And His Friend. With Chien. I was living in a tent in a basement in Vinegar Hill, trying to write my first novel. Summer never quite made it down through the cement. I was listening to a lot of Scandinavian metal that summer, probably too much. She showed me the official-looking laminated I. Fortunately her name was Jennifer.
My Guy. By Kate Christensen. The summer I turned 13, I spent eight weeks at a wilderness camp in upstate New York. We were six boys and six girls. We lived in tents in the woods, ate biodynamic vegetarian food, and sang madrigals around the campfire. I had crushes on two of the boys, Tony and Guy, and they both liked me back.
I spent most of my time trying to choose between them, agonizing, actually: Guy was sweet and chubby and gentle; and Tony was more of a dude, if a year-old can be a dude. He was good-looking and funny, anyway. It should have been the easiest decision in the world, but something about Guy got me, probably the fact that he flat-out adored me, whereas Tony was a little player. He liked me, but he also liked Rachel. I talked on and on to my tent-mate Tina about my impossible choiceβGuy or Tony?
She, meanwhile, was nursing a hopeless crush on David, a badass kid from Wyoming who had coupled up with Cheryl. They were actually having sex. I was flabbergasted by this. Finally, on an overnight canoe trip, I let Guy kiss me: I had chosen.
We were officially boyfriend and girlfriend. This ignited the competitive fury of Tony, unused to losing out to Guy, his best friend. He now pursued me hotly, relentlessly.
