For Real

by Alison Cherry

  Will starts crawling, and he’s much faster than I expected. Ten feet into the ride, I give up on protecting my sweaty hands and brace them against his shoulders. “You okay up there?” he calls.

  “I’m good.”

  I’m slipping to the left a little, and I lean the other way, trying to balance. “Hey,” Will says as I overcorrect, “this might be easier if you lie all the way down on top of me.”

  “Lie on top of you?” Oh God.

  “Like a piggyback ride, but horizontal.” He stops for a minute and waits for me to reposition myself.

  The suggestion kind of makes me feel like my head is going to explode, but Martin and Zora are way ahead of us now, and another cheer goes up behind us, signaling the arrival of a third team. Slowly, I lower myself down until my boobs are pressed flat to Will’s back. I lay my cheek between his shoulder blades, breathing in the heat rising from his skin and the smell of his detergent and fresh sweat. I lock my arms around his torso for balance and wonder if he can feel how fast my heart is beating.

  “Comfy?” he asks, and the vibrations of his voice rumble through my whole body.

  “Ready when you are,” I say.

  Will was right—we’re able to go a lot faster like this. I close my eyes as his body shifts and flexes under mine, and just for a second, I allow myself to imagine pressing this close to him because he wants me there, not because it’s part of a game.

  The ride ends way too quickly.

  When we hit the finish line, Will lets out a whoop. “All done,” he says, reaching back to pat my thigh. “You can get off now.” I don’t want to, but I do.

  Will stands up, brushing the dirt off the knees of his jeans and rotating his wrists. His face is pink with exertion, and it makes him look cuter, if that’s even possible. “Did I hurt you?” I ask him.

  “Nah. You’re like a tiny baby koala.” He runs over to the lion dancer, who pulls a pink envelope out of the pocket of his fringed pants and hands it over. Will opens it and reads aloud:

  Make your way by cab to the Hotel Majapahit and find the swimming pool. In Java, it is traditional for couples to pay a fee of twenty-five rat tails to the Registrar of Marriage before their wedding. In homage to this, you must search the bottom of the pool for twenty-five rat figurines, which you may trade for your next instructions.

  Rat tails? Ew. I make a mental note never to get married in Java.

  “That sounds easy,” Will says. “How hard can it be to find twenty-five figurines on the floor of a pool? It’s not like there’s anywhere to hide them.”

  We sprint back to the starting line to collect our backpacks and see that two other teams have arrived. Steve is already crawling with Vanessa perched cross-legged in the center of his back like a queen riding an elephant. Troy and Janine are having a little trouble with logistics; they’re about the same height, and she can’t seem to keep her mile-long legs off the ground, no matter how she contorts herself. I still don’t see Samir at all—maybe Miranda and I won’t have to do a thing to knock him out of the competition. Then again, my sister’s not here yet either.

  Just as I think that, a taxi comes screeching up to the curb, and Miranda and Aidan pile out with their camera crew. “Hey,” my sister calls. “You guys need a cab? You can have this one.”

  “Yeah, thanks.” I give her a hug as Will and our crew squish inside and start talking to the driver about our next destination. “How was your flight?” I ask my sister.

  “Miranda, come on,” Aidan calls.

  “I gotta go,” she says breathlessly. “I’ll talk to you later.” She blows me a kiss, and then she’s gone.

  I slide into the car next to Will feeling a bit let down—seeing my sister in tiny, rushed snippets is almost worse than not seeing her at all. “So, the driver knows where the hotel is?” I ask.

  “He nodded and said okay when I showed him the instructions,” Will says.

  “I guess we’re good, then.” I pat his head. “Thanks, Lucky Hat.”

  But half an hour later, we’re still driving around, and I swear the same droning song has been playing on the cabdriver’s stereo the whole time. I have no idea where the hotel is supposed to be, but I’m starting to feel like we’re going in circles. Did Miranda know how awful this cabbie was when she handed him off to us? I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t try to sabotage me, but I guess I can’t be certain, now that we’re not technically a team. “Didn’t we already pass that store with the blue awning?” I shout to Will over the music.

