Cece looked wildly around the room until she found me. ‘Murray! What’s the deal? Are we getting paid? Because I’ve got rent, and if I’m here and I’m locked down and I’m not getting paid, then I can’t afford it.’
Amanda had an arm around her, but Cece was actively swaying on her feet, her eyes so wide the whites were visible the whole way around. ‘What if my flatmates lose their jobstoo? I need to look for work! Are we getting paid? Tell me! Are we getting paid?’
‘I think she’s having a panic attack,’ Amanda said, and Cece went down.
It was horrible. Obviously.
But it was going to be killer TV.
Romeo-Dylan raced over and caught Cece before she could completely crush Amanda. Juliet-Dylan dove in and tried to help, snapping at people that she was a nurse and to get out of her way. It gave us a beautiful moment of teamwork between the Dylans as they both tried to help her, Juliet-Dylan checking her pulse, Romeo-Dylan cradling her head in his lap; a perfect contrast between the toughness of Juliet-Dylan and the fragility of Cece.
‘Murray,’ Carrie said in my earpiece. ‘Insurance.’
Shit. Juliet-Dylan might be a registered nurse, but she wasn’t listed on our insurance policy. If something beyond nerves and low blood sugar was wrong with Cece and Juliet-Dylan gave her the wrong care, we’d be liable.
‘Get the medic,’ I said into my headset, and reluctantly waded in to break it up.
But that ultimately gave us even better TV. Romeo-Dylan swept Cece into his arms like a princess. Trailed by the medic, the cameras, and me, he carried her out – all the way down to the Convent, the house at the bottom of the hill.
The sun was coming up, silver and pink and pale gold over the lake. The vista was incredible. In front of it, Romeo-Dylan was a silhouette, dark against the dewy green of the grass, cradling Cece against him like she was the most precious thing in the world.
The poster. This was the poster for the season, better even than Brett and Mary-Ellen under the waterfall.
In the cold sunlight of the dawn, I allowed myself a smile. It had been a long, hard, emotional, exhausting night, but this was going to be the best fucking season premiere we’d ever done.
‘Nailed it,’ I murmured instinctively.
‘What?’ Saurav said.
‘Nothing,’ I lied.
6LilyTwelve years ago
I really didn’t want to like Julia.
In our first three months away in the wilderness together shootingDesert Island Castaway, I’d put together a mental picture of Murray’s fiancée from the things he’d told me – his childhood sweetheart, incredibly intelligent, just starting a PhD in history – and spent a lot of time throwing mental darts at it. She was probably shy. Introverted. A gentle, nice girl next door. A librarian-type, who wore glasses and cardigans buttoned all the way up to the neck, the kind that made boys go wild fantasising about unbuttoning them to reveal the softness and the vulnerability beneath.
The more I realised how much I genuinelylikedMurray, the more darts I threw. I had no loyalty to this cardigan girl. Just because Murray had put a ring on it (at age 22! what the fuck was he thinking?!) didn’t mean he wasn’t fair game.
But he was annoyingly faithful to her. Not a single one of my ploys worked. He’d spent at least sixteen hours a day withme while we were in the wilderness, eaten every meal with me, listened to all my thoughts, laughed at all my jokes, and exhibited interest in even my third- and fourth-tier stories (even I had to admit that the story of that time I modelled in Thuong’s first fashion show and the heel of my stiletto snapped halfway down the runway wasn’t exactly the world’s most compelling narrative, but he still listened and laughed). He even masterminded a brilliant scheme that allowed us to completely ruin the life of the gaffer that kept following me around and telling me how much he liked Asian girls because they were ‘submissive’. But then, every morning after the night shoot ended, the only person I’d ever met whose brain worked the same way as mine did would go back to his own trailer and call his fiancée.
And unfortunately, when we got back from that first stint in the wilderness and I finally met her, Julia turned out to be –sigh– cool.
I hadn’t been entirely wrong. The woman did love cardigans. But she was also, it turned out, doing a PhD insexhistory (objectively cool); had no problem with the fact her fiancé had become best friends with a hot girl (an extremely cool level of self-assuredness); and, contrary to the sweet, innocent, wouldn’t-hurt-a-fly image I’d created of her, she had a healthy (and, alas, also cool) level of respect for schemes.
‘Okay, so I need your advice,’ she said, sitting down opposite me. ‘I will pay you in alcohol.’
Murray and I had just come back from shooting our second season ofDesert Island Castaway, and we were out for drinks at the same bar I’d first spotted him in more than a year ago. Nominally, it was a group thing, but Thuong, whowas the designated driver for my little crew, was once again running late, and Murray’s other friends were clustered around a TV showing the football, so Julia and I were on our own.
‘I think old mate already has that covered—’ I nodded towards Murray, who was standing at the bar, ‘—but for you, I can manage a freebie. Hit me.’
‘I have a nemesis,’ Julia said. ‘He’s in my PhD program, he works in the same field as me, and he’s the worst person in the world. How do I destroy him?’
I cracked my knuckles. ‘Oh, honey, you have come to the right place.’
I was seven points into a twelve-point plan when Murray slid into the booth. ‘Drinks,’ he announced, putting three beers down on the table and kissing Julia’s temple. ‘What did I miss?’
‘Lily’s helping me destroy Elias,’ Julia said.
