Free Saving Gracie by Terry Lee

get a grip,” #2 said. “It’s only for three weeks.”

CHAPTER 11
    GRACE
     
    For the past three years, Josh had spent the month of June in Branson, Missouri. He loved, loved, loved camp.
     
    Packing Camp Clothes for Dummies. For a Kid. For a Month .
     
    Grace needed a manual. Pronto. Clothes could be sent out for washing after two weeks. But that still left fourteen shorts, shirts, underwear, socks, a couple pair of tennis shoes, swim suits, bedding, towels, toiletries, plus a lot of stuff she knew she was supposed to include, but would probably forget. In short, chaos.
    She remembered her mother’s suggestion for Josh’s first month-long stay at camp; over-sized safety pins for each set of matching shirts and shorts.
    Big mistake. Huge. Josh’s first letter home clearly stated she was never, ever, ever under any circumstances—spelled sircomstansis —to send diaper pins to camp. Again. Ever. A rookie mistake.
    Thank God Adam talked her out her mother’s original suggestion of using over-sized zip lock bags for the outfits. She envisioned Josh arriving home from Branson, via Fed Ex, with a note pinned to his shirt.
     
    Return to sender: Camper rejected .
     
    She felt sincere sympathy for her son. Not only did he have to put up with his mother’s indecisiveness and neurosis, but also an overbearing grandmother, to boot. She remembered Adam’s response to the “never, ever, ever” letter.
    “Who cares what seven year olds wear to camp?” Adam’s point, valid. Grace had to agree. Unfortunately, too late for Josh.
    Another camp malady that first year occurred over her obsessive letter writing. A month with only mail communication terrified Grace. At her mother’s suggestion Grace started mailing letters a week before he even left for camp.
    “He’ll enjoy getting letters as soon as he gets there, don’t you think?” Kathryn said.
    Sentimental, over-the-top mushy letters traveled through the mail to Missouri telling Josh how much he was loved, what a special person he was, blah, ba-blah, ba-blah.
    A week later, Josh’s first letter arrived.
     
    Dear Mom, Why are you writing this stuff? Are you dying?
     
    Sigh. Nothing about motherhood came easy. Her hard drive struggled daily with her maternal instinct chip.
    “I thought knowing how to be a mother would come naturally. Why is everything so hard?” She remembered asking after Hannah’s birth.
    “Now, don’t you worry,” her mother had said. “I’ll take care of everything.” Grace remembered Adam’s huge eye-roll after that statement.
    ~~~
    A caravan of chartered buses left Dallas at four o’clock Friday morning. Grace, Josh and Adam had driven up the night before and stayed with Adam’s sister. On the sly Grace persuaded Josh’s cousins, both older and on the same bus, to be super-secret chaperones. Although partially relieved, she still choked up watching the huge chartered bus swallow him whole each year.
    “Mom,” Josh said before they left the car early Friday morning. “One more time.”
    “I’ve got it, Josh.”
    “Repeat it, Mom.” Josh ignored his mother. “No kissing or crying.”
    Grace tightened her lips and nodded, squelching the lump in her throat. “No kissing or crying.” Josh oozed more self-confidence in his pinky finger than Grace had on both hands and feet. He climbed onto the monster-sized bus for an entire month and didn’t even look back. Thank God he didn’t take after her.
    ~~~
    Several times on the ride home from Dallas Grace resisted the urge to complain about volunteering. Orientation, a day away, had her stomach in knots. Her self-esteem, she knew, was in the toilet. She’d spent her entire life begging, pleading and whining, preferring to hide from the outside world.
    #2, on the other hand, reared her ugly head every time Grace started another sob story. “Straighten up and get your skinny ass in gear,” she would say. Oh, how Adam would side with #2. Even Janie batted down Grace’s