Priya bit her lip. “No,” she said. “No, I mean—that’s not what I—”
“Why not?” Grace asked, and she was embarrassed to hear her voice crack. “Spence and I get along great, and he really listens to me. He doesn’t always talk about stuff that happened before I got here. He thinks I’m smart and funny.”
Priya looked hurt. “You are—”
But Grace was already standing up. “I just don’t get why everyone else who goes out with a guy is girl-friend material, but me, no, oh no, he must just be flirting with Grace!”
Gaby sighed. “Get a grip, Grace. You’re totally freaking out.”
“No,” Grace said, shaking her head as she looked from Priya to Chelsea. “He likes me. Not you. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.”
Grace turned and walked away, trembling with anger and hurt. How could they say that? she wondered. I know Spence likes me. She replayed all their conversations in newspaper, and remembered the way he looked at her, so serious and interested. She thought of the way he laughed at her jokes and made her feel like the only person in the room. It was special—and it was different than the way any other guy had ever treated her.
Grace walked away from her friends, all of her friends. Only Priya and Chelsea and Gaby had been involved in the conversation, but who knew what everyone else thought? Maybe this was what had made everyone act so strangely at dinner the other night—they thought Spence was flirting with Grace, and they wanted to make her feel special, even though they thought she wasn’t. They must think I’m a total loser, Grace thought, cringing when she remembered the sympathy in Priya’s eyes. Why else would they think he might not really like me?
I really wish Brynn were here now. Brynn would know how to make her feel better. But with Brynn rehearsing practically all the time, Grace was feeling more left out than ever.
Grace’s mind was still racing when she charged into the small circle where 5G sat, loading up sticks with marshmallows.
“Hey,” she said, crossing the circle and stopping right in front of Spence.
“Hey,” Spence replied. If he was surprised to see her, or if he noticed the hurt in her eyes, or if he just found it weird that she would charge right over to him in front of all his friends during campfire, he didn’t say anything. Instead he popped a marshmallow off the top of his stick and offered it to her. “Marshmallow?”
Grace reached out and popped the marshmallow in her mouth. The gooey sweetness soothed her, and she was able to blink away the tears burning behind her eyes and take a deep breath. He offered me a marshmallow. That means he must like me.
“Thanks,” she said and plopped down beside him.
It was bedtime when Grace returned to her bunkmates. She’d stayed with Spence’s bunk for an hour, enjoying their raunchy jokes and endless teasing, and the warm feeling of Spence sitting next to her, every once in a while reaching over to touch her shoulder. When it was time to head back to their cabins, Spence casually took Grace’s hand and walked with her to where bunk 5A was sitting, which happened to be on the way back to his cabin.
“See you tomorrow,” he said, and gave her hand a little squeeze.
“See you tomorrow,” she echoed.
All of 5A seemed to be watching Grace as they gathered up their things and stood. Most of the girls looked surprised—like this Grace, the Grace who took off to hang out with a boy and then held hands with him in front of everybody, wasn’t the Grace they knew. But Priya looked upset, and Chelsea and Gaby seemed to be avoiding her eyes.
Grace caught Priya’s eye as they began walking back to the cabin. For a second, Priya looked at Grace, her dark eyes wide and searching. But Grace quickly looked away.
chapter SEVEN
“Tonight’s outcasts are . . .”
Gaby held her breath. She was staring straight at the huge projection screen, chewing on her hair. Jake, she thought. Jake, Jake, Jake. Please. Just let him be voted out tonight.
“Erica and Anthony.”
Gaby let out a huge breath. Erica? And Anthony? Okay, Erica could be hard to get along with, and their shelter had flooded because they built it too close to a river. But in this episode alone, Jake had burned his partner’s dinner, built a latrine next to a hornet’s nest, and accidentally dropped his own sleeping bag into the lake. Clearly he was unfit for survival camp! Granted . . . he had taught himself how to gut and clean a fish, and how to bait a hook, which enabled his partner to catch three whole fish that Jake prepared perfectly—until he burned them. And in spite of all his dumb mistakes, his partner had praised him—said he was a “fantastic team player.”
