Chapter Seventeen
Isla hadn’t expected camp to feel so empty without Petra and Nadine. They had gone home at last night’s Sending, leaving one less pair around the fire and a strange quiet over camp.
She also hadn’t expected Aggie and Josie to unravel quite so fast. From the moment they’d gotten back to camp after The Sending, Aggie had been replaying the votes out loud, driving everyone mad.
Even Petra and Nadine’s customary reflection—everyone collectively agreed they would miss Petra’s dry sense of humor and Nadine’s floral bucket hat that she would wear so low over her eyes it was a wonder she could see where she was going—had felt tainted by Aggie making remarks like, “Petra didn’t deserve to go out like that,” and “We’re not those kinds of players. ”
And this morning, over cold rice and beans, she’d launched into a speech about loyalty. Frankie and Kendall had gone off to get firewood. Barra and Dominique had washed up at the creek, leaving only Isla, Tamsyn, and Josie at the shelter.
Isla loved Aggie as a person. She was funny and sweet. She complimented Isla’s hair every morning, even when it looked like she’d fought a tropical storm. But goodness, there was only so much blabbering about loyalty she could take.
This was a game, and everyone was out to win.
Isla and Tamsyn had done what was best for them, and besides, they’d had two votes cast against them last night. She didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to trace those back to the source.
Aggie plopped down beside Isla like a wet sack of potatoes.
It was late afternoon; the sun was hot but not suffocating. It was the level of heat that still pressed on her shoulders and the top of her head, but thankfully didn’t choke her to death.
Today there hadn’t been a reward challenge or a Sending and everyone was kind of lazing around. Barra and Kendall were napping in the shelter. Dominique was off to the watering well with everyone’s bottles, and Josie was meditating under a gum tree.
Isla was sitting a few feet from the creek, watching Tamsyn dip in and out of the water. She had her eye on her the same way a clingy baby with separation anxiety tracked their mother. Still there? Yes. Thank goodness.
“I’m a little disappointed in you,” Aggie said, nudging Isla’s knee. Her blue hair was beginning to grow out at the parting. Isla noticed blonde pushing through, which she hadn’t expected. Aggie’s eyes were deeper than dark chocolate.
“You are?” Isla said, already sighing mentally at the predictable path this conversation was about to take. Enough about loyalty.
“I get why you did it,” Aggie said, folding her arms around her bent knees. “Petra is a strong contender, Nadine too. But you could’ve at least given us some sort of heads-up about the advantage you found.”
“Then it wouldn’t have been a blindside,” Isla replied smoothly, smiling like she was explaining how to use TikTok to her grandmother. Both Petra and Nadine had been unquestionably blindsided.
Aggie clicked her tongue. “You haven’t changed much since Season One.”
For some reason, this was a slap in the face Isla hadn’t expected. She turned toward Aggie with a face that screamed what the fuck did you just say and was just about to ask that very question when Tamsyn waded up the bank toward them.
“What are you two hens clucking about?” She flicked her wet braids out of her face and then shook her whole body like a golden retriever fresh from the pond. Isla assumed it was muscle memory from when she grew up with three dogs.
“Isn’t that a country saying? Between the way you speak and those cowboy boots, one would think you grew up on a farm,” Aggie said, raising an eyebrow.
“You’re judging a book by its cover,” Tamsyn said, smiling.
Aggie laughed, which was a surprise. And so did Isla. Whatever tension in the air vanished like water off a duck’s back. Isla couldn’t stay angry with Aggie. Not when Tamsyn was around.
Since last night Isla’s insides felt permanently toasted, like she’d swallowed a mug of hot chocolate.
She’d heard people talk about the feeling of butterflies many times, but Isla had never felt a thing.
No buzz. No toasty warmth. Now, however, she did.
She even understood why Colbie Caillat sang that song; it starts in my toes, makes me crinkle my nose, wherever it goes I always know.
She’d perfectly described that giddy, warm, fluttery feeling of being in love.
Isla yanked that thought so quickly out of her head that she nearly flung herself forward. Thankfully, both Aggie and Tamsyn remained blissfully unaware that the L-word had popped into her head. Of course, she wasn’t in love.
