‘Everything is going to be filthy,’ she says.
Because that’s our biggest problem.
‘The rain will clean it all, love, don’t worry,’ Tony jokes.
Ozzy squeezes water out of his hair before re-securing his man bun. He seems relatively calm.
‘These storms come in big and ugly and then leave like nothing happened,’ he tells us. ‘We’ll be back to paradise before you know it.’
I don’t know about that. I’ve worked on this show for multiple seasons and I’ve never seen weather like this. It’s hard to imagine what we’ll be going back out to.
‘Right!’ Tony claps his hands once. ‘Alphabet game. Foods. A to Z. Let’s go.’
‘Are you a child?’ Camilla asks him.
‘We’ve nothing better to do, ’ave we?’ he reminds her. ‘Come on, we’ll go mad.’
‘I’ll go mad regardless,’ she says.
‘I believe that,’ he replies. ‘Come on, Honey, you can go first.’
‘A… apple,’ she says proudly.
‘Good one,’ Tony replies. ‘Who wants B?’
Camilla sighs and rolls her eyes dramatically.
‘What about when we get to X?’
‘Extra apples,’ Honey says, beaming like she’s solved all our problems.
I lean my head back against the wall. This is going to feel much longer than it is – however long it is. I try to count the seconds by the sound of rain but lose the will before I even get to fifty. It’s an interesting feeling, experiencing both boredom and mortal danger at the same time. It doesn’t make for a very good headspace.
Ozzy closes his eyes.
‘Perhaps we should sit quietly for a bit,’ he suggests. ‘Sometimes the sound of a storm can be relaxing.’
A fresh crash of thunder rattles the hatch roof. I think it’s safe to say no one is relaxed, not even him.
Lockie shifts in his seat, then casually drapes an arm around my shoulders. I stiffen for half a second, then force myself to stay neutral. I have to remember it’s for the cameras, even in here. I can see just the one, up in the corner.
Still… for half a moment, with the world falling to pieces outside, his arm feels warm and solid around me. It makes me feel better, even if it isn’t real.
The storm doesn’t sound like weather, it sounds like war.
It feels like hours of the wind howling, the rain hammering the tin roof like it’s trying to break in, thunder rumbling so loudly I feel it physically rattle me. Conversation dried up after the third round of the alphabet game (J is for ‘Japan’, K is for ‘Kyrgyzstan’, L is for ‘Let’s never play this again’). The storm shelter is barely big enough for six people to crouch in, let alone lie down. It’s a glorified hole with a hatch, dug into the ground and lined with rusty metal. It barely seems fit for purpose, but we’re still here (in both respects).
We’re crammed shoulder to shoulder along the curved wall, squashing one another, getting on each other’s nerves.
Honey’s curled up against one corner, twisting her damp hair into curls. Camilla keeps flinching every time water drips from somewhere overhead, as though getting any wetter will suddenly make her hair look worse. Tony is just staring up – I’d love to know what goes through that man’s mind. Ozzy is sitting cross-legged, eyes closed like he’s meditating, like he’s mentally somewhere else. And I’m still with Lockie, his arm still around me, still taking comfort from the warmth of his body.
No one’s spoken in maybe twenty minutes. I think we’re all a bit sick of each other’s company, to be honest.
Eventually the weather lets up, the noises calm, the shelter doesn’t feel like it’s shaking. The air feels different, all of a sudden, like the island can breathe again.
Lockie runs a hand through his hair.
‘It sounds like it’s over,’ Lockie says.
