she was feeling... because she did not want to make you go running off scared because of what she was feelin’ about you so quickly.. Being so direct about it, is her trait though, and she has scared people off with int in the past...” Karen came in with, snickering a little as she spoke. “ She really likes you, that si what I’m sayin’!”
“ Sunny’s is gay?” Said Mandy, figuring out what this was all about... then she seemed to be so relieved about it. “ Oh, Man...”
Sunny stiffened a little, as she saw the look on that came on to Mandy’s face. She saw the change in the behavior of the long haired young woman, one that seemed to be of a calming down of sorts.
“ You knew I was gay all along?” She asked, blinking rapidly as she looked at Mandy. “ I never even said that I was... I am normally quite up front about it...”
The long haired girl shook her head, giggling a little.
“ No I did not know that you were gay... until right now...” She giggled, then sighed. “ It was more along the lines of ‘I was hoping that you might have been gay’. That might be a better way of putting it...” Said Mandy, her voice now was much calmer. “ Now that I know... it makes me feel happy.”
“ This is confusing as hell right now...” Said Sunny, still not completely understanding the relief shown by the young lady.
Mandy could not help but blurt out another little sputtering giggle before nodding her head to the stunned lady beside her.
“ I was worried that you would still be totally weirded out because you knew already that I was gay....” She explained, laughing as she explained her relief. “ I was feeling attracted to you as well... more than I probably knew even to myself...”
“ I did not know if I should have said that I was gay...” Sunny said. “ Normally, I do speak up and say it...”
“ Trust me, she does.” Interjected Karen.
“ But with you automatically, something had stopped me from doing it, even though my attraction to you was so instantaneous.” Continued Sunny, bypassing her friends comment.
What the woman had explained, made sense to Mandy, for it had been something like that for her also. She felt herself now feeling more comfortable with each moment that now went by.
“ You seemed a little uneasy when I had explained about my ex, when you had noticed it... and I was completely surprised by the fat that I had felt such an attraction to you so immediately.” She explained. “ I still go under the thought of most people are not gay, even when I am... I guess.”
“ Oh... WOW.” Said Sunny, her bright smile beaming out as she seemed to relax all at once.
The dark skinned woman rolled her eyes and seemed to be just ready to burst out in a huge fir of laughter. Sunny and Mandy looked at her, waiting to see if the woman was going to laugh.
“ Goddamned!! If this don’t that beat all...” Karen said in a drawl, finally laughing at the parallels between the two being so hesitant to say anything about it.. “ We got ourselves a fully out in the open dyke-love-fest here at the ol’ Grandview tonight..”
Mandy nodded, then turned to look across the table.
“ Your gay too?” She asked the darker girl.
“ Me... Nahhh, I’m not gay here...” She drawled, then smirked “ I am as straight as an arrow... but I have known Sunny for years, hence my understanding of the whole lesbian thing...” She winked. “ I just know my friend here a little too much at times, more than perhaps I need to ...”
“ Plain ol’ nosy is what I’d be calling it, girl...” Smirked Sunny, looking at her friend.
“ Wanting to be fully informed... is what I’d be callin’ it.” Quipped back the woman, giggling.
Sunny reached over and put her hand on Mandy’s hand that rested on the table. She gazed at the girl and gave a much easier smile than she had been all night long. Taking a moment, she seemed to be collecting her thoughts.
“ Can we start whatever this is over again?” She asked calmly, with a refreshingly broad smile on her face. “ We sort have gotten off on a nervous tract here.”
“ We can...” Smiled, looking at the woman beautiful blue eyes. “ That would be nice...”
“ Well... I kind of like you...” She said, in a playful kid-like voice. “ Like, I really do...”
“ Guess I do too...” Said Mandy, also in a very small voice as she reflexively griped the hand that was on her’s.
“ Oh, goody!” Sunny squeaked with a high voice.
Karen shook her head at the playful women sitting across from her.
“ Gheesh!!” She gasped.
“ What the hell?” Asked Sunny, not really knowing why the lady had gasped like that.
“ This is more sickening sweet than seeing two teens in love for the first time talking...” She said. “ Anyone got a toothbrush... I feel my teeth rotting.”
“ Your pretty much a very warped individual, aren’t you?” Piped in Mandy, with a smirk.
The dark skinned woman raised her eyebrows and shook her head. She looked at the two for a moment and seemed to start to laugh at the younger gal.
“ Mandy, You are just like Sunny... which is scary in itself...” She said holding back her laughter. “ I am in deep trouble now with two of you, if you two hook up.”
“ Could be fun to drive you completely nuts.” Smirked Sunny. “ We can go for insane, ya know.”
“ God help me...” Groaned the ebony skinned woman, through the laugher that seemed to pour out of her.
For the next ninety minutes or so, the three women sat and drank coffee while ignoring the men at the counter. With the over- nervousness and awkwardness gone finally, they settled into to getting to know one another.
