Topsy-Turvy #24
Topsy-Turvy #24
Morgan, Melissa J.
PENGUIN group (2010)
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Table of Contents
Copyright Page
Title Page
Chapter ONE
Chapter TWO
Chapter THREE
Chapter FOUR
Chapter FIVE
Chapter SIX
Chapter SEVEN
Chapter EIGHT
Chapter NINE
Chapter TEN
Chapter ELEVEN
Chapter TWELVE
Chapter THIRTEEN
Chapter FOURTEEN
Teaser chapter
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Chapter ONE
“Wow,” Tricia said with a sigh, leaning back in her chair as she chewed. “You know what I love about bacon, chicas?” She lifted a crackling new strip to her mouth and bit off the end with a loud crunch. “Everything.”
Jenna glanced up from her own breakfast, casting a little secret smile over at Natalie. Sometimes it was a little weird having Tricia, the actual First Daughter, as in the president’s daughter, right there in their tent at camp. But more often, it was just laugh-out-loud funny. Tricia’s wacky behavior had been a little hard to take at first, but she was definitely growing on all the girls in the bunk.
“Bacon is pretty awesome,” Jenna agreed, finishing up her last piece. “Even the sound it makes cooking sounds like applause. Sssssssss.”
Everyone chuckled except Avery, who was supposed to be at home helping her stepmother with her new baby. “You didn’t come up with that. You stole that from that comedian, what’shisname—on Comedy Central.” Avery claimed her stepmother sent her back to camp halfway through the summer on the grounds that she was being too helpful. But Jenna could only wonder if the real reason behind Avery’s return was that she missed having people around to snark at.
Jenna shrugged. “Actually, I stole it from David,” she said innocently, gesturing across the mess hall at her good-friend-once-boyfriend, who was sitting with his bunk. “But I wouldn’t put it past him to steal a joke. He has no scruples when it comes to comedy.”
David caught her eye right at that moment, and gave her a suspicious look—wondering, no doubt, why she was pointing him out to her entire bunk. Jenna just smiled and waved. In response, David shot her an exaggerated glare, then held out his hands with the palms facing up, bouncing them back and forth like he was playing with a Slinky. Then he leaned down to the floor, gesturing like he was pushing something in her direction.
“What’s that?” Sarah asked, furrowing her brows.
Jenna sighed. “It’s David’s way of letting me know I’m in for it. He calls it the Death Slinky. It’s coming to kill me or something.”
Everyone looked kind of puzzled, but Sarah laughed. “Yeah, that sounds like him,” she agreed, happily turning back to her eggs. A waaaayyyy long time ago, before Jenna and David had ever gotten together, Sarah had gone out with him. But that was all ancient history now. Jenna and David had been “just friends” for years.
Jenna turned back to her plate, but she was distracted by Nat, who was giving her a suspicious glance over her orange juice. “What?” Jenna asked.
Nat gestured to David. “You guys have been spending a lot of time together lately.”
Jenna swallowed. “Well, David and I have been spending a lot of time trying to figure out the thing,” she said, clearing her throat in case Nat didn’t hear her emphasis. “You know. The . . .”
“. . . Strategy for Color War?” Sloan asked brightly, winking in Jenna’s direction.
“Exactly,” Jenna agreed with a relieved smile. “You know, we want to make sure our team totally kicks butt.” She bit her lip, glancing nervously at Jasmine, their counselor. “I mean, wins big. You know. Totally nonviolently.”
Jasmine just laughed, shaking her head. Jenna felt a rush of relief. Actually, what she and David had spent so much time talking about had nothing to do with kicking butt at Color War, or anything camp-sanctioned. They had been talking about what Jenna could possibly pull off as her next prank. For all the years Jenna and her friends had been coming to camp together, Jenna had always come up with amazing, elaborate, sometimes punishment-earning pranks. There was the sugar in the saltshakers prank, the fire-engine red hair prank . . . and so many more, really, that Jenna was almost intimidated by her own success. How could she pull off a prank this summer that would really stand out among all of her greatest hits? It was almost impossible to think of something. What Jenna and David had been talking about most recently—after campfire the night before—was that Jenna probably needed some kind of outside assistance to really up the ante. Like if they could get a cool, laid-back counselor in on their scheme. If was right. Her chances of getting help from anyone in a position of power were pretty unlikely.
“Hey, check out Dr. Steve,” Brynn said, shaking Jenna out of her prank-related trance. “What do you think he’s up to?”
Jenna followed Brynn’s gaze over to the head of Camp Walla Walla, who was striding up to the podium at the head of the mess hall. When she spotted him, Jenna had to rub her eyes. Was he really—no, he couldn’t be.
“Is he wearing pajamas?” Priya gasped, covering her mouth to stifle a giggle.
“Oh my gosh,” whispered Avery. “This is just like a nightmare I had last week.”