Whatever. Gaby sighed. She felt so frustrated with him, it was almost like he really was her brother.
The theme music started up again as the credits rolled, and the lights in the auditorium came back up. Gaby just shook her head. It was official now: Jake was in the final four.
“Omigod!” Val whispered, reaching over to grab Gaby’s elbow. “You must be so psyched! Jake has a one in four chance to win!”
Gaby realized she probably looked horrified, and rushed to put on an “excited” expression. “Yeah. Right. Wow!”
“Do you think he’ll really win?” Priya whispered from the other side of Val. “Did you and your parents talk about what you’d do?”
Gaby tried to think fast. If Jake actually won—if she was just that unlucky—how would she react? What would the actual sister of a reality show winner do? She had no idea. No one she knew had ever been on television; nobody she knew even knew someone who had been on television. But she knew the winner would be getting a trip to Australia for his whole family that left the day after the finale. Either Gaby had to think of some reason she wasn’t going—or she would have to “leave” to “go to Australia.”
Gaby’s stomach clenched. The finale aired the next night. She didn’t have nearly enough time to come up with a plan.
“Gaby?” Priya asked with a frown. “Are you okay?”
Gaby shook her head to clear it. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just so excited, you know? My parents are actually at a conference in Nashua, so if he wins I’m supposed to call my mom right away and she’ll pick me up. Then we’ll drive to New York to meet my dad and Jake. So, you know, that’s what I’ll do.”
Val grinned. “This is so cool.”
Right, Gaby thought. So cool I’m shaking.
During siesta the next day, Gaby lay on her bunk and stared at the ceiling. She should have been sleeping—she’d stayed up nearly the whole night before trying to come up with a plan in case Jake won—but there was no way she could sleep with the Survival Camp finale only six hours away.
She glanced out the window. Outside, she saw Grace sitting on a rock, painting her toenails. A few of the other girls were trying to nap, like Gaby, but most of them were reading, playing cards, or chatting in quiet conversations. And Brynn was off rehearsing again, as usual. She was constantly rehearsing alone with David—a nonstop reminder that Gaby’s role was not one of the leads.
Grace was one of the only non-nappers who wasn’t talking to anyone. She still seemed pretty upset about the whole Spence conversation. Gaby felt a little guilty, but then, everything that was said was true, wasn’t it? Spence was a big flirt. And wasn’t it better for Grace to know that now, before next week came and he started flirting with someone else?
The funny thing about all of the Spence-related drama was that Gaby, Priya, and yes, Chelsea, had suddenly all become BFF. Gaby never expected to enjoy Chelsea’s company this much—but then, she hadn’t mentioned nightmares or flashbacks since that night at campfire when Gaby had called her out. At first they didn’t talk much about Grace and Spence—they came up every once in a while, but they never dominated the conversation. Lately, though, Spence seemed to be all Priya and Chelsea thought about. They both claimed they were over him, just interested in his well-being or something. But ever since he’d asked Grace to the social, they’d been kind of quiet and mopey. Yesterday Priya had re
vealed that even though she didn’t like Spence anymore, it was a little sketchy of Grace to go out with him. “If it were me,” Priya had whispered at the campfire before Grace had come up, “I would stay away awhile, just to respect the other person’s feelings.”
Gaby had totally agreed.
With that thought, Gaby sat up and dangled her legs over the edge of her mattress. Looks like I’m not sleeping, Gaby thought. I might as well try to do some damage control.
Slipping on her sparkly pink flip-flops, Gaby quietly opened the cabin door and slipped out. Grace was carefully swishing the brush over her big toe, totally oblivious. Gaby noted, as she got closer, that Grace’s toes looked awful. They were all smeary and uneven—nothing like the perfect pedicures the rest of the bunk had gotten from Tori before Grace had arrived.
“Hey,” Gaby said casually, dropping down next to Grace.
Grace jumped, making an even bigger smear on her toenail. “Hey,” she said. She didn’t exactly look happy to see Gaby.
