The Streaking Incident
W. Randy Rice

My good buddy Wiles put me up to it. I was a third year CIT, working at the pool, and living in Wing 6 where BJ was the counselor. It was lunch. One of those lunches late in the summer where we've sung every song for the upteenth time, abused the Carlisle JC's as much as we can (since stakeouts got banned), and there just wasn't much left to do.

 So, my good buddy Wiles comes back, at the tail-end of lunch, and whispers in my ear, "we want you to streak - past the girl JC's." Lunch suddenly got more interesting. There was an obvious peril to saying yes. But not much really. My good buddy Wiles reassured me, by pointing out that even if I was stark naked, the counter behind which the girls stood would conceal . . . my pitifully white butt. (Recall I was working at the pool. The tan lines simply exaggerated the complexion bestowed on me by virtue of my northern European heritage.) There was also an obvious peril to saying no. It was the peril that pervaded every junior staff member's decisions: you're not game, you might not get invited back. This seemed easy enough. After close to ten years of community showers with these guys, there wasn't much to hide.

 So, very inconspicuously, I got up and went in the - geez, what did we call that middle closet? The one where we kept the toilet paper and cleaning supplies . . . I don't rememeber, but, that closet. My good buddy Wiles told me to take my clothes off, and when they starting singing "Titanic" (which I thought was pretty appropriate), I should burst out of the closet, turn to the left, and run past the serving line straight out the back door on to the back porch. No problem. Seemed pretty safe. I was starting half way through the Castle. Coming out of the closet and turning left, I'd run past the bulletin board that showed the status of wing competition, and straight on out the back door onto the back porch. Between the bulletin board and the door was the service area. The open area was probably four feet high. The girl JC's would be back in there doing dishes (sounds barbaric now, doesn't it?) and there was no way they were going to see anything. The only spot where I was vulnerable was the single door into the kitchen area. And, I'd be moving fast enough that even if they were looking out the door they wouldn't see anything. All perfectly safe. I was set.

 My good buddy Wiles checks in on me to make sure I'm getting ready. There wasn't much to do other than take my clothes off, and avoid some of the more abrasive chemicals we stored in that particular closet. I slipped out of my shoes, Nikes - white ones with the red swoosh and blue sole everyone was wearing - no socks. Next off was my Adidas t-shirt (we had a strong equal time advertising policy). I was feeling pretty good about myself. Working at the pool, I'd gotten a pretty good tan, and my hair - I had a lot of it then - was bleached to southern California standards.. My swimming trunks were a little more difficult to get out of as they were still a little wet. And, . . . cold.

 Aww man. No way. How could I have not anticipated this. Everyone knows what happens when you've been in cold and wet swimming trunks half the day. Geez, this was the second week, so, I'd actually been in wet swimming trunks for close to half a month now. This was bad. Very bad.

 "Wellllllllll, they built the ship Titanic, to sail the ocean blue . . . "

 Ohhhhhhhhh man . . .

 "and they thought they had a ship . . . "

 . . . counselorhood was on the line here . . .

 "that the water wouldn't go through . . ."

 . . . versus (apparent) manhood . .

 "but, the good lord raised his hand . . . "

 . . . I had my priorities . . .

 I threw the door open hard, turning quickly to the left moving my legs as fast as I could. I thought maybe I could get that cartoon thing going where their legs move so fast it kind of blurs everything below the waist. Imagining anything as silly as this was not my biggest mistake. My biggest mistake was imagining that my good buddy Wiles wasn't up to something other than the obvious. My eyes locked with his as he slammed and locked the door leading to my exit, the back porch. BJ was giving the left front door the same treatment while Blair was taking care of the right one. Between them, dead front and flipp'n center were the two girl JC's!

 There was a silence. A very real, palatable, deafening silence. In that silence, I saw the two girls JC's hands raise to cover their mouths, and they're eyes move lower. All of this in some kind of eerie slow motion, until all at once, when their hands reached the top, and their eyes reached the bottom, the place just exploded. Half the kids jumped straight up in the air, and the other half fell of their chairs in red-faced hysterics. I turned and ran for the back door. It's hard to run without moving your arms, but my hands were covering whatever they could and I consequently did this kind of wiggle run thing to the back door where I had to free up my hands to undo the lock. They hadn't missed a trick. Crisco is amazingly slippery when it is applied to metal. And, these locks having not been used, ever I think, were tight to begin with.

 Finally, the door was open, and I was in the free. Out onto the back porch, down the stairs onto the concrete pad. I could relax somewhat now. The Castle was shaking with laughter, muffled some now. I raised my hands to the top of my head in frustrated disbelief, turning slowly in the thoughtless circles that the traumatized tend to wander, and on about my second time around, finally opening my eyes, I looked up on the hill, at the cooks cabin, and saw Ma.. And Faye. The cooks. And they, saw, me. Ma was sweeping. Faye was apparently just watching. They froze. I froze. The stunt couldn't have been more complete. Until, and I can't swear to this but I've not been able to shake the image since, Ma . . . sweet, ancient, cooked for us since camp started but hadn't heard her ever say anything to anyone except Faye, Ma, gave me just a little wink.

 The next leg of my run was to the clothesline for a towel. I don't know who's towel it was, but it was a big one - the first one I could put my hands on. And, entering the Castle with as much dignity as I could muster to retrieve my clothes, I was greeted with a resurgence of laughter that until just a few moments ago I would have considered the most spasmodic display of hysterics I'd ever witnessed. It didn't dawn on me why at first. Initially, my attention was drawn to Burris who for some reason was peaking at me through his fingers spread about an inch apart and laughing evilly. And, self-consciously looking down the cause for the resurgence in laughter became clear: Out of all the towels on the clothesline, advertising every imaginable thing from tennis shoes to professional sports teams, or simply the color brown, I'd blindly picked a 3-5 foot patch of cloth emblazoned with Tweety Bird.

 My good buddy Wiles. BJ Waldron. Tom Hutton. Be advised, you are all , still, very much, on my list.