My Summer Camp YA-Romance Moment

Almost all of my embarrassing moments related to romance happen because of texting/Facebook messenger. Maybe our parents really did have it better because at least they never accidentally exposed to their crush that they have a crush on them.

I have. It worked out but, god, it still sucked.

Allow me to set the scene.

When I was in high school, I went to a music camp we'll Camp Groove. It was a sleep-away camp (the first one I went to) where you get put into a band and spend the week preparing a song for the final performance. And, as you might expect, there was a lot of drama because we all weren't only preteens and teens with our already heightened emotions-- we were also artists, and sensitive, and misunderstood. (Imagine here that I'm dramatically sighing with my hand over my forehead like a bad actor in a black and white film as if to say "woe is me.").

This was my third year going to camp, the summer between my sophomore and junior years. I had friends at camp now and I knew how everything worked. It was my summer to own.

Then, the worst thing ever happened: my dorm room all caught a stomach bug.

All four of us were miserably ill-- we were quarantined in our room before it was cool and got a bathroom all to ourselves. Which forced all the other girls in our hall (only one of the four halls of our dorm building housed females, all the others were males) were forced to take over one of the boys' bathrooms, and all the boys had to go downstairs.

Lucky for me, I'd gone home for the weekend and, already feeling a little off, had brought back both my laptop and the iPad I'd recently gotten after my dad won it in a raffle at work in case we were forced to stay in our dorm.

Now, I've been holding something back. As you might have suspected, there was also a guy in the picture.

We'll call him Mick. He had swoopy blonde hair he was always pushing out of his gorgeous blue eyes, strong features, and spoke with a slight accent even though he was only from the neighboring state. Even now, some seven years later, I can remember his smile easily. I'd been courting him since the first week of camp started, and I was pretty sure he liked me back.

Mick was friends with me and my roommates and, as a result, also got sick. Lucky for him, I'd anticipated that not everyone would have the chance to get their tech and bring it back, so I offered that he could watch Netflix on my iPad.

I'm not a complete idiot-- I did guided access so he'd only have access to Netflix.

But here's the thing: guided access doesn't stop text banner notifications.

So while he was downstairs watching Netflix, I was upstairs with my three roommates watching Netflix, gossiping, and texting my best friend back home about how cute I thought Mick was.

And she was texting really inappropriate things back. I remember her telling me to jump him, so that was a thing.

And Mick could see all of it. (Including the messages my mom, bless her heart, sent me that were for sure also super embarrassing).

And all of this was happening unbeknownst to me.

My iPad inevitably died, so he texted me asking me to bring him down a charger, which I gladly did. When I walked downstairs, I found him sitting at the bottom of the staircase laughing with the poor counselor who had been forced to stay back at the dorm to take care of us.

"What's so funny?" I asked, handing him the charger.

"Oh, nothing," the counselor replied.

We chatted for a minute until Mick said something I don't remember that sounded familiar.

And with a sinking feeling, I realized it was something my best friend back home had texted me.

My eyes went wide and Mick and the counselor lost it. Without thinking about it I ran upstairs to my dorm and burst in. I leaned back against the door, laughing so hard I was almost crying. My roommates asked what happened, and I explained.

One of them ran down to talk to Mick while I tried to figure out what the heck I was supposed to do now.

When I went back down, Mick told me it was okay, not to be embarrassed, he felt the same way. We were a "thing" the rest of camp, and for a bit after, until he ghosted me out of nowhere.

The next year he brought his girlfriend to camp. As you can imagine, drama ensued.

Now I've learned my lesson. Well, mostly.