Camilla crosses her arms, one hip cocked, clearly beyond irritated now.
‘Well, presumably you guys want to sleep together,’ she says, looking pointedly between me, Lockie and Ozzy. I’m not sure if she means me and Ozzy, me and Lockie or all three of us. No one asks for clarity, her words just hang in the air.
Ozzy clears his throat uncomfortably. Lockie looks at me, telling me to take the lead.
My cheeks flush. I wish I could bury myself in the sand.
I open my mouth to speak but Camilla carries on first.
‘So Honey and I will share,’ Camilla continues.
‘Erm, I’m here too, you know,’ Tony reminds her. ‘Or have you forgotten?’
‘I’m trying to,’ she claps back. ‘I suppose you’re in with us then.’
It really is hard to know who has the short straw. All of us, I think.
‘It’ll be cosy!’ Honey says, trying to stay positive.
‘Claustrophobic is more like it,’ Camilla replies.
I glance toward Lockie and Ozzy – my bedmates for the foreseeable. Lockie’s biting his lip, clearly trying not to laugh. He catches my eye, and for a moment it’s like we’re the only two people on the island – well, the only two in on the joke, maybe.
‘We’ll be okay,’ I tell everyone. In a way, I feel responsible for us all being in this situation, but there’s nothing I could have done.
‘Yeah, everything is calm now,’ Lockie adds. ‘It won’t be much different to yesterday.’
Camilla screams, loud and unbelievably high-pitched. ‘Ugh! What is that?’ she shrieks, pointing at something on the floor next to us.
On the sand just a few feet away from where we’re sitting, there’s a pale starfish, limp and still, half-buried in the sand.
‘Oh, no,’ Honey says, rushing over. ‘Don’t touch it!’
‘Why not?’ Tony asks, squinting. ‘It’s dead. We should just bury it.’
‘I’m not having a funeral for a creature,’ Camilla protests.
‘It might not be dead,’ Honey says, crouching beside it like a tiny marine biologist in a bikini. ‘See, its limbs are curled, but not rigid. And those tiny dots there? Sometimes they just shut down when they’re stressed.’
‘You’re telling me it’s having a panic attack?’ Camilla says in disbelief.
‘Someone definitely is,’ Tony says under his breath.
Honey ignores their bickering. She gently scoops up the starfish in both hands and heads for the sea. ‘If it’s still alive, it needs seawater. Fast.’
We all follow her to the shoreline, weirdly invested in this little starfish, and if it’s going to make it. She kneels down, lowers the starfish into the shallow water, and holds her breath.
For a moment, nothing happens. The waves roll in and out, washing over her hands. Then one of the starfish’s arms (are they arms?) twitches. Then another. Slowly, it starts to move. The little ripples of life running through it give me more hope than I expected.
‘See? It just needed help,’ Honey says brightly. ‘I saw that on TV once.’
‘Thank God you did,’ Ozzy replies. ‘I know how to survive – not how to help other creatures survive.’
‘You’re doing a great job with us,’ I joke, smiling at him.
He laughs. Then Lockie joins in. Then Honey, then Tony – even Camilla cracks her face.
‘Well, that’s one good thing today,’ Lockie says, standing next to me.
