Chapter Twenty
It was Tamsyn’s turn to clean the rice pot.
Last night Dominique had burnt the rice to an absolute crisp, which meant the bottom was lacquered in a thick black crust that would require extreme effort.
But Tamsyn wasn’t complaining. It gave her something to do with her hands while her thoughts ran wild.
She kept replaying last night, adjusting each moment as if it were editable footage.
If Tamsyn had been brave enough, she would’ve asked the only question that mattered: Do you want to be my girlfriend?
She wedged the pot between her boots and dragged the edge of a flat stone across the bottom. The metallic scraping sound nearly split her ears in half.
Scenario one involved Isla saying yes immediately.
No hesitation. Just yes, and then maybe she would’ve laughed a little, like it had been obvious all along.
Because, of course, they were always going to end up as girlfriends.
Tamsyn had no idea if people even used that term anymore because she hadn’t had an official girlfriend in ages.
In her make-believe scenario, they would have kissed again.
A kiss that would feel like the beginning of something bright and glorious.
Tamsyn adjusted her grip around the stone and dragged it slowly until the brittle strip of char curled up like a ribbon.
Scenario two wasn’t as pretty. Isla would’ve blinked, not unkindly or cruelly.
Just surprised. Then she would’ve tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear to buy time and said something carefully like, “I really like what this is.” Which was basically just another way of saying let’s not ruin it by naming it.
Tamsyn scraped again, harder. Way harder.
Because scenario three made her stomach twist into a pretzel.
In this version, Isla would’ve kissed her exactly the same way she had last night, and then she would have gently redirected.
“Let’s not define it. Let’s just see where things go,” she would have said.
Which was just a romantic stall to keep things suspended in the glittering unreality of Outlast Her, where nothing could possibly survive real life.
A thick shard of black crust finally flaked free.
Tamsyn tipped the pot toward the light. Ugh, it wasn’t even close to clean!
“Do you need help?” A voice suddenly asked.
Tamsyn tilted her head up to see Barra standing with her hands on her hips.
She was dressed in a black sports bra and matching cycling tights.
Her Hawaiian shirt hung open and fluttered in the soft breeze.
“Yes,” Tamsyn said, nodding, though she wasn’t sure scrubbing the rice pot was a two-person job.
Barra didn’t seem to think so either because she plopped down onto a rock jutting out of the ground at an angle and proceeded to pick up a stick, which she cracked in half. She took one half and stuck it between her teeth like those old-time gunslingers in a western.
“Did I ever tell you the story about when I fell in love in Venice?” Barra asked, glancing at Isla over her long eyelashes. Out of everyone at camp, Barra had the longest, thickest eyelashes. “I think I’ve told it to a couple of people by now, but I can never keep track.”
Tamsyn shook her head. Her one-on-one conversations with Barra had covered TikTok mukbang influencers, the best series in the world, Deadloch, and one heated political debate that had sent them both to cool off in the creek.
She would have remembered a story about Barra falling in love in Venice.
It sounded like the title of a romance novel she’d bought at the airport bookstore but never got to read.
“Well, I was twenty-two and on exchange in Italy. My grad school had one of those semester swap programs,” Barra said, settling more comfortably onto the rock.
“Grad school?” Tamsyn blurted out before she could stop herself. For some reason, Tamsyn had it in her head that Barra was a river-rafting instructor or a wilderness guide. Something rugged and outdoorsy.
“Architecture. I’m an architect. I do public builds mostly. Museums. Civic centers. Big cultural projects. I was part of the design team for the Hudson Point Contemporary in New York.”
There was a brief but disorienting reshuffling happening in Tamsyn’s brain. Barra designed museums. What the hell? It felt so wrong, but at the same time, she couldn’t unsee Barra stooped over blueprints with a pencil tucked behind her pierced ear.
“Anyway,” she said, waving off Tamsyn’s shock. “I met her in a library. Gabriella Berlusconi. She was a local studying restoration. Mostly old buildings and churches. She corrected my pronunciation of Tintoretto without even looking up from her book.”
Tamsyn was clearly frowning because the next second Barra was saying, “Tintoretto was a sixteenth-century Italian painter who was known for these enormous dramatic paintings of biblical scenes. The figures were always falling or reaching.”