“Well, I just think transparency goes both ways,” Aggie said, her tone snapping back to where it had been before Tamsyn appeared.
Isla’s smile thinned to a line. “This is a game,” she said. Why couldn’t Aggie wrap her blue head around that?
“Sure,” Aggie agreed. “And Josie and I have kept things to ourselves.” She picked up a stick and cracked it in half with just her thumb and forefinger. “Like that little chat we had during the reward challenge, you know... about the two of you.”
This was true. Aggie, Josie, Petra, and Nadine had never once mentioned the discussion they’d had during that first reward challenge. None of the other contestants knew that Isla and Tamsyn had hooked up before the game, or that they were currently sneaking out to trees near the clearing at night.
“What are you saying?” Tamsyn frowned. The sun was directly behind her, which put most of Tamsyn’s face in a shadow. But even so, Isla could see the surprise in the way her eyebrows pulled tightly together.
“Just... remembering our little chat,” Aggie said, her tone sweet as nectar. But really, she was just reminding them that she knew about their hookup, and that knowledge was leverage.
“Aggie, are you seriously trying to threaten us?” Isla asked, completely shocked that the mother of twin toddlers would resort to blackmail.
Aggie smiled, then pushed herself up. “I’m just saying,” she said, dusting her hands on the back of her mom jeans. “Anyway, I should probably tend to the fire. The beans and rice won’t cook themselves.”
Then she walked away, and at the same time, Tamsyn plopped down beside Isla.
Their shoulders brushed. Tamsyn was still wet.
Droplets of creek water glinted on her sun-warmed skin.
Isla wanted to slide a palm along the curve of her back or even better trace the water droplets along her collarbone, but Aggie’s words made her freeze.
“Don’t worry about her,” Tamsyn said, smiling so serenely that Isla melted like a hot fudge sundae on a sunny day. She was right. There was no reason to worry. Aggie was more of a house cat than a lion. Her bite didn’t really matter.
“SHH,” TAMSYN MUTTERED.
“Where are we going?” Isla asked when Tamsyn pulled her right past the last gum tree that bordered Moon Pit.
Beyond the trees, the ground sloped gently upward and was dotted with low scrub and sandstone boulders taller than both of them. Moonlight spilled over the rocks in silvery patches and illuminated tufts of spinifex. As always, the stars were magnificent.
“This feels like a scene from a horror movie,” Isla added. “Are you planning to kill me, skin me, and wear me like a leather jacket? I know you like leather.”
Tamsyn laughed but didn’t answer. Instead, she led Isla to a flat slab of sandstone jutting from the earth.
There were several smaller rocks beneath it, forming makeshift steps.
Tamsyn hopped up first, then gallantly extended her hand for Isla to take, which she did, even though she didn’t need it.
But she’d take any excuse to hold Tamsyn’s hand.
“And now,” Tamsyn said. “For the reason I lugged this backpack along.” She set it down, unfastened the drawstrings, and then pulled out clothing item after clothing item. Some of which weren’t even hers.
“Is that Barra’s Gryffindor sweatshirt?” Isla asked, pointing to the maroon and gold cotton sweatshirt draped over Tamsyn’s arm.
Tamsyn smiled and tugged it free. “She’s wearing the Slytherin one to bed.
It’s not like she’ll miss it.” Then she laid the sweatshirt on the stone and started arranging the rest of the clothes into a lopsided square.
One lilac sweater became a plumped-up pillow.
Another soft grey hoodie got folded into the other.
“A stargazing blanket made of clothes,” Isla said, smirking. “Classy.”
“Shush,” Tamsyn teased and sat down on one end. She patted the spot beside her for Isla to sit. Isla didn’t hesitate. She took up the space beside Tamsyn like it was only hers to take. Every inch of her right side was connected to Tamsyn’s left. Shoulder, hip, thigh.
“I feel like this counts as our first date,” Isla said, intertwining her fingers with Tamsyn’s. She rested their entangled hands on her lap. “And I feel very cheesy for saying that out loud.”
Tamsyn turned to look at her. “There’s nothing cheesy about a first date,” she said, her lips curling into a smile so gorgeous that Isla was surprised she hadn’t leaned in to kiss her yet.
