Chapter Sixteen
Life at camp had become increasingly miserable as the rain settled in.
It didn’t fall so much as hammer down in thick sheets.
Their shelter’s roof had caved in twice.
Barra had figured out how to reinforce it.
Something about lashing a second beam across the top and wedging a flat slab of rock beneath one corner, but it hadn’t interested Allie so much as cowering under a palm tree while rainwater dripped down her back.
Even the next reward challenge had been postponed until the weather cleared up.
Apparently, after Season Five’s incident where Isla Stone had sustained a concussion and a broken bone during one of the challenges, safety was of the utmost importance.
But Allie could understand why. The ground was a slick muddy mess that had actually swallowed Allie’s Gucci Ace trainers last night on the way to Moon Pit.
She’d only left them because the rain had come down so hard she’d been blinded.
She could only imagine what the mud would do if one tried to run through it.
And then there was the ocean, now rough and violent, all churning grey and white foam, far too dangerous for any challenges.
Allie shuddered at the thought of wading into it and pulled her knees closer to her chest. A drop slid through a weak point in the roof and landed cold on her knee.
Allie used to love the rain.
Winters on the East Coast were cold, grey, and damp.
But back then, bad weather meant something entirely different.
It meant staying inside her parents’ townhouse where all three fireplaces were always going out while Mara drifted from room to room to coax them back to life before they even thought of dying out.
It meant curling up in the window seat of her bedroom with a book face down on her lap, watching droplets race down the glass while Mara brought her hot chocolate smothered in Jet-Puffed mini marshmallows.
It meant binge-watching TV in the living room under layers of wool blankets while her parents were still at Mount Sinai Hospital.
It meant a long bath with steam fogging up the mirrors and a self-made avocado and honey treatment mask clinging to her face while Stacie Orrico pondered that there should be more to life through Allie’s iPod Nano earphones.
Rain had been a luxury then.
“How long is this still going to go on?” Tilly asked, dragging her fingers down her cheeks. Her skin had that tight, puffy look of someone who hadn’t slept a wink last night. No one had. Not with the very real threat that the shelter was going to succumb to the rain.
“It can end today,” Toph said, pulling the sleeves of her hoodie down over her hands. “Or it could go on for another few days. Storms are relatively common here this time of year. I’m not quite sure of the statistics, but I do recall reading up—”
“I don’t care about your statistics, Toph,” Tilly groaned, hanging her head between her knees. “No offence,” she added quickly, not that Toph looked offended. “But I just don’t think I can take it anymore.”
“It’s not that bad,” Valerie said. She had a few strips of palm fronds spread out across her lap and was braiding them together. Into what, Allie had absolutely no idea.
“That’s easy for you to say,” Tilly snapped, her head snapping with it. “Didn’t you say you grew up in Alaska? The weather’s always miserable there. You must be used to it.”
“That’s an exaggeration,” Valerie said, not rising to it the way she usually would.
Ever since Sutton had gone home, something about her had softened.
Something Allie couldn’t quite figure out, but she didn’t prod.
It was best to let sleeping dogs lie. Anyway, Valerie had actually begun to grow on Allie.
Just yesterday, when the rain had come down at its hardest, Valerie had broken into It’s Raining Men but swapped the lyrics to It’s Raining Women, Hallelujah.
The Weather Girls should seriously consider the update.
“Alaska can be very pleasant,” Valerie went on.
“Especially in Anchorage. In the summer it barely gets dark. We used to go hiking at midnight and paddle out onto the lake when the water was glassy. In winter, we’d go cross-country skiing and ice fishing, and sometimes we’d all get in a car and drive for hours chasing the northern lights.
” She tightened a knot in the strip of palm frond she was working with.
“I’ve been in Florida since I was twenty, so no, I’m not used to this kind of weather. ”
Tilly only huffed.
Elodie, who had been silently staring at the sky, stuck her hand out from under the shelter and faced her palm upward. Rain immediately flattened against her skin.
Everyone watched it in mild despair.
“When I was twenty-three,” she said, her voice just loud enough to be heard over the rain.
“I spent my entire life savings hiking Machu Picchu. At that time in my life, I couldn’t even afford a coffee at the airport.
I just had enough for the flights and the permits and the local guide and his donkey.
” She paused, and Allie could already tell where this was going.
Poor Elodie. “It poured. Like biblical flooding. I saw exactly five feet in front of me the entire time. And I mean, the entire time.”
“That’s a bummer,” Allie said, though her sympathy was minimal. She never understood how anyone could pay to hike up a mountain. Surely the risks outweighed the benefits.