  “I’m not sure. They’re all starting to look the same.” He leans forward. “Excuse me, sir? Hotel Majapahit?”

  The guy nods. “Yes, yes.”

  “You know where we’re going?”

  “Yes.” But then he does a U-turn, which doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

  Will leans back and lowers his voice. “What do we do? Should we get out?”

  “I don’t know. Do you think we’re really behind?”

  “Maybe. But other people might have gotten lost, too.”

  We pull up beside another cab, and to my relief, our cabbie yells something out the window to the other driver. I don’t understand any of it, but I assume (and hope and pray) he’s asking for directions. Then he does another U-turn, cranking the wheel so hard Will flies into the sound equipment.

  By the time we get to the hotel, we’ve been driving around for an hour, and I’m pretty sure I recognize the auto body shop down the street as one we passed five minutes from the stadium. Martin and Zora sprint out the lobby doors as we go to pull them open, and we spot Troy and Janine getting into a cab down the street. I can’t believe they’ve managed to do two challenges in the time it took us to get here. “This sucks,” I mutter to Will.

  We ask the woman behind the front desk where to go, and she signs Greg’s waiver and directs us toward the back of the hotel. The pool area is gorgeous, tiled in a warm terra-cotta color and surrounded by palm trees and potted ferns. We’re the only ones here, except for a producer and a Javanese guy dressed in a sarong and holding a stack of pink envelopes. Cushioned beach chairs under canvas umbrellas line the edge of the pool, and when I see them, my exhaustion hits me like a punch to the face. All I want to do is curl up in the shade and let the soothing sound of the breeze rustling through the palms lull me to sleep.

  Will approaches the edge of the pool and looks down into the turquoise-blue water. “Oh God,” he says. “Now I get why this is hard.”

  Every single inch of the pool’s floor is covered with tiny animal figurines. There must be thousands of them. From here, I can pick out a few orange tigers, a couple of bright green parrots and frogs, and some white polar bears. But most of the animals are various shades of gray and brown, the same colors as rats.

  “Are you kidding?” I say. Then something else occurs to me. “Oh God, I’m not even going to be able to see which ones are rats without my glasses.” In the rush to pack for the race, it never even occurred to me that I’d need to buy prescription goggles.

  “Can we tie them to your head somehow, so you can swim with them on?”

  “There’s an extra pair of shoelaces in my bag,” I say. “I’ll give it a shot. Why don’t you go ask that guy where the swimsuits are?”

  I’ve managed to craft a functional glasses-holding device by the time Will comes back empty-handed. “That looks … good,” he says, then bursts out laughing. “I mean, you also look like the biggest nerd I’ve ever seen.”

  “Shut up, this was your idea. Where are the swimsuits?”

  “There aren’t any. The producer says we have to swim in whatever we brought.”

  I stare at him. “But … I didn’t bring a swimsuit. They said we didn’t have to. Do you have one?”

  “Nope.” He slips off his shoes. “Come on, we’re wasting time.”

  I can’t very well swim in my jeans, and my cotton shirt will never dry in this humidity. I start pawing furiously through my bag, looking for the sports bra and shorts I know I
packed, but I can’t find them. And even if I did, where would I change? Maybe I could go inside the hotel and find a bathroom?

  “Claire, come on! What are you doing?” Will says.

  “I’m looking for something to swim in, but I can’t—”

  And then I glance up, and my brain shuts off.

  Will is standing in front of me in nothing but a pair of black boxer briefs. His torso is wiry but subtly muscular, and his smooth, damp skin glints in the Java sunshine. As I try not to stare at the chiseled lines leading down from his hipbones, I hear Isis’s voice in my head: We have some seriously steamy challenges in store for you.

  For a second, all I can think is Thank you, God.

  And then I think, Millions of people are about to see my lucky smiley-face underwear.

  “We’re wasting time,” Will says. “We have to find those rats and get out of here. Just take off your clothes, okay? It’s no big deal.”