******
The Honda Sunny drove turned into the access road that led into Camp Pawa at just after twelve thirty. The evening had gone better than anyone had hoped it to have. Mandy sat in the back seat of the car, looking at the driver from her vantage point, a smile a mile wide could not be his by the darkness.
The long haired young woman snickered lowly in her chest, knowing that once she had told Olivia of this little turn of events... she might have a ‘ I told ya so...’ To give her. Mandy giggled, the woman was right... again.
As they rounded the dusty turn that would lead the car towards the admin building and the parking lot, they were met by a blinding array of flashing lights and a whole hoard of people that were mulling about in the courtyard in front of the main buildings. It was a scene, that they all could not believe was there
“ What the hell...” Said Sunny, as she noticed it all first and slowed the car to a crawl.
“ Police cars?” Said Mandy, a little taken back by what she was seeing.
They could see six police cars stopped in front of the administration building, their top lights still flashing wildly. There were many officers gathered around the front of one of the police’s cars, and there were other people also collected around who seemed to be carrying flashlights and hand held camp-lamps.
“ Doesn’t seem to be a fire or anything...” Karen speculated as she looked at the collection of people.
“ Then why are the cops here?” Muttered Sunny.
“ Somebody got hurt while we were gone?” Karen speculated again.
“ I see no ambulances yet...” Came in Mandy.
“ We better find out what the hell is goin’ on here...” The driver said, eyeing the scene.
Reggie, one of the senior male councilors at camp hurried up to the car.
“ Sunny... thank god your back here...” He said. “ We got a missing girl, and she is from your cabin...”
“ Which one of my girls is missing?” She gasped.
“ Tabitha Gambit...” The broad shouldered man said with a rushed voice. “ Your other councilor that was in charge, Beverly, said that Tabitha had gone to the bathroom just before eleven, and no one has seen her since.”
“ Maybe she took a walk before going back?” Karen said, leaning over to listen to the conversation.
“ That is what they thought at first, but they found a pool of fresh blood in front of the bathroom doors on the outside...” The man informed.
“ Fresh blood?” Said a horrified Sunny.
“ Beverly had gone to search with another councilor she saw outside, and they found the blood...” Reggie told Sunny, while the others in the car listened in “ Because of finding that, Miss Ashfield called in the police, and they are now getting a search team up to comb the campgrounds.”
“ They think Tabitha might be hurt or something?” Mandy asked from the back seat.
“ After finding that blood.... they are assuming the worst right now...” Reggie added. “ Some are looking after the campers... most of whom are scared because they know about it, but we need more searchers.
The girl in the driver seat seemed to force herself to calm down, a task that would never be easy at this point. She looked at the man at her window and nodded.
“ I’ll park and join...” Sunny said frantically.
“ Hurry, the cops are organizing it right now.” Racing off to join the clutch of people at the officers’s cars.
After quickly parking, the three councilor women hurried to join up with the officers and the councilors that had gathered to search. .As they neared, they came across one very worried looking Miss Ashfield who was standing beside an equally upset Olivia.
“ We are joining up with the team...” Said Sunny. “ We just came back from having coffee, Ma’am.”
“ We are on the way...” Mandy said also.
The woman looked at the newly arrived three, and seemed to register that they were there all at once.
“ After you have completed the search with the officers... please come to my office... Sunny and Mandy.” Said the woman flatly.
“ Your office?” Questioned Sunny, seeming torn between wanting to know what was going on there, and to search for her missing camper.
Mandy looked at Alexis with a concerned look, as did Sunny. In the midst of all of this, neither young lady was sure of why the woman had asked such a thing from them.
The woman saw this looks she was getting and softened her face a little.
“ Neither one of you are in any trouble here... we need to talk over a matter of great importance about Camp Pawa....” Bluntly said the woman.
“ Talk... about what?” Mandy expressed loudly.
“ It could be really nothing....” Started the woman with her voice back to being flat and in charge. “... Or it might be something...”
“ Something?” Mandy repeated, after hearing it.
The woman took a long pause to look at the smaller woman, as Olivia left to join up with the search party. Alexis face seemed to softened again, but the air of authority she always exuded, never once left her.
“What we need to talk about needs to wait... just go and help look for this girl.” She explained. “ Both you and Sunny.”
Mandy nodded and hurried as Sunny and Karen rushed off also. She was not sure of what that all might have been about, but they had more pressing business than to be wondering about what that might all be about... there was a young girl missing around camp, and they needed to find her as fast as they could.
Her mind flashed to her own attack, now many years passed, and was already hoping that history was not repeating itself. Her stomach was rolling, as if her instincts were telling her to be ready for something big.
She joined up with the others, as the police were verbally planning out how to search the expanse of Pawa. It seemed that this was going to be one long night.