“I went to Machu Picchu, but I actually have no idea what it looks like,” Elodie muttered. “It is a bummer.”
Anna pulled her knees to her chest. “I got caught in a storm in Greece. It was right after I won my season and decided to treat myself to a solo holiday,” she said.
“I was on a ferry. The waves were so bad that they shut down half the coast after we got to shore. Everyone was throwing up except me. Including a woman with whom I was flirting. She was from Iceland and had never heard of Outlast Her. I was explaining to her that I’d won.
The next minute, she was doubled over and her chewed-up lunch was on the floor. ”
Allie turned to Barra and caught her eye.
She deserved a shiny gold medal for not bursting out laughing.
Wasn’t that exactly what had happened between them, give or take a few details?
Barra bit at her bottom lip as if she were holding in her laugh too.
Then she winked, and Allie felt her stomach swoop round and round.
“That’s horrible,” Tilly said flatly. “Worse than Elodie’s Machu Picchu story.”
“How is that worse?” Elodie asked, frowning so deeply her pink eyebrows nearly touched in the middle. “The only picture I got after four days of hiking was of a cloud of mist. It’s definitely worse.”
“It shows that you’ve never had anyone vomit in your lap,” Allie pointed out, feeling oddly brazen. Was it weird that the talk of vomit brought back memories of Big Sur? Or that Allie suddenly felt an urge to sneak off in the rain to kiss Barra. To have her Notebook moment.
Elodie turned to her. “And you have?”
“I’ve lived a full life,” Allie replied with a straight face.
There was a pause, then a ripple of laughter shot through the shelter like a cannon.
Then, as if a tap had been turned down, the sheets of water raining down thinned into a drizzle.
The sky right above their heads turned from charcoal to a light grey, and some clouds even dragged themselves apart.
Allie felt like she could finally hear herself think now that the rain wasn’t hammering down on the shelter. What was she thinking?
Allie leaned over just a smidge until her shoulder bumped into Barra’s shoulder.
When she was certain she had Barra’s attention, she said, “I think I’m going to take this gap and head to Moon Pit before it starts pelting again.
The last thing I need is to...” She cut herself off.
Too much explanation was a dead giveaway that she was up to no good.
And yes, she most certainly planned to be up to no good in a few minutes.
“You’re going to have to be quick,” Tilly said, frowning up at the sky. “The last gap lasted two minutes. I don’t think this one will be any longer.”
Judging by the way the clouds were already beginning to regroup, Allie suspected Tilly was right.
But she also suspected she didn’t care. Rain wouldn’t bother her all that much when she had Barra’s mouth on her lips, or maybe even somewhere else.
Then, before anyone could offer any more of their opinions, she ducked out of the shelter.
ALLIE WALKED TOWARD Moon Pit with a purpose.
She passed the roots of a giant buttress tree and then veered left around a cluster of trees with pale, peeling trunks and tangled aerial roots that hung down like loose threads over the small clearing.
When she got to the flat slab of stone near the base of a walking palm, just before you entered Moon Pit, Allie stopped.
Barra had hidden the brownies there, tucked so far back no one would ever find them, even if they were desperately looking for them.
Mostly because everyone who visited Moon Pit came with a deeply functional purpose and no desire to linger for longer than necessary.
Which made it, according to Barra’s logic, the safest possible place around camp.
Allie had initially found the idea questionable, but even she had to admit it was genius.
“Tell me the truth, Allie.”
Barra’s voice slipped in behind her like an unexpected hand at her back, which was funny because Allie had expected her. She hadn’t doubted for a second that Barra would follow. She only wondered how long it would take. Not long at all, apparently.
Allie turned and smiled.
Barra’s hair was damp and pulled back in a slightly unraveling bun. Her skin was rain-slick and dewy, and her smile was so bright it made up for the missing sun.
“And what truth is that?” Allie asked, knowing full well this was a tease.
A little foreplay to what was coming, and Allie was more than willing to play along.
She liked this version of Barra. The voice, the slightly strict tone.
.. it did something to Allie. She even imagined Barra in a white button-down and fitted black dress slacks, hair pulled back tight, brandishing one of those leather whips you saw only in headmistress fantasies.
Wait. Was Allie having a headmistress fantasy moment? Ha, yes. It appeared she was.
“Did you ask me here so that you could eat more brownies?” Barra asked, raising one eyebrow sternly, the other flattening out. “Or is there another reason?”
Allie didn’t answer. Something pounded between her hips.
It was a buzzing feeling only fingers could ease.
She stepped forward, grabbed the front of Barra’s damp T-shirt, and pulled her close enough to press their mouths together.
“I hope this answers your question,” she muttered against Barra’s lips.