Chapter 16 — Camp Life

A serial novel in the form of correspondence among a family while the world as we know it collapses around us. I recommend you start at the Introduction:

https://medium.com/climate-for-change/climate-for-change-introduction-5331d5ab9313

But you can start anywhere you want.

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Chapter 16:

Hand written on scraps of paper:

Dear Mom, Melody, Grandma, and Grandpa,

If you are reading this, it means our plan worked. For the first month or so, all we did was survive. Since then, Jeremy and I have been working on befriending a guard, a woman named Charlie. Every day we talk to her about all the good in life. I tell her stories about your farm and the gift economy. I tell her about the compost piles on my block and our snow shoveling parties. Jeremy has been drawing comics for Charlie. She is not that much older than we are. She is assigned to guard our cabin, but we are not actually that dangerous. Mostly we play cards with each other and complain about the food. We tried to win her over and now that she is our friend, I have asked her for some paper and a pencil. If all goes to plan, I will have her deliver this letter to Mom and Mel when she goes home on leave. If you are reading this, then she did not betray us.

I don’t think I could escape this prison easily, if that is what you are wondering. The camp we are at is surrounded by razor wire and then pine trees and deep snow. There is a white frozen…