‘Leave her alone. We’ll do better in the next round. Come on. We’re a team, remember?’ shouts Amber, looking like a fierce warrior. ‘Come on girls!’
Thank God, she’s rescued the team morale. I go over to get dunked in the tank while Mimi peels the ‘English’ label off the board and reads out the question underneath. ‘Rhyme as many words as you can with sock.’
Oh my word. I hope no one in the England Education Department is watching this.
Chapter 20
The questions come thick and fast, and the girls grow increasingly despondent at my lack of sexual knowledge and prowess.
‘How can you seriously stand there and not be able to name strange places you’ve had sex? You could have just made it all up for the sake of the fucking quiz!’ Kassy is livid. ‘And why did you blurt out “up the bum” when you clearly fucking haven’t? It wasn’t even your fucking turn!’
It’s true. I panicked. But in all fairness, I clearly didn’t understand the question until they started shouting things like ‘up a tree’, ‘in the meat aisle’ and ‘on a bike’.
I have been the only contestant to be dunked every time. I am so wet, I’m at the point of cooking to death. The heat is so intense, the steam is rising off me causing my skin to become irritated. My hair is frizzing beyond all reasonable expectations.
‘Last question,’ calls Carlton. The men are winning by so many that it is mathematically pointless for us to continue. The girls are now lying down on the bouncy padding. They are pickingtheir nails, sulking and refusing to look me in the eye. ‘Domestic Science. Name things that look like body parts.’
There’s a huge groan from the girls. I leap to my feet, my Year Three Biology project of the human anatomy springing to mind. The boys are struggling once they have said ‘eggplant’ and ‘huge watermelons’. They are so far in the lead they don’t bother to name any more.
‘Broccoli for the hair, marrow for the torso, baby carrots for arms, cherry tomatoes for elbows, oranges for knees, cucumber legs, spaghetti for ligaments, pears for feet, slices of sweet potato for eyes, peas for pupils, aubergine for the stomach, edamame beans for toes.’
On and on I go.
‘Cabbage for intestines. Sweetcorn for teeth.’ The buzzer goes and we have clawed back lots of points. Suddenly we are back in the game.
The girls are giving me a strange look.
‘What can I say?’ I tell them. ‘It’s a gift.’
The final round is called ‘Kissing behind the Bike Shed’. The aim is for the blindfolded boys to identify who has kissed them. It looks very much like I might have to kiss one, if not all, of the boys. The girls are very excited and have perked up. Mimi nominates herself to go first. We watch as she slobbers over every single male contestant with gusto.
I have reached my limit with this game. A line must be drawn somewhere, and I feel this challenge is it. I drop to the ground in a heap.
‘Count me out. I’m done. I’m not snogging any of that lot.’
I wonder what Cam is making of all this when an alarm goes off, blaring loudly from speakers all around the grounds and the runners come running over to inform us that the fire alarm has gone off, it is not a drill, and we are all to make our way to the safety point. Ironically, the safety point is the firepit. There’s noway I’m going to make a fool of myself over the alarm again, so I resist the temptation to snap into teacher-mode.
There’s mass confusion with Porscha bellowing, ‘Which of you fuckers has set off the alarm? Who? WHO?’
We huddle together at the firepit. Islanders, runners, camera operators, kitchen staff, producers, maintenance crew and the cleaning team. There are a lot of us. They seem to be crawling out of the woodwork like ants. I’m surprised at how many people are actually on-site during the filming, half the production village it seems.
‘Somebody count heads, will you?’ Porscha barks. ‘And where is the bloody fire anyway?’
We all sniff the air and inhale the fresh scent of olive groves wafting in from the distance and the smell of fresh paint and plastic from the villa.
‘Can’t we just turn that god-awful alarm off and carry on filming? Time is money people.’
The distant blare of sirens would suggest otherwise. I spot Cam on the far side from me. He looks like a man who is doing his best to ignore me. Then across the chaos, he turns to search the crowd. His gaze rests on mine with an almost tender expression, and we lock eyes. There’s something about him.
There’s a brightness to him.
There’s a tiny hint of a smile on his lips.
Then as the islanders jostle about, I lose sight of him in the throng.
‘I’ll handle this,’ barks Porscha as the emergency services arrive to put out the imaginary fire. ‘Which one of you useless pricks can speak Spanish?’
From nowhere, Cam whispers one word in my ear and without turning around, I slip quietly away.
