‘And, thanks to delusional parenting, you all feel that you deserve privileges and special treatment.’ I give her a sympathetic look. ‘So, of course, you’re all going to be easily upset at the slightest criticism or knock-back.’
‘Like me with Giovanni,’ Mimi says.
‘You might feel your self-worth plummet like a lead balloon just because he looks at someone else. I see it in class, all the time. My students are incredibly needy for attention. In fact, it makes them very hard to be around.’
Mimi is making soothing, understanding noises. ‘They sound like high-maintenance bitches.’
‘They can be,’ I say.
‘How old are they? These students you teach? College, is it?’
‘Eight years old.’
She looks surprised. ‘They start young these days, huh?’
‘By the way, you can’t say “in IRL”. It’s either “in real life” or just “IRL”.’ I might as well help her with sentence structure and basic semantics.
‘Sure thing. Okay. Good chat. See you later.’ Mimi is unsure of how to handle this information overload and bolts off back towards the bar full of mocktails and I am left alone. I look swiftly around and down at my phone. Nothing from Cam.
* * *
I’ve never felt more like a teacher than I have since slip-sliding through the doors of this villa, but it feels nice. After I’ve brushed my teeth and wiped off all the dried juice from my face, I’m just heading back from a vigorous shower when I bump slap bang into Amber.
‘Thank God. You have to help me, Libby.’
‘What’s wrong?’
‘It’s Mimi.’
‘What about Mimi?’
‘Come see for yourself.’
I quickly throw on theLove on the Islandfluffy dressing gown. Amber takes my hand and drags me down a brightly lit corridor into the main bedroom. I’d forgotten how huge it is. It’s more of a light aircraft hangar than a bedroom. There are double beds as far as the eye can see. There are suggestive pieces of fruit-and-veg-themed art hanging over each one. Aubergines and so on. Amber raises her arm and points down the room. Mimi is bouncing from bed to bed like a five-year-old. She’s squealing nonsense and high-fiving people who are lying in bed trying to rest.
‘We’re so sick of her. It was bad enough that we were up through the night. Then we were forced to wake up and “do” breakfast even though most of us had only just had supper, and now we’ve just done back-to-back filming of two challenges that have basically put most of us in a sugar coma. We’re just so disoriented, we have no idea of whether we’re coming or going.’
Amber looks exhausted. They all look exhausted.
I watch Mimi leap on top of Carlton to twerk in his face. Then she moves onto Binky and does the same. Now, she’s demanding they all hug and twiddle fingers with her. She’s stretching out her arms as though she’s Madonna on stage, reaching down to touch fingertips with her fans. She has the look of a spooked horse. I recognise a mammoth sugar rush when I see one. I hope I’m not around when she crashes.
‘It’s like watching a sexually incontinent puppy. But Amber, what do you want me to do about it?’
She looks at me as though it’s obvious. ‘You’re the teacher. You tell her to stop it. She’ll listen to you.’
‘No, she won’t. I’m not that sort of teacher.’
‘What sort of teacher are you?’
The wimpy sort who is fine with children but, when it comes to authority figures, does what she is told, even though she knows she is being taken advantage of. That sort.
‘Please,’ pleads Amber. ‘Say something. She has been like this for over an hour. She’s so desperate for Carlton or Giovanni or someone to find her likeable. I feel kinda sorry for her.’
She’s right. Mimi will end up having a catastrophic breakdown if she carries on like this. It’s just like after lunchtime when parents have packed the lunchboxes full of breakfast bars, bags of sweets, chocolate bars and a token piece of fruit because they’ve forgotten to make anything healthy for their kids to eat. It makes them high as kites. Plus, it’s as though she’s forgotten our entire conversation from earlier about self-worth.
‘Mimi,’ I bellow down the room.
Everyone looks up with startled expressions.
