Arabella looks flawless, which is just perfect when I look like this.
‘There you two are!’ she says brightly, like we’ve been avoiding her. ‘The others are okay, they’re on the way to the yacht. We just need you two and we can have ourselves a final. What do you say?’
What can I say? All I can do is force a smile and climb aboard. It’s my ticket off this island, no matter what happens. I just need to put my brave face on, get through this finale, and then I’m done. Contract completed. I can put all of this behind me.
‘You must be relieved. I mean, what a journey,’ Arabella says as we board the boat.
‘I’m glad to be saved,’ I say – I really am. Not just from the island, but from making any more mistakes with Lockie. When will I learn, eh? Now, hopefully. This is my rock bottom. It has to be.
35
I’m back on a yacht, lined up with the other survivors, cameras on us from all angles, waiting as Arabella talks to the public.
We’re all national treasures, it turns out. Tara flashed me a couple of headlines on her phone while someone mic’d me up. Apparently the whole world is obsessed with us and our survival story. Simon playing the hero who ‘worked tirelessly’ to rescue us from a reality TV show gone wrong. Utter bollocks. You just know he strung it out for as long as he could before rescuing us.
Arabella beams at the cameras a little brighter than usual, like she knows her audience just got much, much bigger.
‘We’ve had a number of votes to determine the winner, seeing as though this season has gone way off script,’ she says to the camera.
Yeah, no kidding.
‘The first vote was to pair the islanders into couples, seeing as though we couldn’t do it on the show. And those couples are…’ – she drags out the dramatic pause – ‘…Camilla and Tony, Honey and Ozzy, and Cleo and Lockie. Please stand in your couples.’
Ugh, fantastic. I wound up left with him.
I move as I’m told. Lockie steps beside me, his eyes fixed forward, playing the part perfectly. I just need to get through this bit and it’s over.
‘The winner of the popular vote is…’ Another endless pause. ‘…Cleo and Lockie!’
My jaw drops down onto the deck. We won the popular vote? How? We weren’t even a couple. Half the time we were fighting…
‘Please stand either side of me,’ Arabella tells us. We do as we’re told. ‘How are you both feeling?’
‘Great,’ Lockie says. ‘And shocked and just… so glad everyone’s safe.’
‘Yeah, so glad we all made it, and that we’re all here,’ I say without thinking. I just need to play along for a little longer.
‘Okay then,’ Arabella continues. ‘The moment of truth. If the public think it’s true love, you win one hundred thousand pounds. If not, well, at least you know you’re popular!’
Laughter all around. I don’t even need to fake it. There’s no way anyone is going to think it’s love.
‘The public have voted… and they think…’ – longest pause yet – ‘…it’s love! Congratulations, you’ve won a hundred thousand pounds!’
Now my jaw is on the deck below. There’s music, the cheering, fireworks, a ridiculously oversized trophy that we don’t usually have. Arabella thrusts it into our hands before turning to the camera to do the outro.
Then the red light on the main camera clicks off, and I drop my smile like a dead weight.
‘Can we talk?’ Lockie says. ‘Before we do anything else.’
‘Yeah,’ I say, already walking off. ‘Let’s get it over with.’
We go down to a lower deck, where we can have some privacy.
‘Well, you were right,’ he begins. ‘The secret to great ratings was normal people after all. It was you they loved.’
‘Us,’ I correct him.
‘Look, I’m sorry,’ he says, cutting to the chase. ‘I thought I was doing the right thing, keeping the show alive. I knew you wouldn’t want to lie to the others, so I… did what I thought was best. The truth is, Simon was going to fire you, after this season. He said with audience numbers dwindling, there were going to be cuts, they would only need one person in casting, and that if it came to it, they would be keeping me. I didn’t want you to lose your job, least of all to me – especially not now I know what you went through before – so I just thought… I don’t know, if we made it a hit, we’d both get to stick around.’
