Stephanie Doyle - The Contestant

“It was really a shark, wasn’t it?”

This time it was Talia’s turn to nod her head in reply. There was no point hiding the truth from her now that it was over.

“I was in the water with it. I was swimming with…wow,” Nancy sighed. Then something akin to excitement lit her eyes. “Well, that was certainly dangerous and adventurous, wasn’t it? And I got out of the water on my own. Wait until my husband and kids see that!”

Talia glanced over her shoulder at Reuben at the comment that Nancy had gotten out of the water alone. He merely shrugged and then fell into the sand butt first, his arms resting casually on his knees. He was in a T-shirt and bathing trunks, and the T-shirt was clinging to his skin showing off firm pecks and hardened little nipples.

She recalled his remark about biting her ass, and her body shivered a little. Not because of him, she told herself, just…because.

“Okay, if we are all recovered from our first adventure—” Evan began to say.

“Our adventure? I don’t remember seeing you in the water, Evan,” Reuben stated.

“Yes, well, I would have jumped in to rescue you all of course…had that been necessary. Thankfully, it wasn’t. So let me explain the next phase of the game,” he said quickly.

“As I mentioned, for some of the early contests, we will be pitting team against team. Team one—Tommy, Marlie, Gus and Sam—against team two—Iris, Nancy, Talia and Reuben. You all will be sharing one camp, but for the team that wins a game, each member of that team will receive one of the items you chose and ranked in order of necessity before the show began. The losing team will receive nothing.

“Remember, this isn’t about politics. It’s about Darwinism. Anyone on the losing team will have the opportunity to pull themselves out of the game citing that they are a weak link. If no one chooses to leave, then as a group you will vote to decide who the strongest member of the team is. Then that person, and that person alone, can choose to eject who he or she considers the weakest link. Or not. It’s that person’s call. It’s a game of attrition, folks. Eventually, most of you will be broken to the point where leaving will be your only choice until there is only—”

“Hold it,” Joe called out. “I’m low on juice.” He lowered the camera off his shoulder and took a look at the battery gauge on the pack that was hooked around his waist. “Dino, focus in on Evan so we can get this last shot, will you?”

Dino, who had been circling the group trying to catch the riveted faces of the contestants, Talia assumed, steered his camera in the direction of Evan.

“We need that last line again,” Joe told the host.

“Eventually, most of you will be broken to the point where leaving will be your only choice…until there is only one person left.”

“Got it,” Dino called. Then he also lowered the bulky camera from his shoulder.

Seeing both cameras turned off, Talia breathed a sigh of relief, then chastised herself. She was going to have to get used to this if she planned on sticking it out for the next few weeks. Or months.

Could it go that long?

She turned and saw Reuben leaning back on his elbows, his face toward the sun, almost ridiculously relaxed considering what they just had been through. He certainly looked comfortable in this element despite being a city boy. If he was telling the truth about that. In a game like this it was hard to know.

“Okay, let’s head out,” Evan suggested.

“To where?” Reuben wanted to know.

“There is an inlet at the other end of the island. We’ve put up some shark netting across the gap so it will be safe to fish. You’ll camp on that beach,” Evan explained as he directed everyone back to the boats.

“Then why in the hell did you drop us off here?” Gus questioned, clearly irritated with the host.

“The inlet is too enclosed,” Joe explained. “There wasn’t enough good light for filming and out here the water is clearer so we could get shots of some of the fish.”

“TV reality as opposed to real reality,” Talia muttered. She wasn’t going to let it bother her. This was a game for entertainment that she was playing for money. Like Wheel of Fortune. If they wanted to film in good light, that was fine by her. “Are we going to have to swim again from the inlet to the beach?”

“Oh, I couldn’t possibly,” Nancy objected as she got to her feet. “Not after what happened.”

“No,” Evan told her. “We’ll take you by boat. Then one boat will go back to the yacht, and the other that has our equipment, the radio and some emergency kits will stay on the island in another part. But it will be hidden and only I will know the location of the boat so don’t think of trying to look for it or trying to get any information from Joe or Dino.”

Talia rolled her eyes at Evan’s attempt to sound menacing. The man was about as threatening as a schoolgirl.

They all loaded back into the boats, each team sticking together, and cruised around the island to where the beach jutted out and then into the inlet that Evan had described. The vessel slid over the netting and Talia could see everyone watching it, wondering if it would be enough to hold back a shark intent on getting inside. It was impossible to know. All they could do was have faith. A lot of it.

The gap between the two stretches of land was only about thirty feet wide. The shape reminded Talia of a horseshoe that was pinched at the top. And she now understood what they meant about the light. The foliage on either side served to shade the inlet, darkening it to the point that only beams of sunlight broke through. The water seemed a darker, deeper blue. More menacing than the previous site in many ways because you couldn’t see beneath the surface.

At the base of the inlet was a stretch of white beach bordering the water. To the left it looked as if the water moved even farther inland creating what Talia imagined would be a lagoon, although she couldn’t see it from her position. The pure white sand was guarded by the trees, bushes and brush. She noted the palm trees, banyan trees, bamboo shoots and massive ferns, all indigenous to the South Pacific. No need for any fake scenery here. It looked just the way it was supposed to look—a remote tropical island.

For the first time she considered that this place, this island would be her home for a while. She wasn’t displeased. It was spectacularly beautiful. Turning away from the view, she studied the people in the boat, trying to assess their reactions, wondering if they saw what she did—a secluded beach protected from the harsh sun by shade and a lagoon that would make for easy fishing.

For her, it was a place where she could live for as long as she needed.

Iris was smiling softly. Nancy still looked a little out of it, no doubt envisioning how she would relay the story of her close encounter with the shark to her ex-husband. Reuben, predictably, was giving nothing away. But when he realized she was watching him, his mouth turned up in what she was coming to know was a half smirk, half smile.

“Looks a little bit like paradise, doesn’t it?”

“It does,” she replied casually.

“Then I guess that would make you Eve.”

“And I guess that would make you the snake,” she returned, refusing to fall for his crude charm.

Undeterred by her sharp tongue, he tilted his head back and laughed full out. Quickly, she looked to the view so he wouldn’t see her own smile. If this was going to be home, then these people were going to be family. Learning to live with them would be as much of a challenge as surviving the elements. But dealing with Reuben, Talia sensed, was going to make those other two obstacles seem easy in comparison.