  Maybe it’s no big deal for him, but it is for me. I hate myself for my nerves and my modesty, and I know I’m wasting precious minutes. But if I’d known coming here would mean that everyone I know would get to see me strip on television, I never would have auditioned. I’m beyond exhausted, there’s a camera in my face, Will is standing in front of me practically naked, and I’m suddenly so overwhelmed that I’m sure I’m going to cry.

  “I just … I can’t …,” I say, and my voice comes out so small it’s almost inaudible.

  “You can,” Will says firmly. He grabs my shoulders and looks me right in the eyes. “The producers want you to make this into a big deal, but you’re not going to let them win, are you? You’re stronger than they are. You’re going to do this challenge with your head held high, and it’ll be over before you know it. Plus, you have absolutely no reason to be embarrassed about taking your clothes off. Trust me.”

  He doesn’t say it in a flirty way, and that’s what makes me believe he really means it. He’s not trying to hit on me; he just thinks it’s an empirical fact that my body is fit to be seen by strangers. I suddenly don’t feel like crying anymore.

  “Come on, Dominique,” he says quietly. “Let’s go swimming. Nobody else is looking. It’s just you and me and the water, okay?”

  If Natalie and I were watching this show at home and we saw some girl fall behind because she didn’t want to swim in her underwear, we’d be disgusted. Nat would probably throw Cheez-Its at the television and shout, “Suck it up, wimp!” I’m sure none of the other girls will have trouble with this challenge—the sorority sisters are probably dying to get out of their clothes, and Miranda’s always bragging about how she skinny-dipped in some reservoir in France. She won’t expect me to face this challenge head-on, and I picture the respect that will dawn in her eyes when she hears how far her innocent little sister was willing to go to stay in the race. This is my first chance to prove her wrong about me, and I’d be stupid not to take it.

  I slip out of my shoes and socks, then turn away from the camera, pull my shirt over my head, and unclip my mike. My bra is dark purple, which won’t be see-through in the water, and I tell myself it’s the same as a bikini. I wriggle out of my jeans and toss them onto a deck chair. And then I join Will at the pool’s edge, holding my head high like Dominique would.

  Who cares if I have a shoelace tied around my head like the biggest dork in the world? Who cares if my butt is covered in neon-colored smiley-faces? If I act like I’m the hottest thing ever, like nothing I’m doing is ridiculous or scary, maybe everyone else will be fooled.

  “Cute undies,” Will whispers. He takes my hand, his fingers warm and strong as they lace through mine, and we jump into the pool together.

  Things are better once I’m in the water. Will scours the deep end for rat figurines while I take the shallow end, and we’re far enough apart that I almost feel like I’m alone. After the exhausting, sweaty day we’ve had, the sensation of cool water against my bare skin is heavenly.

  “Got one!” Will calls after a couple minutes. He holds a figurine up above his head.

  “Let me see.” I swim over, and he drops it into my hand. It’s about the length of my palm, gray with a long pink tail. As I hand it back, I catch Will sneaking a peek at my chest, just like he did to Miranda at the auditions, and I suddenly like this challenge a lot more.

  “Cool,” I say. “Twenty-four to go.”

  Will runs his fingers through his spiky, wet hair—he looks different without his lucky hat—and then his hand dips back into the pool and settles on my waist. “You doing okay with this?” he asks, low enough that I’m not sure Terry’s boom microphone can hear him. He’s so close I can feel his breath on my cheek. A little shiver goes through me, and it has nothing to do with the chilly water.

  “Yeah,” I whisper back. “Thanks.” He smiles at me, and then he dives back down, and he’s gone. I hope he’s checking out my legs underwater.

  My glasses-on-a-string contraption works surprisingly well, and over the course of the next half hour, I find ten rats. Will scrounges up the additional fourteen. As I towel off and struggle into my jeans, Will presents the rats to the man in the sarong and stands there in his dripping boxer briefs, waiting for our next instructions. While he’s turned away, I can’t help staring at the muscles in his smooth, tan back, but then I catch Greg filming my face and smirking, and my cheeks heat up as I turn away. But my embarrassment does nothing to squash my good mood—conquering my fear has invigorated me, and I smile and hum to myself as I pull on my shirt. If I could get through this, maybe the rest of the “seriously steamy challenges” won’t be a problem.

