So this is something I've been working on for awhile. The summary pretty much explains it all. Most of the people at camp will be Degrassi people, the people from Maya's home life will be mainly secondary characters. I have a lot of this story already written up in a notebook, so I just have to type it up so updates shouldn't take too long. I'm really busy with exams now but I'll try to have an update out every 2 weeks atleast.

Summary: Maya has been going to camp every summer for as long as she can remember. Even after her mother's death, Maya still goes in hopes of having fun. She never anticipated the return of Campbell Saunders, her old crush from a few summers ago. Everything with him was so perfect yet so complicated at the same time. Campbell's back, but he's changed and isn't the same person as before.

So in this alternate universe Cam is still alive and Adam is still alive. It takes place during the summer before Maya's sophomore year, so basically just this past summer.

So this chapter is more of an introductory chapter, but I hope you enjoy! I don't own anything.

The long drive up to Silver Lake Camp at the end of June always seemed so long. I would sit in the backseat with my sister in silence for 3 hours, listening to my iPod nano while my parents talked to each other in the front seat as we drove down the boring two lane highway that seemed to never end. This year, the ride was abnormally shorter. My sister, Katie wasn't coming to camp this year, and my mom was no longer with us.

This time last year, everything was normal. I was on my way up to camp for the summer. It was my last summer as a camper and Katie's first summer as a counselor. We had been coming to this place every year as soon as we were old enough. Summer at camp is all I've known for as long as I can remember. Katie and I have never missed a summer. Now 18 and going into her first year in college, Katie needed to stay home and work fulltime. I knew deep down that she just couldn't come back here. There were too many sour memories.

My whole freshman year was a blur to me. Everything started out normally. Everything was perfect. Things were going great until that one gloomy day in October when we came home to find my parents waiting for us in the living room to drop the bad news. They never came home from work until atleast 5:30, so I knew right away that something was up. I sat down on the couch beside Katie after taking off my raincoat, and then they told us. My mom had cancer. She had been going through treatment all summer, but nothing was working. The illness had soon spread from her breast and had made its way into her lungs. By Christmas, the cancer had spread to her brain and we all knew that it was only a matter of time. My mom died the week before Easter, and everything changed after that. I told my two best friends, Taylor and Noelle, but that was it. They were at my house frequently when my mom was sick, so they knew everything already. Katie didn't tell any of her school friends. She was never super close with anyone at our high school. She told her other friends though, the important ones.

Camp ran almost all summer long. It began the last weekend of June right after school was out, and ran for 8 weeks, ending just in time for everyone to have a week to prepare for going back to school. Usually, we took a family holiday that week and went camping. That wasn't happening this year though. I even thought about staying home from camp this year, feeling guilty about leaving my dad after we had just lost mom.

"You've been going to camp forever, Maya," he told me at the beginning of May when forms were due. "Camp next year is all you talk about at the end of August. There's no way you're staying home."

"But what about mom?" I asked before my dad had a chance to say anything else.

"Even with mom gone, your life has to carry on sweetie. You can't stop doing the things you love," he told me. "We all have to move on."

As much as his words hurt in a way, I knew he was right. That's what I loved about dad. Even though him and mom had been together since college, he still had the strength to carry on after her death. He still managed to be a good parent during the whole thing. He did have some trouble with Katie and still did, but my dad and I got along great. He was my rock. I still looked at him as my hero like I did as a child after losing mom. He was all I had left, and the way he managed to maintain a positive outlook on life throughout this whole thing amazed me.

"I know mom would want you to go to camp," my dad added with a smile. "She would want you to be happy." With that, I had sent my forms in.

Over the summer, I knew that I was going to miss Taylor and Noelle like crazy; I would definitely miss them more than normal. I promised them that I would write over the summer, but the three of us secretly knew that wasn't going to happen. Camp kept you really busy, and there wasn't too much down time. This summer would be especially hard without them. They were always there as a shoulder to cry on when I missed my mom. Some days I was okay, like nothing had ever happened. Then I had those times when I just missed her so much and couldn't stop crying. They were always there, no matter what.

Then there was dad. He was the only one who truly understood how hard it was. Katie was there, but she was wrapped up in her own problems. Taylor and Noelle were there, but they never understood the pain I was going through because they had never lost someone so close to them.

