Oh God. This is oncamera.
There’s three short claps from the center of the clearing. Blake. If she has an opinion on the mess, she’s too professional to let it show.
“Now that everyone’s awake, we’ll trek back to camp so Garrett can distribute the points and announce the new standings.”
She says it so clinically, it’s easy to miss the real message: One of us is going home.
The others disperse, leaving us to our pile of limbs and humiliation. I kick Seyoon in the thigh.
“Ow, what was that for?” she says, untangling her legs from the tarp still trapping us.
“I should be askingyouthat. You’re the one who was clinging to me. And you took down the shelter!”
She scratches her neck. “I told you I move around a lot.”
“You also drooled on me.”
“Did not!”
I don’t bother arguing anymore, wiping my collarbone in an attempt to salvage some sense of my dignity. The action makes me remember the way her lips brushed against the skin there. My stomach flips.
“How do you thinkIfeel?” Seyoon grumbles. “Now the whole world will think I’m sleeping around. Ugh. Oh no, my mom’s going tofreak.She’s already has so much to worry about.”
“They’ll think we’re both sleeping around.” I’m getting a headache just envisioning how much shit Meredith will give me when she sees this. No, worse—Dad’s going to give me The Talk.Again.
“It’s different for you,” she snaps. “It’s not cool when a girl does it.”
Even though I’m still mad about her taking down the shelter, I bite my tongue, because, well… she’s right. It’s worse for her.
Begrudgingly, we get to work cleaning up and gathering our supplies. I run through my mental list of everything we had in our pack, looking around for the missing bandage roll.
“Have you seen the gauze?” I ask.
“Siddharth asked if he could borrow it last night,” she says. “He wanted to wrap Adin up like a mummy. He probably still has it—I think I saw him head into the second film zone.”
Sighing, I trek through the woods to find him. Honestly, I don’t really care about the roll too much, but it’s a nice excuse to break away from Seyoon and get some air. As I’m nearing the area where we went foraging yesterday, I hear them before I see them: Siddharth and Adin, whispering to each other. Curious, I stay hidden in the line of trees.
“Shit, man,” Siddharth says. “I think their alliance is for real.”
They’re talking about us, I realize.
“We don’t gotta worry,” Adin replies. “Seyoon’s still the weak link. She’ll drag both of them down when they have to split points.”
“What? You thinkSeyoon’sthe weak link? It’s obviously Dean.”
My stomach drops. I dig my nails into the bark of the tree, frozen.
“She got dead last in the first challenge!” Adin whisper-argues.
“Yeah, but she was in the lead for most of it. She’s way faster than he is, and a whole lot better at survival skills.”
There’s a beat of silence. “So, what, you think Seyoon’s the bigger threat to worry about?”
Siddharth grunts. “No, man, that’s the problem. They’re working togetherandsleeping together. She’s not going to drop him, and he won’t drop her. We need to worry about them both.”
I chance a peek around the trunk. They’re standing close, heads nearly knocking together as they think.
Adin scratches the side of his face. “Okay, they’re stronger together. Should we try to sabotage them in the next challenge or something?”
