Dating : KIDIPATAWAKI SECRETS

It was back in summer 2013. I was preparing to go for our annual Kidipatawaki summer camp. It was an opportunity for parents to send off children they could not stand as well as children with behaviour issues while other kids were sent there just because they had too much energy; so much energy that their parents didn’t know how to deal (I still don’t understand why my parents signed me up in the first place).

I have been going to Kidipatawaki for three consecutive years, and it just seems to get worse every year. I hate it so much! Ana-Maria and John, my best friends, have also been struck by the Kidipatawaki curse. John was sent there because of his weird addiction to the non-existent beings and his mom says going to the camp will remove that nonsense out of his head. Ana-Maria on the other hand, was there because of her anti-social attitude (her parents think she needs friends apart from us). As much as we abhor this place, we loved spending time together, planning how to escape. However, neither of us knew that this year would be our last!

After a week spent in the camp, John, Ana-Maria and I decided to go on an expedition which would help us discover undiscovered territories and possibly find an escape route. We packed torch lights, snacks and a map of the camp for it was a night expedition. John and I had to join Ana-Maria at the girls’ cabana. We walked stealthily to the border of the camp, went over the hedges and landed in the middle of nowhere. We walked down a road for about an hour when Ana-Maria spotted a light coming from the northern side of the forest; we decided to check it out. The closer we got, the brighter the light became.

The light was from a candle by the window of an old house. John said we shouldn’t go but Ana-Maria insisted on finding out who would live in the middle of the forest. After debating for a minute, Ana-Maria had convinced us (well, she convinced me on joining her. John realized he could not go back to the camp alone so had no choice than to follow us ). We entered the house through the open window; who ever lived here must have stepped out.

In the living room was a chair, a coffee table and a desk. The whole place was a mess with books scattered everywhere. We started sniffing through some of the books on the desk and most of them were some kind of encyclopedia so we concluded that a biologist lived here. We were about leaving when Ana-Maria called us back to check out a journal that was hidden beneath a pile of old books. The journal was about the camp. We looked at the entry that had a stained page:

“Kidipatawaki is more than you can imagine. I have been here for sixteen years trying to solve all its mysteries….”

The front door creaked open. All we heard were footsteps…

to be continued…