Gaby ignored that and put on her biggest smile. “I can’t sleep so I thought I’d come out here and keep you company. What’s up?”
Grace looked at her like she was nuts. “What’s up?” she asked. “Well, you and Priya and Chelsea seem to think there’s no way Spence could like me. Thanks for that, by the way.”
Gaby sighed and rolled her eyes. “You’re so sensitive, Grace,” she chided. “We didn’t mean to hurt your feelings or whatever. It’s just . . . Spence is a flirt. It has nothing to do with how lovable you are. You just don’t know what you’re getting into.”
Grace shrugged, still not impressed. “Well, he does like me. I don’t get why that’s such a big deal.”
Gaby shook her head. “Fine, Grace. Seriously, we never meant to hurt your feelings. Let’s not let this ruin our friendship.”
Grace looked skeptical. “Okay, I guess.”
“Great.” Gaby put her hands in her lap and watched Grace try to draw a little flower on her toenail with pink polish. She was hopeless. It looked more like a squished frog. “So,” Gaby said casually. “What is up with you and Spence? Tell me about it.”
Grace’s shoulders tensed up. “Why are you asking?”
Gaby shrugged. “What do you mean, why am I asking? We’re friends, right? Friends catch up with each other.”
Grace turned away and wiped away the pink flower-frog, smearing the candy-pink color over her purple toenail. “It’s weird,” she said, still not looking at Gaby. “I have this funny feeling you’re just asking me about Spence so you can turn around and tell Priya and Chelsea.”
“What!” Gaby tried to look shocked, even though that was exactly what she’d been planning. Priya and Chelsea loved talking about Spence so much—they’d be psyched if she came back with new information.
“Look.” Grace screwed the top back on the nail polish bottle and turned to face Gaby again. “Spence and I like each other, but we’re just hanging out. No canoodling. No kissing. No big romance.”
Gaby smirked. “That’s not what it looks like to me.”
Grace shrugged. “Well, that’s what it is.” She paused. “I know something’s going on, Gaby. There’s something weird happening with Priya and Chelsea. Why don’t you just tell me what it is already, so I can have all the info?”
Gaby was quiet for a moment. It didn’t surprise her that Grace knew there was something up, but it did surprise her that Grace was bold enough to demand the info from her, point-blank. Grace had changed a lot since their first summer. Gaby scratched a mosquito bite, deciding whether or not to tell her.
“They like him,” she said finally. “Priya and Chelsea. You know he liked Priya last year.”
“Yeah,” agreed Grace. “Last year.”
“And then when we first got to camp, he and Chelsea were flirting a little bit.”
Grace nodded. “Okay. Yeah, she said that last night.”
“But then we went on the whole camping trip, and everyone got scared and everyone’s thinking sort of changed,” Gaby went on. “After that, everyone was all about friendship all the time. So Priya and Chelsea had been kind of fighting over Spence, but they decided to stop. They didn’t want to ruin their friendship over a guy. They called him ‘neutral territory.’ ”
Grace sighed. “ ‘Neutral territory’?” she repeated.
“Yeah.” Gaby looked at Grace. “So of course they still like him. And when you guys started hanging out, well, they kind of got jealous. But they won’t admit they’re jealous, ’cause they’re not supposed to like him.”
“Right,” said Grace. She wasn’t looking at Gaby anymore. She stared off into the woods, looking pensive.
“I think you should just not get too into him, Grace,” she said, looking down at her toes. “He liked both of them first. And he does flirt with everyone. No offense.”
Grace seemed to think this over. She didn’t look angry or immediately try to defend herself, like Gaby had expected. Instead, she slowly stood up.
“Thanks for the info, Gaby,” Grace said, turning around and heading for the woods. “I’m going to go for a walk. Alone. I’ll see you later.”
Gaby sat and watched Grace take off into the trees. She wondered what Grace was going to do about the Spence thing. But she quickly stood up and walked back into the cabin to try to get some rest. I can’t worry too much about Grace—I have my own problems.
“Oh my God,” Priya whispered, grabbing Gaby’s hand on the armrest and squeezing it. “Oh my God!”
