Free Boot Camp by Todd Strasser Page A

salvation. That’s why I do what I do, Garrett. And as long as I keep doing that, there will always be parents who’ll want to send their troubled children to me.”
    â€œEven if you have to beat them into submission, sir?”
    Mr. Z’s face goes stony. “That concludes our meeting, Garrett.”
    â€œOne last question, sir?”
    â€œWhat?” Mr. Z snaps, his voice oozing impatient displeasure.
    â€œSir, does every kid meet with you like this?”
    Mr. Z draws a long breath in through his nose. “No, Garrett, they don’t.”
    â€œThen why me, sir?”
    Mr. Z gazes at me with an expression that’s hard to read. “You can go.”
    The taped lectures that blare over the loudspeakers at mealtime are called RLs, which stands for Right Living. Just another example of Lake Harmony’s conviction that before we came here we excelled in wrong living. Tonight’s dinner lecture, broadcast at eardrum-bursting decibels, extols the merits of sleep: “Sufficient sleep positively affects our health and well-being and plays a key role in preventing disease and injury, promoting stability of mood and the ability to learn.”
    The only thing worse than these tapes is the food they serve while we listen to them. Greasy, fatty, and monotonous. Gray hamburgers, soggy French fries, watery spaghetti, slightly rancid-smelling tuna fish.
    Given how foul the food is, hot dogs are a Lake Harmony favorite. For tonight’s meal we each get two franks in buns and a fist-sized glob of mealy brown baked beans. What a feast!
    â€œYou bitch!” Tempers flare in the Courtesy family, where a tall blonde lunges across the table at another female. “Mothers,” “fathers,” and “chaperones” swarm over the two girls, pulling them apart.
    Suddenly I feel a sharp poke in my ribs from the kid sitting next to me. It’s David Zitface. He dips his pimply forehead in Adam’s direction. I look across the table, where Adam meets my gaze and then looks down at the dogs on my plate.
    He must be joking—or crazy—if he thinks I’m going to give him my hot dogs. If he wants part of my dinner, he can wait until a night when they’re serving creamed chicken. Under the booming RL and the continued shouting at the Courtesy family table, Adam bares his lizard teeth menacingly. I ignore him. After a moment he turns his attention to Pauly, whose hot dogs sit untouched on his plate. Like a drop of food coloring in water, the red rash has spread and become diluted over his body.
    â€œAhem.” Adam clears his throat. Pauly gazes up for a moment and shrugs as if he already knows what Adam wants. He wearily glances around to make sureJoe and the chaperones aren’t watching, then slides his plate toward Adam, who quickly picks off both dogs.
    At the end of the meal, the glob of beans on Pauly’s plate remains untouched. He hasn’t eaten a thing.
    After dinner we clear the tables and move on to Reflections, when we’re supposed to write down our thoughts and what we learned from the RLs that day. (Level Fives and Sixes sometimes get to watch nonviolent PG movies and eat snacks like popcorn and potato chips in a special room off-limits to everyone else.) Once every two weeks we can write a letter to our parents (but nowhere else, and to no one else, including Sabrina). The RL is turned off, and we are given fat, bendable rubber markers. Pencils and pens are considered potential weapons.
    There’s no point in writing anything critical about Lake Harmony, because the chaperones read the letters and tear up any that disparage this wonderful institution. Up till now I haven’t felt like writing. Wouldn’t sending my parents a letter be doing them a favor? Letting them know I’m okay? And why should I do that? Why should I do anything that might make them feel good about sending me here? But for some reason today that feels dumb.