“You know what you have to do when we go past a cemetery, right?”
“What are you talking about Chris?” I rolled my eyes at my older brother.
“You gotta hold your breath from the start of the cemetery to where it ends, otherwise you get greasy, grimy, gopher GUTS! AH!” He crescendoed into my face, bugging his eyes and splaying his hands out wide.
“Moooom!” I cried and ran away, trying not to let the tears fall while he watched me go. He laughed as I ran back into the house, and went back to playing in the backyard woods.
…
The memory pops into my head as I drive down a long, deserted midwest road. Farm fields, old barns, fences, and stands of woods whir by as I cruise on, radio low. I know I took a wrong turn somewhere.
I’m working at a camp in Northern Michigan for the summer season, which is almost over. One of the annoying bits of this job is there is no on-site laundry for staff. We have to drive roughly an hour away to another small town to use their local laundromat. It’s not too expensive, and the camp loads money onto preloaded cards so we don’t have to shoulder the cost of clean clothes, but we do have to pay for the gas ourselves. On a normal day off, I don’t drive out to do clothes by myself, I catch a ride with some of the other counselors and we make a day of it: we visit the Dollar Tree and an old-school soda parlor to enjoy a day to ourselves without campers.
This week though I got the shit end of the stick. Well, it started last week, and I guess I didn’t get the shits as they did. A couple of counselors caught a bad case of stomach flu somehow, which then spread through their cabins like wildfire. It was a disaster, with too much fluid coming out of people and not enough toilets to catch it. There were only a couple of kids who weren’t sick, so they reassigned me to be a solo counselor for a small group. We had fun while everyone else recovered in the infirmary, or got a refund on their summer camp experience.
However, the ailment completely rearranged our off days. I got the normal off-day, while everyone else had to bump theirs to use as sick leave. Pretty messed up if you ask me, you’d think the Powers That Be would have mercy on sick, tired, poor college kids making less than minimum wage. That’s the way it goes when you’re desperate for a seasonal job and are willing to use it on your future resume as “experience with behavior management and event planning”.
I shake my head to clear my thoughts. I need to focus, I know I missed the turn… Oh! There it is. Quickly glancing at the scrawled directions on a torn page from an employee handbook, I brake just enough to catch the right onto Finch Road. The ‘05 Ford Escape, a real trooper with 198,000 miles, takes the turn beautifully. I breathe a sigh of relief that I can still follow written directions. My coverage is spotty at best between the small towns Up North, and the GPS on my phone is useless. I feel a kernel of pride as I steal another glance at the directions.
Left from camp
CR 77 10 miles
Left - New Town Rd
35 miles
Right - Finch Rd
12 mi
Right - Lake St
5 mi
Right - Old County Line 89
Exhaling again to collect myself, I settle into the driver’s seat and resume the cruise control. You can tell it’s late in the summer by the light; though it is only just after noon, the glow is becoming more golden. The trees and grasses are reaching the peak greens, the intense verdant shades a foreshadowing of the colder, duller weather to come. There is a hint of chill in the air as it rolls through my open windows. I stick my arm out and let it ride the current, feeling the invisible push of something unseen but powerful.
Drinking in the scenery, I look to the right of the road, a cemetery at the crest of the hill. For old times’ sake, I hold my breath as I pass by.
Greasy grimy gopher guts
Is what you’ll get if you don’t hold your breath
Greasy grimy gopher guts
Hold your breath or you’ll go nuts!
From start to finish, I don’t dare to breathe, just for fun. As the cemetery fades into the rearview I laugh and shake my head.
“Ah the good old days,” I murmur as I turn up the radio and keep my eyes peeled for Lake Street.
…
Finally, I pull into the parking lot of the laundromat. I jump out to stretch my legs and begin unloading my clothes bag and laundry supplies. Hauling the bag over my shoulder and slinging the plastic bag full of detergent, OxiClean, and dryer sheets, I stagger to the doors. A townie I’ve seen here before is on his way out and holds the door for me.
“Thanks very much,” I manage to say under the weight of two weeks worth of dirty camp shirts, flannels, and shorts.
“No problem, your usual crew doesn’t need clean clothes this week?” He’s familiar with the counselors who come here.
“Nah, different days off for the next couple weeks - stomach bug finally made the rounds.”
He nods his head in understanding as I set my gear down and begin the payment process on a washing machine close to the door.