But it was at that moment that Isla let herself imagine a real date with Tamsyn.
No cameras. No alliances. No red dust and snakes.
Just the two of them in actual clothes in an actual city, doing something as wildly normal as choosing where to eat.
“If we were in Santa Monica right now, and we had the whole day together, what would you want to do?” Isla asked.
Tamsyn snorted out a laugh. “Are you asking me out on a hypothetical date, Isla Stone?”
Isla rolled her eyes. Still, she couldn’t help a tiny flicker of insecurity from rising up in her chest. And instead of brushing that comment off like a crumb on her top, she asked, “You do want to take me on a real date, right?”
“Of course I do,” Tamsyn said quickly, over-correcting. “I can’t imagine anything better right now than asking you out on a real date.”
Isla beamed. “So, tell me, what would we do on this date?” she asked, leaning into Tamsyn.
“Well,” Tamsyn said, then took a second to think about it. “Since we’re doing a hypothetical, we can assume the weather is absolutely perfect.”
“Naturally,” Isla replied. In her dreams, the weather was always moderately warm and sunny. Surely this should be no different.
“I’ll pick you up in the morning and we’ll grab coffee from Dogtown. You’ll complain about waking up early, and I’ll ignore you and suggest we walk our coffees down to the beach before it gets crowded.”
“I don’t like crowded beaches,” Isla said, feeling so giddy she could quite possibly be drunk. Was that possible? To be drunk without even a sip of alcohol?
“I assumed so,” Tamsyn replied, looking like she was bursting to smile. Then she continued. “It’s early enough for the marine layer to hang low, turning everything soft and grey. We’ll sit in the sand with our shoes off and pretend we’re the only people awake in the city.”
This time Isla didn’t speak. She just watched Tamsyn’s mouth move.
“Then we’ll rent bikes and ride the Strand all the way down toward Venice Beach,” she went on.
“You’ll pretend you’re not competitive when you absolutely are.
Then we’d walk the little bridges of the Venice Canals and make up backstories for the houses as if we lived there.
You’d pick something modern and monstrous, and I’d choose something with plants and peeling paint. ”
“What about food?” Isla asked. Not only were her hips quaking at their hypothetical date, but her stomach was rumbling too.
“We’ll do lunch at The Great White,” Tamsyn said. “I’ll get the crispy chicken sandwich, and you can get the fish tacos, although you’ll probably end up stealing my pickles.”
“I don’t like pickles.”
“You would that day,” Tamsyn said calmly, and Isla believed her. She’d love pickles that day. “In the afternoon, we’d wander Abbot Kinney Boulevard, and you’d say you don’t need anything but end up buying a ceramic mug and a hand-poured candle that smells like lemongrass and lavender.”
“That sounds like me.”
“Late afternoon, we’d head back to Santa Monica, to Palisades Park, and we’d sit on one of those benches overlooking the water. I’d kiss you smitten, while the sun turned the sky gold.”
“Sounds romantic,” Isla said, because she couldn’t help herself. What could possibly be better than being kissed smitten under a golden sky?
Tamsyn winked, then went on. “Supper is Tar & Roses,” she said. “We’ll sit at the bar and share small plates of chili crab cake, ricotta gnocchi, and yellowtail crudo with white soy, and we’ll order a wine we can’t pronounce.”
“And after?” Please let there be an after, Isla thought. Her breath was all raspy and wanting, but she didn’t care. She didn’t have to care. Not with Tamsyn.
“After, I’ll take you back to my apartment,” Tamsyn said.
Isla’s heart thudded in her chest. Yes. Yes. Yes.
“Then I’ll put on music, maybe something light like The Lumineers or Lord Huron, and I’ll pour us each a glass of wine. The good stuff. I keep a bottle of Belle Glos for special occasions.”
Isla felt honored.
“We’ll then dance around my living room while the moon shines through the window. Nice and slow to the beat of Stubborn Love.” Tamsyn reached up and tipped Isla’s chin upward. “And then I’d kiss you.”
And she did.
Tamsyn kissed Isla so senselessly that the rock fell away and the sky too, and somehow they were a thousand miles away in Tamsyn’s apartment in Santa Monica.