Chapter Eighteen
Welcome to the first official Couple-Up Ceremony of Camp Couple-Up, Season One!
” Natasha cries. Her enthusiasm is contagious, and we all bounce up and down, cheering.
She turns directly to the camera. “The campers have spent the last five days getting to know one another, and we’ve had some beautiful moments of vulnerability and connection, and some spicy moments, too—Damian and Harmony, I’m looking at you!
” Damian grins, sheepishly, and a pink flush fills Harmony’s cheeks.
“Soon,” Natasha continues, “the female campers will choose their official bunkmates. But first, we have a surprise.”
Oooh, surprises. Not my favourite.
“Campers, can you please line up in front of the flagpole?”
We do as we’re told, exchanging wary glances. Reality TV surprises rarely lead to anything good.
“Campers, something you don’t know is that America has been voting for their favourite camper, via the Camp Couple-Up app—” she turns to face Tyler. “Do you still want me to say that?”
There is a hard edge to the look that he gives her, and he replies with a terse “Yes.”
Natasha turns to the camera, not missing a beat.
“—via the Camp Couple-Up app, available for free from the App Store or wherever you get your apps.” She turns back to us.
“And we are about to reveal who received the most votes and is America’s favourite camper, but—” she gives us all a very serious look “—we will also reveal the person who received the fewest votes, and therefore who will be asked to pack their bags and check out of Camp Couple-Up immediately.”
Gasps of shock ring out around me, and I feel a pit of dread sinking and settling in my stomach.
What if it’s me? What if America can see through my act?
I squeeze my hands into tight fists and focus on the pain of my nails digging into my palms. Strangely, the shape of my worry has more to do with Kei than the money at stake.
And now everyone is looking at Harmony and smiling and clapping. She must be America’s favourite. Of course she is. I clap for my friend, my hands clanging clumsily against one another, as if they belong to someone else.
“Now,” Natasha’s serious tone has returned. “It’s time to announce who will be the first camper eliminated from Camp Couple-Up.”
Natasha pauses, one of those overdrawn dramatic pauses loved by reality TV producers.
I look at Kei. He’s focusing intently on Natasha.
“The person with the fewest votes, who will be asked to pack their bags and check out of Camp Couple-Up is…” Natasha pauses.
She looks each of us in the eye. I try to read her expression for some sense of sympathy or sadness, but she is stone cold.
She takes a long breath in and then heaves an exhale. She looks at Harmony, and then back at the rest of us. She lowers her gaze, shaking her head sadly.
Oh for fuck’s sake, just say it.
“Garrett.”
I let out a long exhale.
“No,” says Garrett, shaking his head. “No, this is bullshit.”
“I’m sorry, Garrett,” Natasha says sadly. “You have thirty minutes to—”
“No, don’t believe them!” he yells. Natasha’s mouth drops open. She looks at Tyler, who has been watching from the sidelines. He strides toward Garrett and takes him by the arm.
“Don’t fucking touch me, you liar!” Garrett wrestles his arm away from Tyler, then he turns to us. “Don’t believe a word they say, they’re lying to you!”
Tyler nods at Teddy, who quickly lays his camera down to assist him. They lead Garrett away. In the distance, we can still hear him yelling.
My brain feels fuzzy, like it can’t quite compute what just happened. Someone sniffles—it’s Trina, whose eyes are brimming with tears. Kei’s jaw is hanging slightly open, and Valeria’s hand is clapped over her mouth.
Gabby rushes over. “Campers, I’m so sorry you had to see that.”
Tyler has returned. He’s shaking his head. “Sorry, guys. Gabby and I take full responsibility for this. Can we have a moment, please?” he says to Teddy and the other camera guys. They retreat. Tyler waves us in closer.
“Look, I know that must have been rough for you guys, and I’m so sorry.
We thought something like this might happen, but we hoped he’d take the news better.
I guess we made an error in judgement.” I glance at Gabby, who looks as confused as the rest of us.
“I’m going to be honest with you guys,” Tyler continues.
“It was a handy coincidence for us that Garrett got voted off, because we were going to ask him to leave today, regardless.”
A surprised murmur echoes through the group. “What the hell?” says Damian.
Tyler nods, sighing heavily. “This is difficult for me to say, and it’s probably going to be upsetting for you to hear.” He takes a deep breath. “Yesterday we learned that, at the party the other night, Garrett spiked the punch with MDMA.”
Someone gasps. Harmony looks at me, her brow knitted together. I think of the tiny baggie that Kei shoved into his pocket in the storeroom. I look at Kei, opening my mouth to speak, but something about his expression stops me. He looks scared. Oh god, what if the drugs really were his?
Tyler sighs again. “When we approached him about it, he got really aggressive. He threatened us, said that if we kicked him off, he’d go to the press and tell everyone it was us that had done it.
But by this time, we already had the results of the vote, so we decided to frame his leaving this way, to help him save face and maybe avoid a scene like we just had.
But obviously, we misjudged the situation. ”
I look at Kei. His expression is unreadable. Do I say something? I remember the hurt in his eyes when I asked him if the drugs were his. But maybe he was acting, like we both have been this whole time. But he wouldn’t drug other people…would he?
“I knew there was something off about that guy,” Sue-Ellen says, looking in the direction of where Garrett was dragged away.
“Hey, show some compassion,” Kei replies. His concern seems genuine.
“Compassion? The dude drugged us.”
“He’s obviously been going through something,” says Damian. “Maybe leaving is the best thing for him.” No one makes eye contact as we digest this thought.
“What’s going to happen to him?” Valeria asks.
