"It was in spring,

And spring became the summer,

Who would've thought you'd come along…"

I stepped out of the car and breathed in the mountain air. The sound of someone softly strumming a guitar and singing filled my ears. I looked around the crowd of other newly arrived kids with their parents, searching for familiar faces. There! Just a few feet away, that German kid, Ludwig. He was pretty intimidating, but once you talked to him he really wasn't all that bad. And over there! Sadiq, one of my best friends. He was Turkish, and had quite an attitude. We got off to a rocky start, but now we were really close. I saw the Hungarian girl, Elizaveta, and her close friend Bella, from Belgium. A French guy and notorious pervert, Francis, honhonhon-ed his way through the crowd, with his cohorts Gilbert the self-proclaimed Prussian (but in reality just as German as his brother Ludwig), and Antonio, the ever sunny Spaniard. I was greeted with a sleepy, "Hey, how's it going?" from Heracles, the sleep loving Greek. Once you woke him up, he was a pretty great guy. Actually, the only time he really seemed awake was around Sadiq, who he claimed he hated, but I begged to differ.

A hand clapped me on the shoulder; I spun around. It was just Matthew, my twin brother.

"Another year, huh? Glad to be back?" he asked.

"Heck yeah! This is gonna be the best summer ever! Life just isn't the same outside of camp."

At this point, I should probably introduce myself. I'm Alfred F. Jones, hero extraordinaire, and proud all-American. I live in the awesomest city (in my opinion) ever, New York City. I live with my dad, 'cause when I was 6 my parents divorced. My twin brother Mattie lives in Canada with my mom. I'm the loud one. Mattie's the quiet one. I play all kinds of sports, Hockey, Soccer, Football, video games; you name it. I am proud to say that I'm awesome in school, my best subject being math. I'm in love with the greatest edible invention of mankind…The Hamburger. And this was my final year of summer camp in the Adirondack Mountains.

I guess I should explain my camp. It's an international one, so we get kids from all over the world. Name a country, there's a kid from there here. So that's pretty cool. Camp lasts 7 weeks, and it's sleep away. That might seem like a long time, but time flies when you're having fun. Boys and girls have separate tent lines, which are also separated by year. There's first years, 11-12 year olds, second years, 12-13 year olds, and seniors, the oldest kids who are 13-15 years old. All my friends and I were seniors this year, and I, for one, was super pumped.

Everybody gets assigned a cabin, where you room with 3 other campers. No electronics at camp, and no candy. That part kind of sucked, but the kitchen staff, which did all the cooking stuff for us, were amazing bakers, and always had some sort of delicious dessert cooking.

I figured that I'd check in with my counselors, and find out who I was bunking with. Dad in tow, I dragged my duffel over to the camp director, Remus Vargas, who was directing people about. Remus was Italian, and related to twins at camp named Feliciano and Romano, who happened to be seniors as well. Those two were as different as…um…ketchup and mustard? Spiderman and the bad Anti-Spiderman? Heck I don't know. Feliciano was a total spazz, running around spreading affection even to those who clearly didn't want it. Romano on the other hand, was potty mouthed, grumpy, and ridiculously prejudiced against Germans, calling Ludwig a, "Potato sucking bastard" on a daily basis, much to his brother's dismay. But for some reason, Antonio had taken a strange shine to the kid. Whatever, I guess. So anyways, Mr. Vargas was a pretty chill dude.

"Hello, Alfred! Welcome back!" He said enthusiastically, pumping my hand up and down vigorously.

"Hey, Mr. Vargas, it's good to be back."

"Would you like to know your tent mates?" he asked.

"Yes please, sir!" Like I said, I was pumped.

"Hmm, let's see. It looks like you'll be in cabin…4. With Heracles Karpusi," mental "yes!" "Sadiq Adnan," mental "oh yeah this is gonna be good" "and Arthur Kirkland."

Wait…, "What? Arthur who?" Who was this Arthur kid?

"Oh yes, Arthur is a new camper from England, he'll be arriving a week or so late. I'm trusting you to make him feel welcome."

"You can count on me!" After all, it's a hero's duty to make people feel welcome.

My dad and I got my bag down to my cabin, and said our goodbyes. Sadiq and Heracles were already in there, and already fighting over who got to sleep where. Summer was about to begin.

"I TOLD YOU ALREADY, YOU BASTARD, THIS BED IS MINE!"

"Nuh-uh, cat-molester, I was here first, so it's mine!"

"Pervert!"

"Lazy ass!"

"Fucker!"

"Shit face!"

"You better move!"

"Or what? You'll fall asleep on me?"

"You'd better hope that's the least that happens!"

"That's stupid!"

"You're stupid!"

My god, this was the funniest thing I had seen in months! Two 15 year-old boys fighting over a sleeping space! And their insults! Like five year olds! (Although they did have remarkably dirty mouths.) I couldn't help it, I was laughing. I was laughing so hard I fell down, laughing so hard tears were streaming down my face. Heracles and Sadiq stopped in the middle of pulling each others hair to look over. Slowly, they realized how silly this all looked. They glanced at each other, then at me, then back, and soon they were cracking up too.

After getting the whole bed situation worked out, (and let me tell you, that took a long time) we started unpacking. Every cabin had a counselor who looked after them for the summer, and ours this year was…dear god…IVAN!

"Greetings, small children!"