Chapter 14
“Why are we going in the ocean? I’m not wearing the right thing,” Cassidy said, moving the loose strands of hair hanging in her face to look down at her cropped tank top and floral skirt.
“It doesn’t matter. It’ll dry,” James said, pulling his shirt over his head and tossing it down in the soft sand just before the hard pack of the ocean’s reach. “Put your phones here.”
“I think we should change, too,” Edie argued.
“And I think it’s really important that we get in the ocean right now,” he said with such force that Cassidy didn’t question him again. She slipped off her sandals and carefully placed her phone inside of one and used James’ shirt to protect it from the sun.
The water caught at Cassidy’s skirt, plastering the thin cotton to her ankles.
She yanked up on it until the hem was at knee height so that walking was easier and then met James where he stood in the waist-high water.
The cool waves shocked against her exposed mid drift, but she managed to stay upright in the soft, loose sand underwater.
“Okay, what are we doing?” she asked.
“Are you coming?” James called back to shore, where Edie stood, phone in hand, looking around for something or someone.
Then she sat, untied her shoes, removed her socks, and put everything into a tight group.
Edie put her phone next to the pile and then tiptoed out to the water in her athleisure set.
“What are we doing out here?” Edie asked.
“We’re avoiding being overheard. If it’s something on our phones, they can’t hear us out here,” James said.
“Okay, but if it’s not something in our mobiles, and they’re monitoring us some other way, we are kind of drawing attention to ourselves this way,” Edie said.
The beach just outside the medical tent was not particularly crowded, but there were a handful of people on the sand and a group swimming in the water only about 50 feet from them.
When Cassidy turned to look, no one appeared to be watching them or taking their photographs, but run-ins with paparazzi before had taught her that just because they can see you doesn’t mean you can always see them.
“We need to come up with a plan quickly and they can’t bug the ocean,” James said.
“A plan for what?” Cassidy asked.
“Figuring out what the hell is going on. Whatever this is—this coverup or whatever—it seems to involve everyone on the island.”
“But why?” Edie asked.
James shrugged.
“Okay, but even if all those people are part of some conspiracy, that doesn’t explain why Apricot doesn’t remember Daisy. What if it is something in the food? Or the drinks or something?” Cassidy asked.
“I don’t think so. I know I suggested that,” Edie said. “But I’ve been drinking like a fish since I got here, and I’m fine. I mean, I’m not fine, but you know what I mean,” Edie said.
James nodded “Same here. I don’t think it’s the food.”
Cassidy watched two women lying next to one another in bikinis pass something between the two of them. It looked like a phone, but then one woman put it to her mouth and let loose a cloud of vapor. “What about the drugs that have been getting passed around?”
Edie and James both shook their heads.
“I don’t think it’s the drugs. Like, I’m not na?ve and I don’t think the medics weren’t taking any drugs over the last few days, but I don’t think they could still function if drugs were making them forget things that quickly,” Edie said.
“Drugs also wouldn’t explain what’s going on with all the videos and photos getting changed. ”
“Do you think all that is still AI?” Cassidy asked, directing her question to James.
He paused, arms crossed over his chest. “I’m not sure anymore ...” he slowly admitted.
Both women eyed him closely, waiting for him to finish his thought.
“What do you think it is, then?” Edie asked.
James raised his hands to his head, elbows spread wide in a fake stretch, and looked around.
Although no one came any closer to the group, he lowered his voice to answer.
“If they’re keeping us from calling off of the island, maybe they’re controlling what’s coming into the island as well.
It could be that everyone knows something we don’t, and maybe people even know about Ryan LeHane because of Cassidy’s video and similar stuff that got posted about it, but we don’t know that they know. ”
“You’re making my fucking head spin. What are you trying to say?” Edie asked, pinching the bridge of her nose.
“Have you two looked at which of your posts have been changed and which have been left alone?”
“None of mine have changed.” Edie answered so quickly that Cassidy nearly questioned how she could be so sure.
“What kind of stuff have you been posting?” James asked.
Edie threw an errant braid over her shoulder. “Mostly just photos of Rose and I. Selfies. Paid ads. Stuff like that,” she answered in staccato, like she didn’t want to talk about it.
