Chapter 13 Season 20, Episode 1 “The Viper Room” #2
Perhaps not expecting Chrissy to so explicitly blow the subtext to smithereens, Greta’s simper briefly faltered as the cameraman stepped closer, but I’d be damned if I let any more of this crap slide, no matter how much sway Chrissy or her boyfriend held.
“Erika’s as much a woman as anyone here,” I replied tightly.
“That seems obvious, and I’ve barely met her. ”
Chrissy squinted at me dimly, as if only just noticing I was there (entirely possible), but Greta swiftly changed course. “Always such a gentleman, this one. Oh! New eyeliner, Chris?”
Suddenly rapid Russian cut through the room, and a screaming Tati burst from the kitchen, her turquoise troll kaftan billowing.
Out of nowhere, a bust of the Virgin Mary sailed through the air behind her, shattering one of the glass doors to the pool, and a totally wasted Vanessa stumbled in.
“Next time I won’t miss, you Soviet cow!
” she cried as Royce shoved past her, rushing to comfort Tati.
“Vanessa, we weren’t flirting! I was literally just talking to her!” Royce snapped.
Her spirits renewed, Greta eagerly stood on tiptoe to reach my ear. “Okay, so Royce and Linda Blair over there had a showmance last season, at least until she bitch-slapped him, Camdon, and PB in a drunken stupor. Now the fans call her the Loch Ness Monster on social.”
PB appeared at Vanessa’s side, but she pushed him off. “No! No more playing savior!”
“Ness, just let me help—”
“You only ‘help’ when it’s convenient. You’re no different than any scumbag here.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Actually I do, and you can fly your parents to New York for more half-ass interventions, but it won’t change that I’m a drunk.
I’m done letting you screw me over on TV, then ride your white horse in off camera.
So quit embarrassing yourself and spare Ellen and Hank the round trip in coach, you cheap prick.
You’re not my friend,” she sneered. “You’re nobody’s friend. ”
I couldn’t help but wince on PB’s behalf as Zara arrived to grimly eye the wreckage, architectural and otherwise. “Okay, let’s pause this. Nobody move until the glass is gone.”
Never one to skip attention, Greta raised a hand. “Zara, are we sure it’s”—she exaggeratedly mouthed the word safe—“for us to be around her tonight?”
Vanessa’s wild, drunken eyes blazed at a new target. “Oh, fuck off, you hag! You ignorant shits aren’t any better than me! Aspen punched his own father live on primetime, and that Cajun twat robbed half the Gulf region with her bogus cleft palate charity.”
“Miles of Smiles was not bogus!” Solana interjected, scandalized.
PB tried again to lead Vanessa upstairs, but she rounded on him violently. “STOP your phony bullshit! You don’t want me here! I went in three Trials last season, even though you promised I wouldn’t. Because Paul-Bryan always chooses the cash first. Right, Jiamin?”
But Jiamin evacuated quickly as PB finally snapped. “Fine, Ness, you win! Wanna get slap happy like last time and catch the first plane back to America?”
“Don’t you dare play the victim. No one here’s a victim…” She trailed off, gears slowing as she shuffled toward me, inexplicably burying her face in my chest. I tentatively consoled her, though I felt like I’d just been gifted a freshly lit Molotov cocktail.
“Vanessa, upstairs now, or we talk damage fines,” Zara said evenly. Vanessa groaned, involuntary tears tracing her face while we ushered her to the staircase. And we almost made it.
“Now that’s the bitch to vote in first,” Chrissy snidely muttered to Greta, and though Vanessa was hammered, she was not deaf.
“I knew it!” Vanessa lunged at Chrissy, messy hair splayed like Medusa as I struggled to restrain her. “I knew you’d all still go after me, you redneck cunt!”
Chrissy remained as unfussed as ever. “Great, hit me. Then you can go home and finally blow your brains out in some shitty little Staten Island SRO.”
I’d heard—and said—some repulsive things on this show, but this was a new low. Even Hartt looked stunned by his girlfriend, the entire room shifting uncomfortably. Vanessa defiantly held Chrissy’s gaze, then escaped my grasp, shooting up the stairs like a lightning bolt.
“I have a self-harm concern! Security to the second floor now!” Zara screamed into her walkie as she pursued Vanessa alongside an ashen PB.
“Please, she’s too obsessed with herself to commit suicide,” Chrissy said defensively to an unusually quiet Greta.
My fists clenched as she rattled on, my brain cruelly dragging me where it did any time someone mentioned suicide, like I was twenty-six again and sobbing in Barnes’ arms. I breathed through the rage boiling inside me, straining to focus on anything other than Chrissy’s ignorant rambling, but all I noticed was Imogen observing me, her face unreadable.
