Chapter Three
Barra couldn’t believe she was doing this. Honestly, it would’ve been more believable if Antoni Gaudí had phoned, asking for her help to design a new chapel in Montju?c. For the record, Antoni Gaudí had been dead for nearly a century.
“Why do you look like you dropped your phone in a pond?” Gabi asked, pushing a latte into Barra’s face.
Gabi was Barra’s oldest friend. They’d met in college before Gabi had dropped out and moved to Los Angeles.
She’d decided designing buildings was too boring and her true talents were better used making jewelry that no one could afford.
And she’d been right. Gabi had started a line of elegant, heirloom-worthy pieces called Lumen.
Barra was wearing one of her signet rings right this minute.
“Thank you,” Barra muttered, accepting the coffee with both hands. “And I look like this because I can’t believe I’m going to spend the next four weeks eating beans and rice again.”
“That’s if you win again,” Gabi pointed out as she led them toward the nearest row of airport lounge chairs.
They were at LAX and in a few minutes, Barra would pass through security and board a plane that would take her to Outlast Her’s newest destination.
“You might not even make it past the first three days.”
Barra shot her a glare.
Gabi smiled, unbothered, and plopped down in the seat next to her. “Well, I think it’s a great idea that you’re doing this. You’ve always wanted to go to Costa Rica.”
“Yes,” Barra said, stretching out her long legs.
She was dressed in charcoal sweatpants, a faded navy hoodie with GSAPP—Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation—printed on the front, and her hair, which had grown a few inches longer over the winter, brushed the hood.
“To see the Iglesia de la Merced or visit the Cartago ruins. Not to live on a desolate beach fending off crabs and spiders and waking up every morning wondering who was trying to stab me in the back.”
The thought was honestly like volunteering to be slowly sandblasted.
She couldn’t believe she’d said yes when Elise Mercier had called her three months ago with the theme for next season.
Winners vs. Newbies. Was that supposed to be catchy?
Apparently yes. Elise predicted the ratings would go up tenfold.
Survivor: Heroes vs. Villains had once been ranked number one by fans and critics, and Elise believed that was solely due to villainess Sandra Diaz-Twine winning the entire game for a whopping second time.
That was frankly unheard of before that season.
Previous winners were underdogs, the ones everyone expected to get voted out first because the newbies were terrified of them.
Or desperate to make a name for themselves by eliminating them.
Barra hadn’t found the season theme as appealing as Elise did, yet she’d emailed her without a second thought.
I’m in. She suspected now that the reason she’d said yes was that she was lying on her sofa, doomscrolling through Dominique’s delayed honeymoon content.
Dominique and Kiara had gone somewhere in the Maldives.
In one story, they were clinking sweating glasses of gin and tonics under a striped umbrella with their bare legs tangled on a daybed.
In another, they were swimming in water the color of aquamarine.
“Maybe you’ll be paired up with someone great and fall in love with them,” Gabi said. “Then you’ll forget all about Dominique. Wouldn’t that be nice?”
Barra slowly lifted her hand and flipped her off.
Gabi chuckled and sipped on her cinnamon spice latte with two pumps of vanilla.
She was as predictable as cheese, which was why Barra had felt comfort in asking Gabi to drive her to the airport.
Instead of dropping her off at departures, Gabi had insisted she walk Barra into the airport and buy her an overpriced latte.
“Fine,” she said, raising up a free hand in surrender.
“That was too soon. My bad. I’m a terrible friend. ”
“You are,” Barra shot. Though that was as far from the truth as the Earth was to the Moon.
Gabi had flown all the way from LA to stroke Barra’s hair two weeks after the finale when she perpetually looked like she’d been run over by a truck.
She’d filled Barra’s fridge with groceries—fresh berries, a loaf of sourdough, and ten different ready-made meals from that fancy organic place in the West Village that packaged everything in compostable cardboard.
And she’d even stayed for an extra week when she’d caught Barra staring blankly at a wall like some Victorian widow.
Which was funny, right, because Barra was the Ultimate Outlast Her. She was a million dollars richer, minus tax, of course. But somehow it still felt like she’d lost something.
