The-Lucky-List-Rachael-Lippincott

25
The next forty-eight hours pass in an absolute blur.
From kayaking, to unsuccessfully scavenging for a four-leaf clover, to flinging myself o a rope
swing into the water, I barely stop moving. And Matt is alongside me the whole weekend, Kiera
pushing us closer and closer together every time we move even a foot apart.
It’s slowly starting to feel like how things used to be.
“Do a flip!” I call to him as he soars on the rope swing.
“Race you to the dining hall?” he asks, pushing me into the water before we go laughing up the path
back to Huckabee Lodge.
And slowly but surely, the rest of the group begins to find a new rhythm, even with Olivia and half
the students glaring at me during mealtimes and activities and in the taxidermy-filled Henry Huckabee
Lodge hallway.
I try to keep a distance from Blake and our shared room, but she always finds her way into whatever
we’re doing, even though she’s already made friends with just about everyone else in our grade too.
It’s a welcome relief when I find myself peacefully floating atop a donut-shaped pool float on
Huckabee Lake, my legs still sore from a hike Kiera led us on before lunch.
I raise my head, flipping my sunglasses up and squinting against the bright aernoon sun at the
glittering water, the circle of trees around the perimeter, and Henry Huckabee Lodge peeking through
the branches. I scan the throngs of students, taking a quick inventory. Kiera is a few feet away from me
in an oversize inner tube, Blake is lounging on the dock with a sketchbook, and Matt, Jake, and Ryan
have convinced half the boys on the trip to launch themselves o said dock in a very intense belly-flop
competition. I can see their fire-engine-red arms and legs from here.
I grimace, watching as Jake slaps the water flat as a pancake, my skin burning as the boys cheer like
he just scored a game-winning touchdown.
I slide my sunglasses back on and go to shi farther up in my donut float, but the plastic screeches
noisily and as it wobbles past vertical, it tips sharply.
“Shit!” I squeak out as I flip backward o it into the lake, my mouth and nose filling with bacteriaridden
water as I claw my way back to the surface, pushing through the murkiness.
Coughing, I’m about to chalk this up to a bit of bad luck when I feel something lightly tap my