A/N: Like I've stated earlier, I know that I've taken a few liberties, please just bear with me, it's for a reason. Other than that, enjoy. Oh, I guess I should say that we're starting off with Allison, which means is mostly (read 90%) SFF.
If you want to read more of my writing, check out my tumblr of the same name cause I have some Hartbiggy stuff on there.
Also, I, sadly, do not own any part of Camp Takota or the characters... Just throwing that out there. Not that anyone should question it.
Allison was at camp first. In fact, she didn't remember her first summer at camp, or a time when she didn't live near the lake. But that was probably because her mother and father divorced when she was only two. Sally and her mother had gone to camp together and became best friends, so of course when Sally found out that the two Henrys were looking for a place to stay she came up with a reason for them to come to camp. So that was where Allison grew up, in one of the two cabins up the hill from Camp. Next door to Jared, but otherwise alone for nine months out of the year. What she remembers of her childhood pretty much consists of cooking for camp, or, at least, assisting her mother. Of course, when she was 7 everything changed.
Maxine came to camp next. Bubbly and rambunctious, 8 years old Max was one of, if not the youngest camper, her first year. Which meant she spent a lot of time around Allison. Allison who, at 7, had been an honorary camper for the past few years already. Allison who toted 5 year old Jared around because they were friends still. Max and Allison became close that summer, so the next year, Allison's first year as a real camper; Allison's first year sleeping in a cabin on the small bunk beds, when Max wasn't there, Allison was devastated. It was Allison's turn to be the youngest camper, but that still wasn't anything new.
Max came early the next year, and Allison can remember actually driving down to Chicago to pick her up. Looking back, she can barely remember the faint outline of a black eye and a busted lip that Max swore up and down was from a kid at school or falling down the stairs. After that year Max was always at camp early and stayed at camp just a few extra days, and some years, she was even up for Spring Break, which was always extra fun for Allison.
Now that they were older, Jared was more annoying than anything. He switched on and off between chasing Allison around and ignoring her completely, not to mention that he started doing weird things like taping a calculator to his walkie-talkie and calling it a cell phone. So, for the most part, during the off season Allison sat in her room reading, and went to the small school in the little town near them and experimented in the kitchen with her mother. The school months were boring without Max.
And then one summer their duo became a trio when Elise arrived. At 10 she was one of the oldest first year campers, and Allison can distinctly remember when she stepped out of the shiny SUV. Elise was the epitome of the girls that she and Max had made fun of in the past. While Max arrived each summer with a duffel bag that was clearly bought at an army surplus store, a rolled up sleeping bag with a pillow haphazardly shoved inside tied together with shoelaces or belts, and a backpack brimming with books and yet more clothes, Elise arrived in pristine tennis shoes, pulling a large polka dotted rolling suitcase behind her over the dirt and gravel. She carried a tennis bag over one shoulder and a purse over the other.
Max and Allison had earned a reputation the year before for running off other girls that tried to bunk with them, deciding that one was too loud or too slow or too messy, so theirs was the only cabin free, and that's where Elise ended up. Max had quickly declared that only returning campers deserved the top bunk, and so Elise was forced to sleep on the bottom bunk underneath Allison. To be honest, they probably would have found a way to run Elise off too if she hadn't wet the bed that first night, but when Allison awoke the first morning to find Elise quietly changing her sheets, she immediately knew that the new girl would fit in quite nicely in their little group.
Elise didn't wet the bed again for a few days, not until Max made her laugh so hard a lunch one day that milk came out her nose. But it was Allison that figured out that Elise only wet the bed when she was either really uncomfortable in her surroundings or really comfortable, and it was Allison who quietly slipped a note to her mother one morning asking her to pick up plastic sheets so her bunk mate wouldn't have to sleep on a damp mattress. It wasn't that Elise wet the bed every night, but when she did, Allison realized she was always a little more tired the next day and it wasn't hard to connect the dots from there.
The next year instead of moving down to camp early and staking claim on their bunks Max and Allison waited for Elise; waited so that they could all move in together. Elise had begged for a top bunk, and Max relented, saying Elise had earned it for returning. Besides, she swore up and down that she was over the bed wetting, but when Allison woke up a few nights later to a damp bed, she realized the issue. She didn't make a big deal of it, just helped Elise pull the sheets off both of their beds and pass another note to her mother. She probably would have moved to another bed if they hadn't picked up another stray girl. She didn't hang out with Allison, Max and Elise though, their reputation proceeded them it seemed.