“Do you think he realizes it?” hissed Tricia. “This one time, I almost wore my whitening strips to a photo op on the White House lawn. It was only when my mom’s secretary pointed it out that I realized I still had them on my teeth!”
“Thank goodness you have assistants,” Avery muttered under her breath, not entirely kindly.
“Yeah, thank goodness,” Tricia agreed cheerfully, taking another bite of bacon with a sigh. “Ohhhh, last piece.”
Jenna grinned as Dr. Steve tapped the mi
ke two times. “Is this thing on?” he asked with a goofy grin, as the campers quickly quieted down. They were all dying to hear his explanation for wearing pj’s to breakfast.
“Campers,” he continued, “I know you’re all eager to get to your morning activities, so I’ll keep this brief. Do you notice anything different about me today?”
Laughter spread around the room, reaching near-deafening levels within seconds. “You’re wearing your pj’s!” squealed one of the youngest campers, a little blond girl with French braids.
“That’s right, April!” Dr. Steve said cheerfully. “And what’s strange about that?”
April started giggling. In fact, she was giggling so hard, Jenna wasn’t sure she’d be able to get the words out. “You’re not in bed, silly! You’re at breakfast.”
Dr. Steve smiled. “That’s right,” he agreed. “You might even say I’m wearing the . . . opposite of what I should be wearing.”
Jenna and her friends glanced at one another. “Where’s he going with this?” said Priya under her breath.
“And I’m wearing my pj’s,” Dr. Steve went on, “to announce that tomorrow will be the first official Opposite Day in Camp Walla Walla’s history!”
“Opposite Day?” Jenna repeated. She’d been coming to camp—first Lakeview and now Walla Walla—for longer than she could remember, and neither camp had ever done anything like this before.
“Opposite Day will be a new Camp Walla Walla tradition,” Dr. Steve explained. “On Opposite Day, everything will be upside down and the opposite of normal! We’ll wear our pajamas all day long. We’ll have dinner for breakfast. We’ll have campfire first thing in the morning. And most exciting . . .”
He paused. The room quieted down instantly, everyone holding their breath to see what the most exciting element would be.
“. . . For the first and only time, campers will be in charge, and the camp staff and counselors will have to do what you tell us!” The mess hall erupted into cheers, but Jenna heard Dr. Steve lean into the microphone and add, “Within reason, of course.”
“Oh, wow,” Jenna breathed, instinctively looking over at David, who was staring at her with the same goggle-eyed expression she was sure she wore. “This is perfect!” she mouthed at him.
“Prank to End All Pranks!” David mouthed back.
“There’s just one catch,” Dr. Steve continued. “There are many more of you than there are of us, as you know.”
“Tell me about it,” whispered Jasmine, looking less than thrilled about this new development.
“And we need to keep some semblance of order around here,” Dr. Steve added. “Which means we need some way to choose one bunk to be in charge! Which means . . . campwide talent show tonight!”
Jenna pulled her eyes away from David and looked around at her bunkmates. This was her big chance . . . if their bunk was in charge of the rest of the camp tomorrow, she could be responsible for pulling off the biggest prank in history!
Jenna put on her best We’ve-Got-This expression, but to her surprise, her bunkmates looked less than enthused. Avery looked flat-out bored, but then she often looked that way. Nat looked skeptical. And Tricia was still having some serious one-on-one time with her bacon.
“We can totally do this,” Jenna put in, trying to work up a response from her friends.
“I dunno,” Avery said with a shrug. “It’s kind of . . . kid stuff, isn’t it?”
Nat wrinkled her nose. “Kind of,” she agreed. “I mean, pancakes for dinner, whatever, you know?”
“And what do we get to do if we win?” Sloan added. “We could boss the other bunks around, I guess—but so what?”
Jenna felt her eyes bugging out of her head. “Guys,” she insisted. “It would be awesome. Trust me.”
Brynn glanced over at Jenna, and she could tell that Brynn sensed something was up. “Maybe we can talk about it on the way to the lake,” Brynn suggested, quickly looking over at Jasmine and Jamie, their counselor and CIT. Jenna nodded, relieved. At least Brynn got it: Jenna had ideas here, big ideas, too big to be discussed in the presence of counselors.
“You’ll have a couple hours this afternoon to prepare an act,” Dr. Steve went on. “Tonight, you’ll all draw straws to determine the order of the performances, and the best act will win the chance to rule the camp tomorrow!”
Dr. Steve may have given a few more details, but Jenna was no longer paying attention. She leaped out of her seat and quickly gathered her things, shooting a meaningful look at Brynn, and anyone else who would meet her eye. Within a few minutes, she was outside the mess hall, walking toward the lake. Brynn and the rest of the bunk quickly caught up.