Barra was suddenly and viciously yanked from her thoughts by the sight of dark, wavy hair with the slightest auburn highlights moving through the crowd.
There, at the other end of the terminal, above the heads of a school group in matching navy polo shirts and identical backpacks, Barra spotted someone she knew.
Briefly. Intimately. Someone with smooth, buttery skin.
Someone with rosy lips. Someone she didn’t think she’d ever see again.
Barra immediately sank into her chair.
Gabi looked at her with one eyebrow raised and one depressed. “What’s going on with you?” she asked. “Why are you sitting like you lost your spine?”
“Nothing,” Barra replied, staring down at her scuffed Nike Airs. She even yanked at the strings of her hoodie, pulling the fabric forward so the hood drooped a little lower over her face. Unfortunately, not enough to hide completely. “I’m just resting.”
“Resting?” Gabi asked. “You’ve got a six-hour flight to rest. I didn’t skip my morning yoga and matcha to drive you all the way to the airport to watch you rest.”
But Barra was barely listening. She couldn’t stop wondering what Allie was doing here.
In LAX. Was she going on holiday? Was she about to solo backpack through Europe or island-hop through the San Juan Islands?
Though that didn’t seem quite her scene.
Everything about her screamed five-star hotels and fancy Mediterranean yachts.
Maybe she was moving overseas. Yes. That was exactly it.
Allie had decided California was overrated, and she was relocating to Barcelona or Normandy, or some charming coastal town where people drank wine at lunch and never once ran into former reality show winners they’d hooked up with in wedding venue bathrooms.
Or... Barra didn’t even want to consider the possibility that Allie was flying to Costa Rica, to a remote slice of the Osa Peninsula where rainforests swallowed the sky, and the beaches were only accessible by boat or small plane.
It was very possible that Allie was going to be a contestant on Season Seven of Outlast Her: Winners vs. Newbies.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t as unrealistic as Barra desperately wished it were.
Not only had Barra drunkenly promised to email Elise and recommend Allie for the new Outlast Her season, but she’d actually sent the message. Right there in that bathroom while Get the Party Started by Pink had drummed outside, and Allie had nibbled on the skin of Barra’s neck.
The very next morning, while Barra had battled a headache as severe as a jackhammer in her skull, she’d checked her messages and seen the email that she’d sent Elise.
You have to cast this woman on Outlast Her.
Her name is Allie Chen, and she’s amazing.
You’ll regret it big time if you don’t. She also saw the reply from Elise.
Barra had stared at the email for a full thirty seconds, at Elise’s response that she’d take the suggestion under consideration. Then she’d clapped a hand over her mouth and run for the bathroom.
“You look green. Did you eat something funny?” Gabi said, frowning.
It wasn’t so much what Barra had eaten. It was more so who had eaten her four months ago in a bathroom stall.
And there was that very woman she’d vomited all over while they climbed into a cab together after the wedding.
And to make matters even worse, Barra had shot out of the cab like a mortified missile and run away. Literally.
Barra tilted her head up just a smidge. Maybe Allie had walked off to the opposite side of the terminal, and that would be the end of it, no explaining necessary.
Gabi knew all about Barra hooking up with someone at Dominique’s wedding, but she hadn’t given more details than that.
No name. No description whatsoever. And certainly no talk about stomach contents.
“I’m fi—” Barra started.
But the word was barely out before Allie spotted her.
She waved her arm so wildly overhead that Barra was half-convinced it might lift her off the ground.
Then she began weaving through the cluster of squirming children and a group of fifty-something women all wearing matching turquoise T-shirts with the words Only Young Once printed in fuchsia pink.
“Who’s that?” Gabi asked, leaning toward Barra. “Do you know her? Because she looks like she’s coming straight for us.”
Barra didn’t have time to explain or run away or tell Gabi to stop staring as if she’d just spotted a UFO.
Allie had already reached them.
“I can’t believe this,” Allie said, panting slightly. She had a Louis Vuitton Keepall slung over her shoulder, Golden Goose sneakers on her feet, and she wore a cropped cashmere zip-hoodie in dove grey with Alto track pants. A slim tennis bracelet flashed at her wrist.
