The real moment I fucked up was when I crashed the car into a street lamp.

I'd been hanging out with some friends, hitting a bong and blaring Bubblegum Bitch on the stereo, having the time of my life. The night was like a ripened mauve plum stretching out across the galaxy. All I could smell was dope. School was such a drag that day, I can remember, especially with my algebra teacher riding my ass last period. Nag nag nag. I always get good grades, at least in subjects that aren't algebra. Which I'll never need anyway. I think I remember sprouting this exact same spiel to Taylor and Courtney, actually, who were sitting in the back seat just giggling at everything I said. "Oh my god, you're so funny, Victoria!" Taylor kept telling me, then howling like a banshee. They'd been drinking, I could tell from their slurred speech, but I didn't care. I'd had a few shots myself but unlike them I could hold it.

Nathan, in the shotgun seat next to me, was on something else entirely. He was jiggling his leg up and down furiously, fingers strumming, occasionally scratching phantom itches and twitching his head. I thought it was probably coke, way too much coke at that, and I was secretly jealous that he knew where to get it when I didn't. But I never knew for sure since I never asked. Nathan scared me sometimes. Say something wrong and he'd just look at you, eyes light blue like robin's eggs, eyes that always seemed completely sober even when his body was twitching around him. He'd say absolutely nothing and just wait, and then I'd have to apologise. After a further pause the conversation would continue like nothing happened. I'm not easily spooked, and don't get me wrong, I love Nathan, but the boy's wild.

So I guess I was thinking about that as I was watching him twitch, and Courtney was screaming about something in the back, and my girl Marina was singing about her liquor liquor lips. I was feeling really chilled out, my hands all bubbly. Tripping out. Like I said, everything was totally fine until I hit the damn street lamp. But I did hit the damn street lamp, and the entire car jolted. Taylor and Courtney fell forward in the backseat because they're basic bitches who never wear seat belts. I screamed, we all screamed. It was pretty shitty.

"The fuck, Vic?" Nathan stammered, after we took a moment to breathe. His hair, short and blonde like mine, was all tostled from the jolt. When I first cut my hair short, apart from the lesbian rumours, there were people who said I did it to match Nate. I shut that shit down faster than a priest at a strip club.

"I'm sorry," was all I could say. My head was heavy, my body leaned against the side door. Taylor was talking about how I could sneak the car home, get it repaired without my parents finding out, when we saw the flashing red and blue in the rear view mirror. I learned another word then. That word was,

"Busted."

My Dad has a look the magazines describe as 'violently handsome'. In his earlier days, before he owned the art gallery, he modelled part time and could have made it full time if he'd wanted. He's a combination of amber eyes and flawless olive skin, thick black hair and well maintained beard, a jawline to kill for. Though he's well into his thirties he still somehow kept the body of his nineteen year old quarterback self. Image is everything to him. As he's explained. Over and over again.

I can tell by the way he's sitting that he's still mad at me. He's rigid like an automation, suit impeccable. Gripping the steering wheel evenly. I don't say anything. He doesn't want to hear my voice anyway. It's not that we have nothing left to say to each other, because I know he does - he was absolutely furious when he found out about the car, not about the repairs or the dope but because "What will people think of us now?" He spent an hour lecturing me on that. I lay sprawled on my bed like a starfish. My mother, with her icy emerald eyes, just stood there watching me. She does a lot of that.

"Victoria. Do they have wifi there?" Dad asks suddenly, jolting me out of my thoughts. He doesn't take his eyes off the forest-swallowed road.

"I don't know," I mutter, mad at my heart for beating so fast. "Probably not."

"Take lots of pictures when you get there. Good pictures. Put them on your Instagram so the family can see." It's not a suggestion. He scratches his beard with his index finger, still not looking at me.

"I thought I wasn't supposed to be having fun."

"You're not. But you need to look like you are. Everyone likes a girl who's good with kids."

I scoff, checking my makeup on my phone so I don't have to look anywhere else. Victoria Chase: brought to you by Chanel. "I don't like children. You know that."

He doesn't reply. Doesn't care. He was the one who thought of this cruel and unusual punishment in the first place, just because he knew how much I'd hate it. Eight weeks out in Buttfuck Nowhere, babysitting the hellspawn of people I don't care to know, forced to live communally and take lukewarm showers. I tried arguing. Tried pleading. Nothing worked. My parents knew they had me in the bag with this one. And what half-baked camp would turn down a job application with $5,000 in donations attached to it?

"I don't even look good in blue," I add, with a pissed off gesture to the (non-designer!) camp leader shirt I'm forced to wear.

"Victoria, shut up," my father sighs, ending the conversation.

I say nothing as the trees thin out and a lake appears in the distance, a shimmering blue smear on the landscape like spilled 70s eyeshadow. The trees block my vision, and then it appears again, closer. I can see wooden cabins, a smudge of smoke rising up from a minuscule chimney, and before I know it the car has pulled up in the gravel of the front office and I'm staring up at a faded blue and gold sign reading WELCOME TO CAMP DESBOIS!

"Out," Dad commands.

I groan and step out to what will be my world for eight weeks.

I think, "Home, shit home."