My thoughts exactly, Gaby thought. Onscreen, an ad for some SUV played, with cheerful music about driving around the country and feeling carefree. Gaby had never felt less carefree in her whole life. Jake, her imaginary brother, was in the final two. And once this commercial break was over, the winner would be chosen.
It was probably a good thing that Gaby was so tense and nervous: At least she’d look excited to her bunkmates. They kept leaning over to catch her eye, bugging their eyes out and mouthing, “Wow!” Gaby couldn’t believe it had gotten to this point. Even last night, during the worst of her nightlong freak-out, she’d thought the odds of Jake actually winning were pretty slim. He was well liked by his partners—but he was so much weaker than they were! Surely the judges would eventually catch on. And besides, as part of the final four, he had only a 25 percent chance.
Which gave Gaby this terrible feeling in the pit of her stomach.
The guitar riff of the cheesy theme song came back up, and the show replayed the last few seconds before the commercial break:
“Haley,” intoned the stone-faced host, “you are . . . going home.”
Haley, a chubby girl with dyed platinum-blond hair, looked crushed. Jake and the other finalist, Deborah, turned to each other and shrieked, hugging and jumping up and down.
“That means . . .” the host continued. It seemed like he took a thirty-second break between each word, drawing the suspense out as long as possible. “Jake . . . and . . . Deborah . . . you . . . are . . . the . . . FINAL . . . TWO!”
Now it was a 50 percent chance.
All the campers cheered. The nightly conversations had shown that almost everybody liked Deborah and picked her to win; Jake, while not the strongest, was still better than that conniving Haley.
“You will have one minute to make a last speech to the judges,” the host went on, returning to a normal pace. “Then, the winner of Survival Camp will be chosen.”
Gaby took a deep breath. Deborah can still win. Deborah can still win. She tried to talk herself down as Deborah made her speech, all about the spirit of competition and her superior skills.
Right on, Gaby thought, crossing her fingers hard. You tell ’em, sister.
But then Jake got up. He said the win would mean a lot to his family, his parents and—say you have a sister, say you have a sister—sister and little brother. He went on to talk about everything he had learned over the course of the competition, not just physical skills, but mental skills, too, like courage
and the value of teamwork.
Gaby sighed.
This is so cheesy, Gaby thought. The judges will never go for this.
“Thank you,” said the host solemnly. “The judges will now deliberate.”
Dramatic music played as the camera panned over the judges, Jake and Deborah, the host, and then the judges again. Gaby was seriously worried that she might have a heart attack before the winner was announced. I guess that would solve my problem, she thought, but I’d kind of like to live to see what happens.
Thirty seconds and another commercial break later, Jake and Deborah were standing up on a platform, looking as nervous as Gaby felt.
“The . . . winner . . . of . . . Survival . . . Camp,” the host announced, “is . . .”
Suddenly Deborah’s half of the platform sank down, while Jake’s raised up, and fireworks shot off behind them.
“JAAAAAAAAAAKE!!!”
Gaby’s mouth dropped open. Oh my God. Oh my God.
Priya grabbed her arm on one side, and Chelsea grabbed her arm on the other. They both squeezed hard, letting out little shrieks that the counselors weren’t supposed to hear.
“Omigod,” whispered Priya, squeezing Gaby’s hand so hard she thought it would fall off. “Omigod!”
Omigod is right, Gaby thought. She’d never imagined when she’d first said Jake was her brother that there was any way she’d be sitting here in this position right now. Now she had to pretend she was leaving camp, going to Australia, and related to a semi-famous person. Most people, she thought to herself, would not be able to pull this off.
But Gaby had a plan.
chapter EIGHT
“Oh . . . my . . . God.” Priya’s mouth was hanging open as they all stared at Gaby on the way back to the cabin. “I just can’t believe it!” she continued in a whisper. “Your brother totally pulled it off. Your family is headed down under!”
Grace and Brynn trailed behind as everyone crowded around Gaby. Earlier, Grace had filled Brynn in on what had happened at campfire the night before, and just as Grace had suspected, Brynn had made her feel better.
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