Reluctantly, Barra pressed her palms against the cool metal seat and pushed herself upright. She’d pinch herself if she had any doubt that she wasn’t completely awake.
“Hi, Allie,” she said politely, and was grateful Allie hadn’t closed the gap for a hug.
Although Barra’s luggage was strewn carelessly on the floor between them, which was probably the reason.
She wondered if now was a good time to apologize for the vomit-and-bolt she’d subjected Allie to four months ago.
No, she decided. She didn’t want to relive that night. Not one part of it. She was mortified.
“I almost didn’t recognize you with your hoodie,” Allie said, laughing so loud the teal shirt group turned their heads to look at them.
“But I wasn’t going to make the same mistake again.
I read about that thing once, you know, where people don’t recognize faces.
Proso... prosopagnosia, I think it’s called.
Honestly, I thought I had it for a second. ”
Barra forced a smile. She hoped that by keeping quiet, Allie might get the hint to leave her alone.
“Are you flying to Costa Rica for Season Seven of Outlast Her?” Allie asked, dropping her voice to a whisper.
Barra suppressed an inward groan. “I am,” she said, looking over her shoulder for the handlers who were meant to be hovering nearby.
If they were there, they were doing a terrible job.
“And since I assume you are as well, you should know that we’re not actually allowed to talk.
” Her tone was so icy that it even surprised her.
But it was the truth. They technically weren’t allowed to talk.
The handbook had made it strikingly clear that there was to be no interaction between contestants before game day.
Not that the rule had ever bothered her.
During Season Five, Barra had on several occasions tried to communicate with the other contestants.
Allie wasn’t doing anything Barra hadn’t done before.
She shouldn’t be this bothered. But then again, this whole thing with Dominique, well, she hadn’t been herself in a long time. A really long time.
“Oh,” Allie said, her expression falling.
“It’s in the handbook,” Barra said, not sure why she felt the need to explain.
Allie nodded and smiled thinly. “You’re right,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to get you into any trouble.” Then she turned around and walked away before Barra could apologize for being such a total bitch. Which she had been.
Gabi seemed to think so too because she rounded on Barra the minute Barra plopped back into the seat. “Who was that? And why did it look like you just slapped that poor woman in the face?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I’m sorry, my friend,” Gabi shot. “You will talk about it, and you will tell me every little detail.” Then her face lit up like a lightbulb. “Is that the woman from Dominique’s wedding, the one you hooked up with but refused to give me any more details?”
Barra didn’t say anything. Though sometimes silence was louder than words.
Gabi gasped. “She’s gorgeous,” she said, sounding flabbergasted. “And did you see her necklace? It’s one of Anita Ko’s signature pieces.”
Barra hadn’t paid attention to her necklace. She’d been too busy trying not to remember how Allie’s lips had felt against hers. Barra found it strangely vital to forget everything about Dominique’s wedding, and that included Allie’s face between her legs.
“Why were you so rude to her?” Gabi asked when Barra didn’t reply. “She seemed perfectly nice. And since when are you rude to anyone? You’re like the nicest person I know.”
Barra felt her chest tighten. She glanced toward the security checkpoint where Allie had just reached the conveyor belt and slid her Louis Vuitton into one of the grey plastic trays.
A minute ago, she’d been all smiles, but now she looked like Barra had snuffed her light.
“Do you think she’s offended?” she asked, scraping her cheeks with her nails.
“Hell yes.”
“Shit,” Barra muttered, feeling awful. Gabi was right.
Barra was usually quite pleasant. But then again, usually was the key word.
There hadn’t been anything usual about her life for some time now.
Not since Dominique had slipped a ring onto someone else’s finger and Barra had lain awake night after night convincing herself that her soulmate was taken by someone else, and she was doomed to loneliness.
“You have to apologize to her,” Gabi said, sipping her coffee.
“I will,” Barra said, but she didn’t say when, and thankfully Gabi didn’t get the chance to ask her when she’d do it, because a man wearing all black with a cropped head of dark hair and electric blue eyes walked toward them.
“Barbara Jones,” the man said, nodding toward her. “I’m Ricky. Your handler. Please say your goodbyes; we’ll be heading through security now and straight into departures.”
Barra’s throat went dry.
This was it.