“We unfortunately have to alert the authorities,” Tyler says, his face set in a grim line. “But we’ll make sure he gets the help he needs. Right, Gab?”
Gabby has gone pale. She nods, swallowing.
“Look, guys, we know this is a lot to take in, but we’re on a tight schedule, so we’ve got to get on with the Couple-Up Ceremony.”
The Couple-Up Ceremony. I’ve totally forgotten about the reason we’re all here in front of the flagpole to begin with. We stumble like sleepwalkers back to our places in the line. I glance at Kei. His gaze is downcast, and he’s biting his lip. Is he just upset? Or feeling guilty?
“Can’t we just take an hour to, like, process this, Ty?” Natasha says in a low voice.
“Not if you want to be paid for that hour, Tash,” Tyler says, quietly. I catch Natasha’s eye, and look away, quickly.
Someone rushes over and brushes Natasha’s nose and brow with powder. Tyler mumbles into his headset, and all of the camera guys take their places.
Natasha plasters a smile onto her face. She’s got her work cut out for her, as we’re all standing there, in shock, like we’re just waking up from a bad dream. But somehow, she works her TV magic, and within minutes, we’re all clapping and cheering like nothing has happened.
Harmony gets to choose her bunkmate first, and to no one’s surprise, she chooses Damian. Valeria chooses Giovanni, and his cheeks turn red in a rare moment of bashfulness. Sue-Ellen is next, and she gloats about choosing Isa, but I’m unbothered. She can have him.
It’s now down to me and Trina, and just one guy, Kei. It hadn’t occurred to me that Trina could swoop in and steal Kei, but thankfully, Natasha calls my name next. My speech is well-rehearsed.
“I’m choosing this guy to be my bunkmate because I’ve spent some time with him over the past few days, and though he’s not my usual type, I want to do things differently here.
He’s kind and caring, and I think he’s someone I could really learn to trust.” I couldn’t have said it better if I was reading a script, but it comes out surprisingly naturally.
Kei beams at me, and I beam right back. “So, the guy I want to bunk with is…” Drawing out the moment too long feels silly, since there’s only one guy left, but I count to ten slowly in my head, and then I say, “Kei.”
He lopes toward me, pulls me into him and wraps his arms around me. I breathe him in.
“Thanks,” he whispers in my ear, and then takes his place behind me.
“Trina, you are now single, which would normally leave you vulnerable, but we’ve got another surprise for you.”
Trina glances from Tyler to Gabby and back to Natasha, who is grinning, like she has something major up her sleeve. “Trina, do you remember, amongst all the paperwork you did for the show, you filled out a questionnaire about your perfect-on-paper person?”
Trina nods. “I remember.”
Natasha turns to the camera. “Before filming began, each of the campers filled out a questionnaire in which they described, in detail, their ideal mate, everything from hair colour to profession to goals for the future.”
I vaguely remember doing this, but I have no idea what I said. The concept of the perfect man has long been dead to me.
Natasha turns back to Trina. “How would you feel if I told you, Trina, your perfect-on-paper person…is here.”
“What?” gasps Trina. Teddy swoops in for the close-up of Trina’s face, her delicate features twisted in confusion.
“That’s right,” Natasha says to the camera. “We scoured the country looking for a guy that fit Trina’s description of her ideal mate, and would you believe it? We found him. Please welcome our newest camper, a twenty-eight-year-old visual artist from Detroit, Michigan, welcome…Sid!”
A tall, lanky guy with bleach-blond hair and a torso full of tattoos jogs up the beach path. So not what I would picture for Trina, but she looks thrilled. When he leans down to kiss her cheek, the red rises up her neck in blotches.
“Another happy couple!” Natasha says in a singsong voice, clasping her hands together. “All of these happy couples, so content, isn’t it lovely?” She sighs theatrically, and the hairs on my arms stand up on end. This fawning feels exaggerated, even for Natasha.
“Here at Camp Couple-Up, we want to ensure that all of our campers form the absolute strongest possible connections.” Natasha is talking to the camera again. “And sometimes, the only way to do that is with a test.”
“Girl, what?” Damian mutters.
“While our couples are happy right now, it may be short-lived, because we’ve created the ultimate test.”
No! I don’t want a test! I glance back at Kei. His face is knitted with worry, but he squeezes my waist, as if to tell me We’ll be okay.
“Are you ready for this, campers?” Natasha asks, a gleeful grin distorting her pretty face. No one says anything. “We have found the perfect-on-paper person for every single one of our campers, and we have brought them all here.”
Several shocked gasps ring out; one of them might be me. This is bad. This is very bad. Kei and I are just about to implement our strategy, and we have no contingency plan.
“We call them POPPs, not just because we love an acronym, but also because these folks are a little pop of excitement, a pop of intrigue, and they’re also just popping in for twenty-four hours, after which time each of our campers will have the option of choosing their POPP or sticking with their current bunkmate. ”
Teddy walks slowly in front of us, pushing the camera into our faces to catch our open mouths, our worried eyes, our blank expressions.
“Shall we welcome our next POPP? She’s here for you, Kei.”
Silence.
“Come on, campers, let’s be polite.” Natasha waves her hand to encourage a round of feeble applause. “Hailing from S?o Paolo, Brazil, this POPP is a twenty-four-year-old lingerie model.”
I feel Kei stiffen behind me.
“Let’s give a warm Camp Couple-Up welcome to…”
Kei drops his arm from around my waist and takes a step back. I turn to look at him. His face has blanched, and his mouth is slack with shock.
“Alessandra,” he whispers.