We both glanced away when Vanessa abruptly reappeared, elbowing past crew and cast alike, her pillowcase gripped like a sack. “Here’s what happens when you fuck me over, bitch!”
I realized then that pillowcase was not empty.
She launched it, fabric unfolding in midair to reveal a knotted collection of four very pissed snakes from the Tribulation—that landed smack on Chrissy and Greta.
The entire room dissolved into madness as Vanessa cackled maniacally, the chaos queen reigning supreme.
Vanessa had smuggled the snakes from the Arena in her trench coat.
Who knows how long she’d intended to keep her impromptu arsenal, but her suspicions of betrayal hadn’t been unfounded.
Now all that remained was whether she’d be kicked off the show.
Greta and Chrissy insisted Vanessa had broken the show’s no-violence policy, but PB fervently countered Vanessa hadn’t technically laid hands on anyone.
Even the snakes were alive. Nonetheless, Vanessa had been sequestered with Zara and PB in the production office while network legal was consulted.
As the cast retired, Troy stopped me, eyes bloodshot and even his energy finally fading.
“Luke, it’s 8:00 p.m. in DC if you want to call home? ”
I nodded, too drained to confront him about my spot on Team Devil, but then realized Vanessa’s whole face of makeup was smeared across my shirt. “Just let me change first?”
I walked into the room where I’d claimed my bed to discover most of Team Angel making a final toast. Erika, Jiamin, Royce, Camdon, Shawn, Balthazar, and (naturally) Imogen stared back. I hesitantly raised a hand in greeting. “Hi, I’m Luke… if you don’t know me.”
Balthazar’s pink faux-hawk came at me like a machete. “No way! Get out, you bigot!”
“Bal, you’re drunk, it’s late,” Erika said softly.
“Erika, you owe him nothing! It’s insulting he’s even here… Imogen, back me up!”
Imogen sighed. I couldn’t tell what she resented more: my presence or getting roped into this debate. “You should probably go.”
“There weren’t any other open beds.”
“Then sleep on the ground,” Bal spat. “Like the Republican dog you are.”
“Look, my ex-husband and I are not the same—”
“Oh, do not sell me that shit, you equivocating motherfucker. I said get out!” Balthazar furiously grabbed my nearest bag, slamming it to the floor.
Glass audibly cracked inside, and I knew instantly.
My spine crumbled as I crouched down, unzipping the bag to fish out the broken frame with the kids’ photo.
Snapped popsicle sticks scrawled in Andie’s handwriting clattered to the tile, and I knelt to retrieve the lost pieces.
Poor Erika joined me with a pained look.
“Sorry, my daughter made it,” I managed to say.
“Wonder what she’ll do once she learns how many lives her fathers ruined,” Bal prodded.
“Don’t bring his kids into this!” Jiamin said from her bunk. “Kids are off the table.”
“Oh, are we protecting kids? What about protecting the trans kids this asshole’s husband wants to use the wrong bathroom?
I’m glad you have the privilege of not knowing what HB623 is, because that legislation is the handiwork of Barnes Appleby.
So maybe think about the shit he’s made strangers’ kids endure.
I can only imagine how he’s fucked up his own. ”
I should have leapt at his throat. The last few weeks I’d felt so much rage—at Barnes, his lawyer, myself—but now I had nothing. Bal was right.
Sticky lukewarm liquid suddenly cascaded through my hair, lime-green rivulets slicing across my arms as Balthazar poured margarita mix over me and my open luggage.
Troy and a cameraman had arrived, but I’d concede no reaction.
Instead my eyes were rapt on the terra-cotta tiles where a piece of Andie’s frame still lay, the snapped stick reading “ily” in blue marker, severed from its “fam.” I grabbed it, reminding myself, This is for them.
“Put me in a Trial with him!” Bal went on. “I’ll send Uncle Tom where he belongs!”
“Okay,” Troy interrupted. “That’s enough—”
“Don’t even get me started with you! You’re rewarding him with a platform, making us all complicit in the conservative agenda—”
“Bal, you know this won’t air.”
“I still want some accountability, Troy! How can you allow this as a gay man?!”
I inhaled sharply. Learning Troy was gay explained a lot, and Bal wasn’t wrong. Why would Troy advocate for me? Unless he’d lured me here specifically to make me look bad?
“Try making your points without breaking the fourth wall,” Troy replied coldly.
“He blew the fucking fourth wall to high hell years ago!”
I felt it coming, and I could only brace myself.
“Arjun Bhaduri killed himself because Luke Griffin outed him to the entire world!”
I’d never actually heard anyone say that sentence aloud, but there it was after all this time. If only they knew I’d done so much worse than out him.