“Well have a good one, tell them to get better for me. Better hold your breath.” I can’t help it, my head turns quickly at his warning.
“I’m sorry, what did you say?” I can feel my eyes widen a bit as I call after him. Too late though, he’s already out the door and getting into his old green pickup truck. I watch him bewildered as he pulls out and gives me the two-finger wave from his steering wheel.
I wave back but frown as I begin loading my clothes into the machine. He probably meant holding my breath around my coworkers since they were sick. It was the only thing that made sense, and that is how most germs are spread. Though there’s truth to his caution, this bug most likely came from the general setting: working with kids, people don’t always wash their hands properly, and voila: outbreak.
As the washing machine begins to fill with sudsy water, I go back out to the car. The book, snacks, and phone charger are on the passenger seat waiting for me. I scoop it all into my hands and glance back to the directions.
Ah, man. I wrote down all the directions to get here, I didn’t really consider writing down the directions for the way back. Though it’s all just opposites I suppose. I grab the paper with the intent of rewriting the directions, just to be safe. Though it is a day off, I still have to get back to camp with some daylight left. I promised I’d help our senior counselor with splitting and delivering wood to the campfire sites.
Back inside the shop, I settle into a booth near my machine. I check my phone’s battery, 91%. It’s useless on the road, but at least it saves on juice. Not that I have enough of a connection to do anything with it other than call and message people. It takes so long for videos to load, it’s not even worth checking any apps. I open the book instead and begin to kill the time.
…
The dryer’s buzzer drones on for a good few seconds after I wrench open the metal door. The smell of warm, fresh clothes hits my nose, and I breathe deep. Finally, truly clean clothes. Really, there is nothing better than fresh shorts and tee shirts. While sink washing and clotheslines can make it manageable, it doesn’t compare to real washing and machine drying. I stuff my last load into my fresh laundry bag and cinch it tight. Grabbing my host of laundry and entertainment items as I breeze out, I check my watch.
I’ll make it back with a few minutes to spare at this point. Skipping out on the extra parts of laundry day makes a difference when you have to get back before twilight. I load everything and myself back into the Escape, click my seatbelt into place, and reverse out of the lot. I scan my new set of directions, reassuring myself I know the way back. I tried to check for a faster route on my phone just in case, but the map wouldn’t load all the way. It’s not a big deal, it’s the same route, just backward. Cranking up a local country station, I begin to cruise on back to camp.
…
I fell into a burning ring of fire
I went down, down, down
And the flames went higher
And it burns, burns, burns
The ring of fire
The ring of fire
“The ring of FIIIREEE!” I belt out the last lines of the song, volume cranked, windows open, hair whipping madly in the artificial wind created by speed and summer. The sun is still lowering in the evening sky, a burning bright ball of orange painting the land with a palette only available to Michigan during August dusk. Grinning at my surroundings, I keep rolling on with the hills, taking in the unexpected joy I found in my lonesome laundry trip. The countryside is whizzing by now, pushing the good old Escape to 65 miles an hour. She doesn’t complain.
My eyes do a quick flick to each mirror. I linger in the rearview, I just passed the cemetery. Or rather, a cemetery. It looks… not the same? It’s at the bottom of the hill now, and I am climbing beyond it up a massive grade, perfect for sledding once the snow comes. I shrug and return to my solo performance, gracing all that I pass with a snippet of my loud, off-tune singing.
…
One by one, I mentally mark off each direction from the torn page, until I am finally pulling back into camp. I have a few minutes to spare after dropping off my clothes at my current cabin, so I take my car to the back employee lot. It’s more of a field rather than a lot, and many counselors attest that it has claimed more than a few beaters over the years. Something about the ground just sucks the oil and miles right out of the car, some say. It makes sense, poor college kids with beat-up cars. I think it’s more the quality of the cars that get parked there rather than the area itself. I find a spot, but it’s on the furthest side away from camp. I’ll have to hurry to get to the woodshed if I’m going to help Mark with the campfire wood.
I jump out of my Escape, putting my keys into the inside zip pocket of my jacket. I have finally learned to keep the valuable things in there, rather than in the loose side ones. It is a running joke that I’ve lost my keys more than my marbles during my summer here. They aren’t wrong. Though they always turn up, I’d rather not let another tally get added to the score. I tighten the buckles on my sandals and hoof it back to the main camp road.
