“Team Salmon Sliders, thank you for playing. We loved getting to know you,” Pat says.
Buckley and Alexia both look about ready to blab my secret, but before either of them gets a chance to speak, I notice they’re being consoled by a background actor in a grocery store uniform.
I’m not even relieved. A twisted part of me wishes Buckley and Alexia would out our lie. I would bow out in disgrace but at least I could wash my hands clean of this whole scheme. But then I look at Leo who is so genuinely thrilled to have almost won his way out of unemployment hell, and I can’t torch it all.
Leo doesn’t deserve that. He deserves better than the lot he’s been given.
He definitely deserves better than me: an emotionally messed up, stuck-in-life nobody. Right?
As a show of good sportsmanship, they always ask the losing team to shake hands with the winning team before the finale. Alexia does so, eyes narrowed but not maliciously. She had no serious skin in this game. She got her screen time.
Buckley, on the other hand, bypasses my friendly outstretched hand and pulls me in for an overly familiar hug right as they cut to commercial again to ready the set for the finale.
Buckley’s right hand slithers up between us and does its best to cover both of our microphones. He whispers in my ear, “I figured it out.”
“What?” I ask as he continues to hold me.
“The other night you said I couldn’t have come all this way because of the restaurant fiasco,” he explains. “Well, you were right. You put all your love into the past. Into this show. Into your mom. There was no place for me. Do you know what it’s like being in a relationship with someone, living with someone who is barely there, a ghost?”
“I—” I want to protest, but a part of me knows when the chaos and excitement of college ended, I fell into a depression. The grief tsunami tugged me into the undertow once more. My jobs weren’t fulfilling, I hated our apartment, and I can now see clearly that Buckley was pulling away from me. That tension I felt that I thought was just growing pains—acclimating to a new normal—was a serious warning sign that my insular, avoidant life was about to collapse.
“I hope you’ve worked it out. For Leo’s sake,” he whispers. So earnest it’s cruel. I almost wish he were still playing up the mustache-twirling villain. It was easier to hate him. Easier to pin my neuroses on his antagonism. Now he’s handed me my faults on a silver platter. Where am I supposed to hide them when I’m on the set of a national TV show?
I swallow a thick wad of spit as he walks off the set arm linked in Alexia’s. I’m crying. I try to wipe the tears away faster than Leo can spot them, but he’s too perceptive for his own good.
“What did that asshole say now?” Leo asks, totally ready to throw fists if he needs to.
“Nothing,” I say, mustering up a sense of self-preservation. “He wished us luck. That’s all.” For a second, I consider reaching out and touching Leo, but instead, I keep my hands to myself. This devastation feels private. Something I can’t drag him into when I’ve already unloaded so much on to him.
The makeup artist who has been working with me all week rushes onto the set. “This part is always overwhelming. Don’t worry, sweetie. I’ll fix you.” Externally, he erases any evidence of upset. Internally, I’m unspooled, and there’s no fixing that.
When the show returns from commercial break, the monitor shows Leo and me all primped and made over in our interview from the other day. Instead of the green screen, they’ve dropped in a generic backdrop of the produce section. This was the video Buckley watched and deduced we were lying.
Watching myself now, it’s not the obvious holes in our story that get to me. It’s the fact that, in my grief, I don’t even recognize myself. The guy on the screen is empty-eyed, spouting off rehearsed lines. My posture is rigid. That’s the face of a man who’s deluded himself beyond reality. A man who’s convinced himself that reality TV was the answer to all his problems.
I seem to have only created more for myself.
The video ends, and against all odds, I couldn’t care less what happens next.
“Team Eggplant, how does it feel to be going on to the final round?” Pat asks.
Leo jumps in. “Amazing! We trained hard, we played hard, and we’re going to take home that grand prize.”
“Holden, anything to add?”
With the microphone in my face, my mind goes blank. Shouldn’t I be stoked to be making good on that long-ago promise to Mom? Shouldn’t this be an accomplishment—the last stage of grief completed? Chip collected? Life moves on?
To save my last shred of dignity, I flick on the false charisma and say into the camera, “Only that we’re blessed to have this opportunity, and I hope our efforts were worth it.”
Twenty-Five
“Where’s the best place to put this?” Leo asks of the absurdly large prop check theMadcap Marketcrew insisted we take back with us even though it won’t fit in my suitcase no matter how hard I squish my stuff.
“Anywhere is fine.” I close the door to my hotel room for the final night, pick a stray piece of confetti off the shoulder of my crewneck. How can a festive piece of paper feel so hefty?
We won, but I don’t feel like celebrating.
Actually, I feel just as bad as I did the night Alexia friend-dumped me at the tapas restaurant. If Leo wasn’t here, I’m sure I’d be elbow-deep in the mini fridge by now.
