The young girl entered the doors of the bus and sat alone as she hoped and prayed. She smiled out the window to calm the worries of her awaiting parents. The engine started and away the bus went. The young girl sat in silence while the rest of the bus roared with laughter, screams, cheers, and voices. There, the young girl existed, alone in the front of the bus with everyone around her, but no one with her. The young girl thought about what she could say to the surrounding strangers, but the nerves ate her words. She seemed incapable of the skill she had known the longest which worried her deeply. She couldn’t understand how she was unable to speak. She thought, What have I gotten myself into? Why would I choose to be here? What kind of idiot wastes her summer on a short pointless trip? I wish I were home. 
As she sat and contemplated standing up and getting off right then, a hyper, loud voice entered her ears. Once again, she heard the voice and turned her head to a pair of eyes pointed directly at her face.
“Hello” the stranger said aloud.
“Hi.”
“What is your name? I’m Kelly.”
“I’m Kathryn.”
“Nice to meet you! Do you know anyone that goes to camp here or are you alone?”
“I’m alone.”
“Now, you’re not.”
Kelly and the young girl continued their conversation while others added comments and spoke as strangers do.
The young girl exited the bus, worry still cutting off her words and sadness radiating out of her frown. I wish I were home, she thought as the counselors asked her for her bunk number and name. More strangers and happy faces surrounded her and filled the campgrounds. Kathryn stayed behind her group and hesitantly continued walking.
Soon came nightfall and the rain began to change from a drizzle to a downpour. The young girl sat listening to sixteen unfamiliar voices have conversations around her. On and on they went until she could no longer hear more than her own voice questioning her decision. I wish I were home.
Days and weeks went by, the young girl met new strangers and began to hear more familiar voices. Although, after twenty three days of the young girl meeting new people, bonding over even the most minuscule things, every night the voices around her would fade off and become irrelevant as the young girl repeated, I wish I were home.
The next morning would arrive and the girl would put on a show. She would not tell a story or perform on a stage, but she would smile. The young girl week after week smiled and laughed so convincingly that she could have been put on Broadway. She not only convinced the strangers around her, but she also started to convince herself that she was happy. Until she would lie down once again, at the closing of the day, and reflect. Each night coming to the same conclusion, I wish I were home.
One morning, the sky was blue and the air smelled of bagels and doughnuts. That morning Kathryn did not wake to strangers slowly moving out of their bunks, but instead to many familiar faces rummaging throughout they’re under the bed storage units and yelling to one another.  That morning Kathryn was not woken up by the loud alerts and announcements that played above her head, but instead, ten to fifteen girls asking to borrow makeup. That morning Kathryn, felt as if she were home. Walking to breakfast she had not noticed nor cared what she had worn. That morning she was home.
She awoke suddenly after a long night. She wanted to say she had forgotten or that even after the previous day she wished she could stay, but she had remembered and was anxious to go. That day the young girl would return home. The friends that were once strangers would become memories of the past and the people she had never met would never be a familiar voice to her. That morning was the morning she could go home.
She packed her bags and headed to the gate where her mother would pick her up. She waited.
Her drive home was not lonely. Her cheeks would rise and fall with each word she spoke. Her voice began to brighten as she told stories of her adventures. She spoke of the very few friends she had made and told story after story. The girl was impressed by the memories she had made because of the hard struggle it took to make them. The lonely hours and days had seemed like they hadn’t mattered because of the few that reached out, the few that made her feel at home.  
That night, Kathryn laid in bed and as the noises of the world became a calming hum she realized there was something she had not said, nor did she need to. Instead, all the young girl thought was, What am I going to do tomorrow?