“So, personal stuff? Nothing really about the island, good or bad?”
Edie thought on it and sighed. “I mean, I’ve been saying I’m having fun, but no, not really.”
“What about you, what have you been posting?” James asked Cassidy.
“I mean, I haven’t been posting as much as Edie. A couple photos of Apricot and Daisy and me when we first got here, some pictures of the scenery and stuff. I’ve put a lot of videos in my stories, but I don’t really check them after I post them.”
Even thinking through her own posts, Cassidy couldn’t really recall the photos clearly or their throw away captions.
Nothing she posted was very telling, intentionally.
She wanted to be able to have a profile for friends to visit and to support people she liked publicly, but she really didn’t put very much online and having a presence on a public social media profile wasn’t important, especially during a festival.
“Here’s what I think. Someone with power is monitoring us and our posts. If they don’t like something we post, they change it, and if they like us or like something we post, then they’ll keep it. Maybe they’ll even do things for us in exchange for certain videos,” James said.
Edie narrowed her gaze at James.
“You really expect us to believe that? That you just posted a ‘rumor’?” she asked, making quotation marks with her fingers above the surface of the waves.
“He’s fucking with us, Cassidy. He’s full of shit.
He knew the set was going to change and Bad Bunny was going to headline and he’s trying to act like he didn’t to freak us out. ”
“If you were told something ahead of time, you can tell us here, and we’ll be the only ones to know,” Cassidy said to James, trying to sound more even keeled than Edie.
“Are you both going to attack me like Rose now?” James snapped.
“Edie I fucking get because she’s made it clear she doesn’t trust me if her fucking buddy doesn’t, but you, Cassidy?
Come on. I genuinely made up that rumor, okay?
I’m not fucking with you. I was testing what kind of lies I could get away with posting and what would be taken down.
I knew just as much as you two did and I wanted to do some experiments.
So, I made up the rumor that Bad Bunny was going to play, and he fucking did. ”
“It also could have just been a coincidence. Everyone on this island likes Bad Bunny and he wasn’t on the original set for the festival. Someone probably has an in with him or something,” Cassidy said.
“It could have been a coincidence, but what are the chances of that, really?” he asked.
“And what are the chances that someone with the ability to contact all of us, like, including big time celebrities like Brad King and Missy Lauder and Bad Bunny, what are the chances that you— no offence, but seriously, you?—fell into their good graces enough that they were monitoring you and decided that they should do what you asked?” Edie scoffed, crossing her arms, and raising a single eyebrow.
“I think,” James said with pointed articulation, “that I suggested something that was good for the festival, and so someone at the festival took notice and decided to pull some strings to make it happen. Think about it: What are all the things that you’ve noticed have changed since the first day here?
” He started pulling fingers down on his left hand with his right.
“The fat bikes everyone was biking into the ocean are gone, the food is better—”
“All of the waiters and waitresses are shirtless now or in bikini tops?” Cassidy said. “Is that ‘for the better?’”
“There are weird art installations around the island that weren’t here before and are getting tons of screentime,” James continued, ignoring her.
“The music lineup is supposed to start three hours earlier today, and at noon tomorrow, which is a full seven hours before it started on day one and means there are, like, twenty more artists playing.”
“I mean, the bathroom situation did get better for the people in tents. It was getting pretty Mad Max out there,” Edie said.
“Exactly,” James said, pointing a finger aggressively at Edie.
“But what does that prove?” Cassidy asked. “So, whoever is behind the festival has deep pockets and had no sense of what they wanted to do with this thing when it started, so what? What does that have to do with us?”
“I think if we suggest something that is good for the festival, that person with deep pockets might feel inclined to give it to us.”
Edie pointed an acrylic back to the shore with such force she splashed water up on James. “I thought you wanted us to stay away from our phones because we were being spied on,”
“Yeah,” James said, blocking himself with his hands from any more water droplets, “and we still need to be careful about the ways we use our phones and the things we do and don’t say around them, but maybe we can play the system a little bit and see where it gets us.”
“How?” Cassidy asked.