Reality Gold

by Tiffany Brooks

“So does everyone understand what we are doing here? The Incas were masters of stonework. Their villages were supported and protected by their well-made walls. They also had a sophisticated network of messengers to get information from town to town. Those two things are the inspiration behind this challenge. First, each team is going to construct a wall made from stones without any mortar. Your wall only needs to be three feet by three feet, but it has to be sturdy enough to hold Joaquin’s body weight, because he’s going to come over and sit on it to test it out. When that’s done, you are going to run a relay race, and the first team to plant their flag at the finish line wins.

  It was pretty clear that Huaca was at a disadvantage. We had only had six team members left, and with four needed as messengers that left only two to build the wall. I looked over at Maren, trying to see if there was any clue she’d decided to make a deal with Porter. If not, we were definitely toast.

  “We don’t need all ten players,” London mimicked AJ. She was obviously still upset at the loss of Annika, and based on the size of our pile of rocks, rightly so. I was pretty peeved myself. This was going to be a tough one.

  I was the one who’d be constructing our wall. “I want all the big rocks first,” I directed the team. “And all of them should be as flat as possible, no matter what size. I also want a pile of the really small rocks, because I can use those as filler in the cracks.”

  I like doing puzzles, and that’s really what this was—a 3D puzzle. I got absorbed in the work and time passed quickly.

  “You a stonemason back home?” Lucas asked me at one point. “You might have a career waiting when you get off this island.”

  But it turned out Justin, the Sol builder, was the one with a future in stonemasonry. Not only was his wall finished way before mine, but when he let out a victory yell, I knew he’d found an immunity coin.

  Ugh! Oh, well. I kept building, but in the distance I could see Deb arguing with Phil and Katya, stabbing the air in the direction of the walls, and then the trail. I didn’t need to know how to lip-read to understand the challenge had been a bust. Sol would probably finish their relay race before our wall was even finished, which turned out to be exactly what happened.

  I called Joaquin over to test my wall right as Willa was running the last leg of the relay. She planted the Sol flag in theirs and gave me a sheepish look.

  “Sorry,” she said apologetically.

  “Do we even have to run?” Lucas asked Joaquin. “They won. It’s over. I’d rather not exert myself unnecessarily, if you know what I mean.”

  Phil came over, red-faced and bothered. “Yes, of course you have to run. We’ll have to use film magic to make it look more competitive than it actually was.”

  Joaquin was still sitting on my wall. “Very nice,” he complimented me. “It can probably hold you, too. Come see. Sit.”

  He patted the wall, and the stones barely even shifted when I sat next to him. I felt weirdly proud of this silly accomplishment, but despite Joaquin’s urging to take a break, I couldn’t sit still. Alex was looking at me with concern, which made me realize: Justin wasn’t part of the group who’d made the deal with Maren for their things. Porter had promised that if they won, they’d vote someone off their own team instead of ours. But as High Priest, Justin could overrule that decision. He could easily decide to send our team to Council, and really, why wouldn’t he? He had nothing to gain by honoring the deal with Maren.

  “Let’s go watch the runners, if you can call them that,” Justin said, leading the group toward the course.

  I waited for Joaquin to get up before using my phone to take a picture of my wall.

  “What good is a picture if you’re not in it?” Willa asked. “If you aren’t going to take a selfie, at least let me get one of you sitting on top.”

  I sat on the wall and she directed me. “Oh, that’s cute. Cross your ankles, and hold up your arms in a shrug, as if you’re saying I made this, but in a really modest way.”

  She laughed when I attempted the pose. “Great. Look.” She held out her screen so I could see the result. “See? I’m good for something around here: photo advice.”

  She took a quick selfie of herself as if to illustrate the point, holding the camera high and tipping her head to the right with a wide, openmouth smile. It was a pose that looked awkward when it was happening in real life right in front of me, but when she held out her phone, the image she’d caught made it look as if she was mid-laugh, listening to the funniest joke ever. She looked so carefree and happy, palm trees and blue sky in the background. I wondered if I’d ever have the guts to casually fake a pose like that in front of other people. I’m sure I could do it alone in my bedroom, but if there was any sadder visual than a lonely girl making faces at her phone, pretending to laugh and have fun with imaginary friends, I couldn’t think of one.

  “Now one of us,” Willa said, leaning in close. She smelled sweet, like the freshly cut fields in Golden Gate Park. It hadn’t even occurred to me to pack perfume. I smiled. Me and Willa. Maybe someday people would be scrolling through their feed and they’d see this picture and envy me, the way I’d done last night.

  “Don’t worry,” she said, after she inspected the picture. “We can still honor the deal. I’m going to convince Justin to pick our own team for the vote. The only thing is . . .”

  I frowned.

  “I’m worried for Porter. He and Justin haven’t really hit it off. Justin thinks Porter likes me, so it’s a little awkward.”

  Oh. My face flushed. Wait, were she and Justin together? Not her and Porter?

  “Well, does . . . Porter . . . like you?” I managed to stammer out.

  Willa laughed. “No! I think he’s got a thing for you. Didn’t you realize? It would be so sad if he left before you guys got together.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. So much for my nonexpressive face.

  “Aw, you’re so precious. I’ll work on Justin, don’t worry. Come on, let’s go watch them come in from the race. Plus I want to get close enough to hear Deb reaming Phil and Katya out for making this challenge so lame.”

  She grabbed my hand and pulled me into a run. Harry, the lone cameraman who’d stayed behind from the race, moved to follow us.

