Cam cannot sleep. His family is in the tent with him snoring softly and the campground is beginning to quiet down.

He is angry with his family because he doesn’t want to be on this camping trip. He has been against it since his parents brought it up.

“Can I just stay home by myself?” he asked. His parents said no. They said it would be a fun thing to do as a family. He told them that he wasn’t a kid anymore and he shouldn’t be forced to do stuff like this. His dad countered by saying that he was too young to stay home alone for a week.

“We’re staying for a week?” Cam said in an incredulous monotone.

Things did not improve when the family pulled up in front of the campground.

“Happy Skull Camping Park?” Cam said. “This better not be pirate themed.”

“Did it at least have good reviews?” his sister Iris asked.

“No, but it didn’t have any bad reviews, either,” his mom said. “I thought it would be like the news.”

There was no response from the back seat.

“You know,” she said, “because no reviews is good reviews?”

“That’s the worst dad joke I’ve ever heard,” Cam said.

“It’s not a dad joke, it’s a mom joke,” his mom said, affronted.

The worst part was when they got to their campsite and he asked for the wifi code.

“They don’t have wifi here,” mom said. “Your dad specifically wanted to go somewhere with no wifi.”

“Well, that’s just great,” Cam shouted. “How am I supposed to do my live stream?”

“I’m pretty sure that your three followers can find something else to watch,” Iris said. His mother crinkled her nose the way she does when she’s trying not to laugh.

“I’m going to talk to dad and get him to take us somewhere with wifi,” Cam said. Iris gave him a strange look before he stomped off.

Now he’s stuck with them in the humid tent. His face is coated with a film of sweat and dirt. Maybe he’ll jump in the lake tomorrow.

The other campers on the other campsites are talking and laughing around their campfires, and now they’re lightly chattering inside their tents, and now they’re silent.

The last thing Cam remembers is struggling to fall asleep.

He opens his eyes and it’s daytime.

He is the only one left in the tent. He is not surprised, as he is usually the last one up. He opens the zippered door loudly to find that his family is not outside of the tent, either.

The car and all of their other stuff is gone, and the other campers are gone, too. His tent is the only one in the entire campground. The campsites are overgrown and long weeds are growing out of the fire pits and over the small gravel roads.

Cam angrily calls his dad.

“You forgot me,” he says when his dad answers.

“Cam?” his dad says. “Where are you guys?”

“What do you mean?” Cam screams into the phone. “Where are you?” Static crackles in his ear.

“Dad?” he says. “Dad!”

A thin, dry, voice whispers, “Nobody will come for you.” The call cuts out.

Cam looks at his phone and sees that the battery has died.

After sitting on the ground and crying for twenty minutes, he comes up with a plan. Having a plan calms him somewhat. He grabs his phone charger from the tent and sets off to find somewhere to plug it in. He finds a site near his that has a wooden post sticking out of the ground with two electrical sockets. He plugs his phone in and leaves it on the post.

The lake is cold and stings his skin a little bit. He splashes water on his face and hair. The beach is quiet and empty.

When his fingers and toes are wrinkled, he goes back to check on his phone. It is still completely dead. He realizes that the campground is probably no longer connected. He will need to go elsewhere for help.

After drying off and changing into dry clothes, he heads to the entrance of the campground with his backpack. He wonders how long he’ll have to walk down the road before he finds something. Equipped with his handheld gaming console, he had not seen any reason to gaze out the window on the way here.

When he gets to the entrance, he looks down the road to see if he can spot anything. The road is obscured by steel-coloured clouds that are rolling towards him like a giant wave. Pink threads of lightning are dashing and wiggling out of the edges.

Cam turns and runs. He makes it to the tent right on time. The rain falls on the tent steadily for about ten minutes. He opens the door and looks out. There are no more clouds, but it’s already night time. He wonders what time he got up.

He struggles to fall asleep again, and then he wakes up.

His family is back in the tent.

His mother’s back is to him. Her hair is sticking out of her sleeping bag like a mop.

“Mom?” he says. “I’m sorry I gave you a hard time about bringing me here.” He puts his hand on her shoulder. It feels thin and brittle through the sleeping bag.

“Mom?” he says again. He sits up a little and pulls on her shoulder. Her body falls onto its back, revealing a yellowed skeleton with his mother’s hair growing out of the skull.