It was that summer that Elise figured out that Max got to spend extra time with Allison, and it was that next winter break when Elise invited Max and Allison on her family's trip to Colorado. After that, it was silently agreed that Elise would come up a day or two early and stay a day or two late too. The three girls spent as much time together as they could, and even wrote during the school year. Allison made it a point to call Max and Elise at least once a week to see how they were doing, to talk about school, to catch up on all the time they had to spend apart.
That was the pattern of Allison's life: School time and Camp time. When she was 12 her mother opened a restaurant in the small town near them and that, too, became a part of Allison's life. She loved helping her mother with the dishes, or clearing tables, or creating new recipes. Besides, if she helped out she could earn a little extra money to spend when she went to visit Elise in the city, which was becoming an increasingly more frequent thing. They never went to Max's house, and didn't really ask why either, because the one time they had Max had just shrugged and changed the subject.
Instead, when Max asked them if they wanted to do the more primitive camping when they were 13 Allison and Elise agreed, thinking that since Max was more at home in the forest, it was kind of like visiting her. Of course, living in the perma-tents for an entire summer quickly turned them off of the idea and when Max asked if they wanted to do the really primitive camping the next year, Elise promptly put her foot down and Allison agreed. Not only did the primitive course require you to cook more of your meals, which meant she didn't get to see her mother as much, but the advanced course had no semblance of an outhouse whatsoever.
So, 15 year old Max, and 14 year old Allison and Elise moved in to the Robin's Egg cabin. The last cabin they would live in as campers. They spent the next two summers in that cabin together: sharing stories, growing, sneaking out to smoke cigarettes because they were "cool" and simply enjoying each other's company. That was also around the time that they picked up another stray, Lindsey Johnson. As much as Max and Elise wanted to, they refrained from running her off because Allison wanted to be her friend, but they were somewhat overly protective of the youngest member of their group. So it was a surprise when Elise walked in on Allison and Lindsey playing tonsil hockey one day. Allison swore up and down they were just practicing frenching, but nevertheless they added it to the things they just didn't talk about.
Of course, Max moved out the summer she turned 17. She couldn't be a camper anymore. Allison can remember being worried the summer before, about how she and Elise would function alone, but Max found a way. She came back as a CIT, a counselor in training. She didn't always get to see the younger girls, but at least they were together. The next summer Elise and Allison followed in Max's footsteps, and learned the ropes of being counselors. Finally, the two 18 year olds were full counselors and reunited with Max. Now, instead of sneaking around to smoke they used their free days to tip back shots of tequila in Allison's childhood bedroom.
When summer ended Max returned to college and Elise moved out to college for the first time. Allison started taking online classes, still not quite sure of what she wanted to do with her life. She went to visit both Max and Elise on their respective campuses, and spent time sitting in on their classes, but it never seemed right. So she just continued her pattern of school and the restaurant, only now, instead of doing dishes or serving tables, she pretty much manned the kitchen full time. Her mom wasn't doing too great anyway, so she tried to help out as best as she could.
They were 20 when things changed for good. They stopped visiting each other, because everyone seemed to be absorbed in their own world. Allison was helping take care of her mother, and the restaurant. She felt bad, but it couldn't be helped. The last straw came when Elise decided that an unpaid internship with her university's publication department was worth more than a summer at camp with her two best friends. They talked some after that, but, for the most part, it was back to being Max and Allison, not that either of them minded. Sure, they missed Elise, but Max was there for Allison when she came out to her mom, just as Allison was there after they boy that Max had her sexual debut with dumped her.
The next year Allison took over in the kitchen and Max started climbing her way from counselor to head counselor to Assistant Camp Director. They were happy, for the most part. They still went out and drank tequila, though they switched to wine or beer a lot earlier now than in previous years, and they still had fun at camp, but now with an added sense of responsibility. If Allison was being truthful with herself, in those lonely nine months out of the year, what she most wanted to do was learn to cook for real, not just mass amounts of whatever the kids wanted to eat. Maybe that's what lead her to apply to culinary school in Chicago. In all likelihood, she'd never leave camp, it was too comforting and too familiar.
Still, Allison couldn't help the overwhelming sense of hope that started to grow in her belly when she overheard Sally telling Max that Elise might be returning to camp for the summer. If Elise could find it in herself to come back to camp maybe, just maybe, Allison could find a way to leave.