Super Special #2: Baby-sitters' Summer Vacation
Another Super Special? YES PLEASE. These are my jam. This time it's summer vacation and the gals (INCLUDING STACEY!!!!) are headed to Camp Mohawk to be counselors-in-training. Some Stoneybrook kids (David Michael Thomas, Karen Brewer, Becca Ramsey, Charlotte Johanssen, Byron Pike, Adam Pike, Jordan Pike, Nicky Pike, Vanessa Pike, Margo Pike, Buddy Barrett, Matt Braddock, Haley Braddock, Shea Rodowsky, and life MVP Jackie Rodowsky) are along for the ride, too.
Claudia is in a cabin with Haley and Vanessa. Kristy is in a cabin with Becca and Charlotte. Mallory and Jessi are in the same cabin as "Junior CITs," but their bunkmates are super snide and make some vaguely racist comments. Dawn is in the bunk next door to Jessi and Mal. Mary Anne is with Margo Pike and Nancy Dawes (a friend of Karen's), as well as three CITs who think she's a loser and don't believe that Logan is real. Logan is with Jackie, Buddy, and Matt.
The camp director Mrs. Means (nicknamed Ol Meanie) asks Jessi and Mal to help choreograph a dance for the eight-year-old girls (including Charlotte and Becca) to do on Parents' Day. It's a happy respite for them, since the campers in their bunk are super snotty to them and call them "Oreos" (black on the outside, white in the middle). Those eleven-year-olds are racist as shit. And Charlotte Johanssen is suuuuper homesick. Kristy spends a lot of time tending to Charlotte and taking care of her, even as Charlotte constantly feels like she wants to go home. So far, though, she's hanging on. So far.
Claudia is having a fun time at camp (minus the mess hall food - but luckily she can buy candy at the canteen) and then to top it all off she meets a very cute Japanese boy, who seems smitten with her as well. He and a couple of other boys come and invite the girls to a CIT movie night and a dance on the boys' side of the camp the next week. CLAUDIA'S IN LUV.
Mary Anne, desperate to prove that she's as sophisticated as her co-CITs, writes a love letter to Logan (that she has no intention of giving to him) and leaves it where they can see it. Of course, it backfires - they convince her she has to sneak over to the boys' side of the camp to deliver the letter. Mary Anne is trapped. She has to do it - and her co-CITs also convince her that there are escaped crazies on the loose around camp. This does not bode well for scaredy-cat Mary Anne. But she does it! Well, she tries to. She skips out before bed check and makes it halfway around the lake. She would've gotten to the boys' camp if it weren't for those meddling kids! Well, one meddling kid: Tara the Terror, a camper who sold her out. Mary Anne survives, though; she's banned from swimming for three days, but the boy CITs who help catch her promise to deliver her note to Logan. Interesting. As a bonus, the other CITs and campers are in awe of her chutzpah and Mary Anne is no longer the cabin dork. (Although at one point they do try to call her bluff by piercing her ears themselves... but they chicken out and don't go through with it.)
Logan is co-CIT with a few wild guys over on the boys' side of camp. A couple of them are trying to swap in a dirty movie for Movie Night. (Risqué stuff for BSC-land.) At lunch, Mary Anne's note is delivered to Logan, and of course his co-CITs read it out loud in front of everyone. They all get a good laugh at Logan. He's surprised by Mary Anne but also intrigued. And then, of course, he starts a food fight. Because apparently that's what boys do at camp.
Dawn's counselor gets terrible news that her mother is sick and has to leave immediately, so Dawn is temporarily put in charge of Cabin 11-A. She immediately goes on a power trip. JK... mostly. She has fun with her campers, except uber-solitary Heather. Meanwhile, Stacey is stuck in the infirmary with poison ivy, impetigo, pinkeye, and a range of other maladies. The least glamorous circumstances befell our most glamorous baby-sitter! She left Bloomingdale's for this? And Kristy's bunkmates, much to her chagrin, keep trying to give her a makeover - especially for the CIT dance - but she resists because made-up Kristy doesn't feel like Kristy. Claudia is LOVING her bunkies, though, because they tracked down the cute boy she's in L-U-V with: Will Yamakawa. And they found out he'll definitely be at Movie Night. Once at the boys' camp, Claudia strides right up to Will and introduces herself (go, Claud!) and they spend the whole night talking and - eventually - holding hands. LUV IS IN THE AIR. Too bad Will's from New York.
Dawn's cabin gets a new counselor - Debra - but she's kind of a flake, and on their overnight camping trip she gets them lost in the woods. D'oh! The girls don't have cell phones because it's 1989, so they have no way of letting anyone know where they are. They end up spending an extra night in the woods but Heather, the quiet camper, really knows her stuff and leads them back to safety.
Logan, on the boys' side of camp, has been teased about Mary Anne's letter all week. Still, he follows instructions and wears after-shave and picks out a yellow flower for Mary Anne. He's pretty whipped by this point. But it's all good, because Mary Anne and Logan (Mogan? Margan? Logey Anne?) have a great time, Mary Anne's bunkmates see that Logan's real, and Logan's pals see that Mary Anne isn't a "feeb" (what a weird 80s insult). Logey Anne (yup, I'm going with it) even kiss - twice - at the end of the dance. HUBBA HUBBA.
Claudia and Will have another romantic night at the dance, slow-dancing a lot, holding hands, and whispering intimate things to one another. At the end of the night Will tells her he wishes he "could hold [her] forever." Geez, ya horny teenagers! Get a room! (JK. You're thirteen. Get your braces off first.) They don't say goodbye but they know they have to part. Claudia figures she'll probably never see Will again, but she'll always have the memory!
It's time for Parents' Day and the performance of Mal and Jessi's dance routine. Turns out they've used their bunkmate strife as inspiration, and created a dancey musical about twins (one black, one white) who get teased by a bunch of friends, but meet a nice girl and learn to trust her. They're definitely sending a message to their bitchy bunkmates. And it seems like their bunkies get the message - well, three out of four do. And three out of four apologize. Mallory and Jessi have made their point.
All's well that ends well. Everyone survives their two weeks at Camp Mohawk. Kristy learns to wear mascara. Stacey learns not to sit in a pile of leaves. And Claudia's campers get Will's address for her, so they can write back and forth. OOH LA LA!