“Okay,” Jenna whispered, looking behind her to make sure the counselors were out of earshot. “First things first. We have to win tonight. If we win the chance to rule the camp tomorrow, that will give me a chance to pull off an amazing prank! Like, legendary!”
Avery sighed. “Jenna, don’t you think you’re a little old for pranks?”
Jenna turned to her, shocked, but Sarah jumped in before things could get ugly. “Um—pranks are fun for all ages!” she insisted, looking from Avery to Jenna. Sarah had spent a summer at camp with Avery before Jenna and her friends from Camp Lakeview had started coming there, so she had gotten pretty skilled at smoothing over Avery’s snarkiness.
“Look at that old Ashton Kutcher show, Punk’d. People loved watching that—and not just kids.”
“Omigod, you are so right!” cried Tricia suddenly, her voice carrying through the woods. “I love pranks! Sometimes I like to play little tricks on my secret service guys. Like, I’ll try to hide from them and stuff, and see how long I can go before they find me.” She paused. “They don’t like that too much.”
Avery sighed. “I guess we can still pull pranks,” she muttered, shrugging her shoulders. “But, anyway, even if we want to win this thing, it’s not guaranteed. We still need a great act.”
Brynn smiled, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Leave that to me,” she said confidently. Brynn was the bunk’s resident actress—she had even acted as an extra in a major Hollywood movie last fall—and Jenna had no doubt that her dramatic flair would lead them to an awesome, victory-ensuring act.
“Perfect,” said Jenna. “Everyone think about it this morning, and we’ll share ideas at our meeting this afternoon. This is so exciting! I mean, if I were in charge, I could . . .” She trailed off, thinking over the possibilities in her mind. Rearranging the buildings. (Well, okay, that would require major construction and possibly magic.) Stealing all the underwear at camp. (Highly entertaining, but perhaps not practical.) Planting blue dye in the shower heads, so everyone came out looking like a smurf. (That was a keeper.) Or . . .
“Oh my gosh!” Jenna shouted suddenly, as a vision of the Prank to End All Pranks took shape in her mind. “This could be my ticket into the Guinness Book of World Records!”
“What could be your ticket?” asked Jamie with a chuckle, suddenly stepping up behind them. “Why are you guys in such a hurry today? I’ve never seen kids so anxious to canoe in my life.”
Jenna turned to her counselor. “Um . . . eating hot dogs,” she replied, blurting out the first thing that came to mind. “I could eat, like, a ton of hot dogs tonight. But you know what, I hate hot dogs. So never mind.”
She slipped away to the lake, leaving Jamie looking confused.
“Nice save,” Brynn giggled, catching up to Jenna. “Totally smooth.”
Jenna turned to her friend. “Oh my gosh, Brynn. I’m serious about this. We have to make this happen. We have to win that show tonight.”
Brynn just smiled, blew on her nails, and pretended to polish them on the shoulder of her shirt. “No worries, Jenna,” she said simply. “We’ve got it in the bag.”
Chapter TWO
“Oh, cool!” cried Jenna when she saw Priya step inside the tent. “That means everyone’s here. Come here, Pree. I’m about to explain my plans to . . .” She looked
quickly right and left, like she was afraid of being observed.
“Nobody’s coming,” Priya assured her. “Jasmine and Jamie are outside writing letters. I think we’re safe.”
Jenna nodded slowly. “The walls have ears,” she murmured, which Priya thought was a supremely weird thing to say. Still, she ran over to hear Jenna’s plans.
“All right,” Jenna announced. “You guys, I think I could be onto something big here. Really big. Like history-making, legendary, getting-my-own-reality-show big.”
Nat looked skeptical. “What are you talking about?” she asked.
Jenna looked around again, then moved closer to the group, gesturing to everyone to close ranks and move in closer.
“I have an idea,” she said slowly, looking around at everyone’s faces, “for the biggest water-balloon fight in history.”
Priya looked around at her friends. For a few seconds, nobody said anything. Jenna looked confused, like she didn’t get why they weren’t freaking out and jumping up and down.
“Water balloons?” asked Avery, wrinkling her nose like she’d smelled something bad. “That’s it?”
“What do you mean, that’s it?” Jenna asked, looking sincerely confused. “Water balloons are awesome!”
Priya bit her lip, feeling awkward. She knew Jenna thought water balloons were awesome—Jenna thought anything prank-related was awesome. And when she was in the midst of planning a good prank, Jenna could be a little . . . well . . . bossy. Priya never minded, but she knew a lot of her tentmates were tired of it.
Sarah glanced a little nervously from Avery to Jenna. “I think it could be cool,” she said in a tentative voice. “Tell us more, Jenna.”
Jenna nodded. “Well, David and I have had a couple of secret meetings today to work this out. At first, we had hoped to get into the Guinness Book of World Records, but when we saw how many balloons it would take to break the record . . . well, it seemed pretty impossible.” Everyone laughed.