Even as we turned onto the two lane dirt road that camp was on, I still regretted my decision to come back here in the first place. As I sat next to my dad in the front seat, I turned my head to talk to him for one of the first times the whole ride.

"Dad, you're sure you want me to go?" I asked, the words coming out of my mouth slowly.

"Of course," he replied without hesitation. "You know how much I'm going to miss you kiddo," dad added. "You've had a long year though, and you need to be here having fun, okay?"

Dad said nothing else, and I turned my head to look out the window for the small remainder of the ride until the car slowed down and pulled over to the side of the road to drop me off.

I sat in the car in silence as my dad opened the trunk to take out my suitcases. Camp only did a wash every two weeks, so I had to bring a lot of clothes. Even though I technically only needed roughly 15 days worth of clothes for camp, I had always brought more the past couple of years. I've always been one of those crazy over packers. I would much rather have more clothes than I needed than not enough. I was scared that I would run down to such a small selection of clothes to the point that I would have minimal choices of what to wear; and what if I didn't want to wear any of those? I would be screwed. Having so many options of clothing made me feel more at home too, it would help me this year especially. I had a lot of clothes at home, and they were part of me. All the money I made delivering papers often went towards my clothes. My clothes were certainly not top notch fashionista clothes, but they were perfect for me, and I took pride I them.

Before long, I heard my dad tapping on my window.

"Maya, come on!" My dad said enthusiastically as he opened the car door for me. I reluctantly stepped out of the car, looking around camp.

It looked no different than last summer or the summer before, but it was empty. I'm 14 now, turning 15 in December, which meant that I was no longer a camper. Because of my late birthday I could have been, but anyone turning 15 by the end of the year qualified to be a CIT, so I chose to do that. All the staff and CITs arrived a day before camp began to get everything organized before the campers arrived. Campers ranged from the age of 6-14; CITs were 15 and 16, and once you were 17 or older, you were eligible to be a counselor or staff. Don't get me wrong, I was definitely excited about being a CIT. Being a CIT was just the awkward in between stage. You were too old to be a camper so you didn't pay to be here, but you weren't old enough to get paid. You were too old to participate in many activities, but you weren't old enough to run them. CITs were there to help out, and I was excited. At the same time though, I knew that I would have responsibilities this year and camp wouldn't quite be the same as before.

The thing I was most excited about today were the group assignments. Every year, each cabin would have 2 counselors, 2 CITs and 10-14 campers. Once you got all acquainted with your cabin, it would be split in two. You would still have cabin time with them, but the majority of activities were done in groups. Groups were made up of one counselor and one CIT from each cabin who were then paired up with another counselor and CIT from a different cabin. The campers in each cabin were then divided in half. A bunch of people hated the groups for when they got split up from their friends in their cabin, but I've always liked it because the groups let you get to know other campers easily. Unless you had a shitty group, then you were screwed.

I remember last year, my group sucked. My group counselors were Mia and Leia, and as much as they tried to put on an act, it was obvious that they did not get along. We were also an all girl group. All girl groups were useful for a good heart to heart, but they got boring after awhile. They could also create drama, which ours did. At camp, the juniors, intermediates and seniors were separated when it came to groups, since it was unlikely that a 7 year old would find common ground with a 13 year old. Juniors were 6-8, intermediates were 9-11 and seniors were 12-14. I secretly hoped for a group of intermediate campers. They were by far the easiest to work with, and it was easy to entertain them.

My dad looked at me with a smile as he unloaded my last bag from the trunk.

"You ready, kiddo?" He asked me.

I sighed, looking around camp. I smiled for the first time. I felt really excited looking around. It was summer. I'm here at camp, my favorite place in the world. I would never know if it was the right choice for me to come here this year, but I knew that I would make the best of my time here.

"Ready!" I said enthusiastically as I followed my dad into the lodge.

Sorry about the abrupt ending, I was trying to find a good place to cut off. What did you guys think? A lot of the characters will be introduced in the next couple of chapters. I'll try to get an update out as soon as possible, depending on the feedback I get from this :P Thanks for reading though! Reviews are highly appreciated! And if you have any questions about the story let me know.

~Lauren