  Maybe I’m more ready for this race than I thought.

  Just as Philadelphia and an already-shirtless Blake sprint into the pool area—I guess they didn’t end up in Serbia after all—Will returns to my side with our next envelope. “Go ahead and read it while I get dressed,” he says, pulling his lucky hat on over his wet hair.

  The sound guy makes me wait while he reaches up my shirt and reattaches my mike to my wet bra, and then I rip the envelope open and read the instructions aloud.

  Make your way by cab to the Pasar Pabean market. In nearby Malaysia, brides and grooms are forbidden to use the bathroom for three days after their weddings, a superstitious practice meant to ensure the health of their future children. In homage to this tradition of “holding in your water,” so to speak, you must navigate this crowded marketplace and purchase one srikaya, one bakpao, and a quarter kilo of ikan asin, all while holding a shallow pan of water between you. If you spill it, you must return to the entrance to have your pan refilled. You may not set down the pan at any time. Present your purchases and your full water pan behind the market to receive your next instructions.

  I don’t even understand half the words I just read. “What the hell is a srikaya? And a bakpao?” I say.

  At the same time, Will says, “I’m sorry, people aren’t allowed to pee for three days after they get married?”

  I start giggling uncontrollably; I am so, so tired right now. “That doesn’t even seem possible, does it?”

  “I would just let it flow. Screw my future children. They can keep themselves healthy.”

  “I guess we should be happy that’s not the challenge, right?”

  As we run out the sliding doors and back into the hotel lobby, I catch Will glancing back at Philadelphia, who has just removed her shirt. It’s not exactly surprising that he wants to see more boobs—he is a twenty-one-year-old guy, after all—but it makes me a little sad that my boobs weren’t enough for him.

  We manage to flag down a taxi, and the driver smiles and nods when we tell him where we’re going. Will tries asking him what a srikaya is, but he just repeats the word and nods again, which isn’t very helpful. A little while later, he drops us off in a small square in front of the market and extracts a few more rupiahs from the stack I hold out. We’re getting low on cash—our hour-long ride to the hotel cost a lot, and it was impossible to haggle. I pray a bakpao isn’t s
omething expensive, like a television or a live cow.

  The square is crowded with people carrying heaping shopping baskets and riding bicycles and mopeds, but the pink Around the World flag is easy to spot. A middle-aged woman in a long print skirt is waiting for us with a stack of pans and a bucket of water. Though there are no other teams in sight, some of them are probably inside the market already. I peer through the doorway, but it’s too dark in there to make out anything but general chaos.

  “Okay, let’s strategize,” Will says. “We should find someone who speaks English and ask them what this stuff is that we’re supposed to buy.”

  There’s a group of teenage boys loitering and smoking near the front of the market, and I point them out. “Maybe those guys?”

  “Sure. Go for it.”

  I look down at my feet. “Um, maybe you could do it?”

  “They’d probably be more likely to help a cute girl than some random white dude, don’t you think?”

  As much as I love that Will just called me cute, I feel anything but attractive right now. My butt is damp from the swimming pool, my hair is a bedraggled mess, and I have wet spots on the front of my shirt that make me look like I’m lactating. I don’t even like to ask for help at the grocery store at home, where everyone speaks English and I look relatively normal. But I’ve wasted enough of our time already today. If I can strip on camera, surely I can ask a stranger what an Indonesian word means. “Fine,” I say. “I’ll be right back.”

  My palms start sweating as I approach the guys, and I wipe them on my jeans. At first nobody even notices me, but when the boys spot Greg and his giant camera, they all fall silent and look at me. I have no idea what to say, so I try “English?”

  “Yes,” says one of the guys. He’s wearing a red baseball cap and looks about my age. When he smiles into the camera, he reveals a gap between his front teeth.

  “Can you tell me what srikaya is?”

  His eyebrows furrow. I hold out the card and point to the word. “Srikaya?” I say again.