“Oh,” Tamsyn said, nodding though she didn’t give a flying fuck who Tintoretto was. Barra needed to get back to the story, to where she fell in love in Venice.
Barra sucked the inside of her cheek for a second before she said, “We started running into each other everywhere. The same café near Campo Santa Margherita. The same vaporetto stop. Once in the rain under the Rialto. I had an umbrella, and she didn’t, and that was when it all just clicked.
From then on, we were inseparable. We spent every night together wandering the piazzas.
One weekend we had sex on every surface in her tiny apartment.
I don’t think I even wore clothes once when we were at her apartment.
I thought I loved her,” Barra added. “But then the semester ended, and real life was not as poetic as Venice. Things didn’t work out for us. ”
Tamsyn poured a little water into the pot. She watched it turn the color of weak coffee. Was Barra telling her this because she knew about her and Isla? But how did she know?
“Did you speak to Aggie?” Tamsyn asked abruptly. Subtlety had flown out the window.
“You mean this morning?” Barra asked, frowning. “Because I’ve spoken to her a few times this morning. She asked if I wanted to take a walk to the watering hole, but it’s wash—”
“Never mind,” Tamsyn interrupted quickly and tossed the water into the dust. Then she looked up at Barra, who was staring intently at her feet.
She had bare feet. She was the only woman brave enough to wander around camp without shoes, as if the hot rocks and the possibility of scorpions didn’t exist. “Why did you tell me that story?”
Barra lifted her gaze until their eyes met. “Do you believe people can actually fall in love?” she asked, her voice softer than Tamsyn had ever heard it.
Tamsyn glimpsed Isla over by the creek. She was ankle-deep, hands on her hips, staring out across the orange-colored plains.
Then, almost instinctively, Isla glanced back over her shoulder.
She caught Tamsyn’s eye and smiled. Tamsyn swooned.
A swooping rush of what could only be described as love flutters filled the entirety of her stomach.
“I do,” Tamsyn said.
Barra considered this for a moment. “Well, I think I might be in love with Dominique.”
That hit like a punch to the ribs. What? Dominique was engaged.
“Barra—” Tamsyn started. She wasn’t sure what to say. Should she reprimand Barra for falling in love with a taken woman? What did someone do in a situation like this?
But then Barra interrupted her with a deep exhale.
“That felt really good to say out loud,” she grinned, wiping make-believe sweat off her smooth forehead.
“Thank you for listening to me. I’ve been dying to get it off my chest. I don’t really trust anyone else out here, especially not Aggie.
Josie clings to her like a leech. But out of all the people, you and Isla get it, right? ”
“I do,” Tamsyn said, even though she wasn’t sure what Barra meant by her and Isla. Not that she was going to ask. This conversation was about Barra and Barra alone. “I get it.”
“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t say anything.”
“Of course,” Tamsyn replied, raising her hand. She covered her pinky with her thumb. “Scout’s honor.”
Barra laughed her usual laugh at the same time Aggie and Josie came running back into camp. “We’ve got mail!” Aggie called, brandishing a letter.
“And muffins!” Josie added, walking after her, holding a wicker basket in her arms. Golden brown-tops glimmered with sugar crystals.
Naturally, everyone gravitated toward the commotion.
“What does the letter say?” Dominique asked, standing behind Barra. She was a head taller and had her palms pressed on Barra’s shoulders, gently squeezing her. Tamsyn wondered if Dominique had any idea just how much damage that little touch was doing right now. Probably not.
Aggie slid out a piece of parchment and read, “Tomorrow tests more than muscle. Wit, cunning, and stamina will decide who rises and falls. Fortune favors the daring, and the well-fed.” Aggie glanced up. “You heard the letter, time to fuel up. The muffins won’t eat themselves.”
Tamsyn didn’t have to be told twice. And it seemed Isla neither.
Before Tamsyn could even grab a muffin from the basket, Isla had already snagged two and tossed one with an easy flick straight into Tamsyn’s hands.
“Good catch,” Isla said, winking, and then Tamsyn felt it again... that swarm of love flutters she couldn’t possibly hide.