A rustling in the woods to my right grabs my attention. I forgot my flashlight, but it doesn’t worry me. There is still enough light to see, and there haven’t been any bear reports in our area this summer. The sound was closer to the ground anyway, a rabbit or a bird.
The trail back to camp seems to stretch too far, too narrow. The trees crowd over each other and unease begins to creep in, filling the pit of my stomach. I feel a sudden sharp stab in my stomach and a wave of nausea rolls over me. I gasp and clutch my abdomen, feeling it spasm.
“Ohhh no, oh no no no,” I groan. I dry heave where I stand. There is no way, no way I could have gotten sick. Everyone has been in strict isolation or left camp altogether. Of all the times for a stomach bug to hit, I’m not even close to one of the rustic outhouses or portajohns set along the farther edges of the camp.
A rumble rips its way through my body, causing me panic and pain simultaneously. It feels like my insides are being twisted and squished, threatening to exit one way or another.
I belch loud and long, almost like a cartoon. It jerks my head and neck forward with the force. It would have been hilarious if I wasn’t alone, or in agonizing pain. It was like lightning, flashing through my lower back and hips, I tried to steady myself against a nearby tree but dizziness got the better of me.
I slam to my knees, arms too busy to break my fall. I feel like I need to literally hold myself together or I am going to lose all of my laundry snacks. Saliva fills my mouth, and the taste of pennies coats my tongue. I grind my teeth but feel the bile in my stomach racing up my throat.
I vomit. No, not the right word. Hurl, puke, lose my guts is more like it. The noise is disgusting and wet, a squelching, steaming mess all over my shirt and on the ground. The color is wrong, a sickening dark green with chunks.
I try to catch my breath, gasping for air, but it comes again, even more forceful. It feels like my stomach is pulled up my throat. The smell is acrid, stuffing its vileness into my nose. I can’t smell anything else but the upchuck on and in front of me. Until a different smell hits me, like a brick into my face.
It smells like death, like a rotting corpse that’s been left out in the summer heat, a bloated, sickly sweet and sour odor that demands attention. I raise my head, groaning, and see a form in front of me.
It looks like a weasel. But the tail isn’t right, it’s like a rat’s. Fleshy, fat and too pink, it drags behind it. The eyes are black and beady, it stands on its hind legs. The fur is mottled and missing in some spots. The color is patchy and dull, its face a pointy snout, with two yellowing buck teeth in front. It wiggled its nose at me, and it… smiled? The face seemed too human, a sliver glint in its eyes like it knew something. Possessed a knowledge that I never would.
I couldn’t help but stare, and my jaw dropped as it whispered in an old but too high-pitched tone, “Greasy grimy gopher guts, hold your breath or you’ll go nuts!” It began to squeal, like it was laughing at me, and raised one of its gnarled digits to point at me.
Another ripple of pain coursed through my body, hitting my bowels. A sob broke out from the depths of my lungs. I couldn’t help it, I release the muscles just to hopefully be rid of the pain I was in, the absolute misery of my guts being pulled out from both ends. A new smell joined the vomit but was far, far worse. I felt my face redden realizing I had defecated completely.
The gopher tittered again, then mocked me, pretending to hold its stomach and wretch.
“That’s what you get, that’s what you get when you don’t hold your BREATH!” The thing jeered at me as the sinister, unearthly smile formed on its mug again. The beast snickered, then darted off into the darkness.
I have no idea how much time has passed, but I can’t move from where I collapsed. I haven’t had anything come out again, but I have no strength to stand. I fall back onto the ground, my whole body exhausted, covered in sick and feces. The feeling of thick liquids dripping down on the ground, creating revolting puddles underneath me. I stare up into the sky, a cloudless night with no moon, only stars.
I hear a shout in the distance, and a small beam of light sweeps down the trail. As my mind and consciousness fade, I hear footsteps running toward me.
…
I have been isolated for 3 days now, with no signs of illness. After I was found, I was immediately, (though carefully) taken to the infirmary. Camp is shutting down a week early due to “a mass outbreak of the flu”. I tried to tell them I wasn’t sick, but being found semi-conscious in a pile of your own vomit and shit, raving about a mocking weasel did not convince anyone otherwise.
Greasy grimy gopher guts
Is what you’ll get if you don’t hold your breath
Greasy grimy gopher guts
Hold your breath or you’ll go nuts!