  I definitely didn’t want to go home, not now. For a split second I didn’t even care if I never found the treasure because I was holding hands with Willa, a social media star, and she’d called me precious and said a guy liked me. I felt an exhilaration I’d thought I’d never experience again—yet it felt scary at the same time, as if I was teetering on the edge of something. Was I ready to start trusting people again?

  Maybe. For the first time in a long while I wanted to. There were tons of flights to LA every day. I imagined flying to visit Willa for weekends. We’d go shopping, run into some paparazzi, post pictures on Instagram together.

  Willa laughed and pulled me to go even faster, and we left Harry in the dust.

  Take that, SF friends. Or to use AJ’s eloquent words to Team Sol: Suck it.

  16

  True to Willa’s word, even though Sol had won, Justin announced at Council that he was going to allow their team to cannibalize itself. He was honoring the deal Porter and Maren had made—Willa must have convinced him. I was relieved that my team wouldn’t be voting anyone off, but I was worried Porter might end up a target. If Justin saw Porter as competition for Willa, the odds were pretty good Porter would be voted off. Bad news for me. Of course, if Justin saw Porter as competition for Willa then that probably also meant Porter wasn’t into me anyway and I should just bury myself under my perfectly made stone wall and be grateful his disinterest hadn’t play out on camera.

  Either way, it was hard to sit around the fire pit waiting for Sol to return while worrying about what was happening at their Council. The lightning was back, sporadic and scraggly in the distance. I couldn’t tell if rain would follow. S
o far the weather didn’t really follow any pattern I was used to. Heat lightning, or storm lightning? It was unclear which one we were witnessing, but if a storm was coming, I hoped the boat returned before the rain arrived.

  “I see the boat!” Maddie exclaimed, pointing toward the water. It was late, or maybe it just seemed as if the night had dragged on. I didn’t know what time it actually was because I’d left my phone at the charging station.

  I looked across the beach where she had indicated, but I didn’t bother getting up the way I had the first two times someone had thought they’d seen a boat’s lights blinking in the distance. We’d already wasted a ton of time thinking it was the Sol motorboat, which led, inevitably, to worrying whether all the blinks were a pirate code. I was ready for Sol to come back already.

  “For real this time, you guys,” Maddie said. “Look!”

  The lights floated closer and closer until we could make out the boat. Maddie let out a sigh of relief when it was clear it was the Sol team, not a pirate ship. I scanned the group, trying to see who was there, but more importantly, who wasn’t. Willa was there in the bow, but that wasn’t a surprise. I spotted long blond hair; that was Alex. She was sitting next to Cody. He was so tall, he was hard to miss. The boat slid ashore and everyone got out, a lot more subdued than usual.

  Porter was there. I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. Even better news was that Murch was gone. A quiet guy named Zander was missing, too.

  “One of the girls is gone,” Maddie said, surprised.

  “Must be Taylor,” I guessed, but I was wrong. Taylor was there, but not Chloe. That was crazy—how had Taylor survived but not Chloe? Pretty, normal, nice Chloe. I hadn’t seen that coming at all.

  It must have been a tough Council. They walked toward camp single file, not really interacting, except for Willa and Justin. He had his arm around her, and her head was on his shoulder. She looked upset.

  Porter looked happy to see me. “Glad you made it,” I told him.

  “Worried about me, Frisco?”

  “Maybe.”

  He reached for my hand. I felt his fingers intertwine with mine and we moved closer together.

  One of the cameras targeted us, something I felt rather than saw because the light that accompanied the camera crew suddenly hit me like a blast of sunlight.

  We split apart, and I didn’t expect to feel so frustrated at the separation.

  The beleaguered Phil ushered us all off to our own cabins. He must have been tired if he didn’t care about filming something potentially juicy like that.

  “Save all strategizing and fraternizing for tomorrow,” he said. “Plenty of time then. Tonight, it’s lights out.”

  I wondered if Maren had seen the hand-holding incident because she was extra snippy in the morning. I’d noticed her black mood in the cabin—she was wearing a You Discussed Me T-shirt and it seemed like she pointedly turned in my direction when she put it on—but the fact she was targeting me didn’t really come out until after we signed out the phones and headed off into the woods.

  A few minutes later, we ran into Porter, Cody, Willa, and Alex, a meet-up that they tried to play off as random but was obviously staged.

  “Mind if we join you?” Porter asked innocently. “Or should we just follow behind at a discreet distance?”

  “Heck yeah, join us. The more eyes the better,” AJ said, at the same time Maren gave a loud “No.”

  She looked at him in disbelief. “You threw three of our own teammates off the island for no reason because you didn’t want to share. But now you want to let these guys in from the other team?”

  AJ shrugged. “I’ve seen the error of my ways. More eyes are a good thing. Maybe even necessary.”

  “Oh, isn’t that nice. Would’ve been helpful if you’d figured that out before. Anyway, the three of us have an alliance, remember?”

  “When it comes to the game, sure,” AJ said. “But for the rest of it, I’m Team Treasure. Team Trillion Pounds of Incan Gold, Team Get into Harvard.”

  “Team AJ, you mean?” Maren meant it as an insult, but AJ didn’t take it that way. He held up a finger and then opened his backpack.

  “That reminds me. I’ve got a waiver here that everyone needs to sign, basically agreeing that by going on this search you are admitting that it is part of an effort directed by me, I’m the one in charge, it’s my proprietary information that will lead to any findings, that sort of thing.”

  AJ held his pen out expectantly. Willa waved it off and slipped away toward the beach after announcing her lawyer never let her sign anything without reviewing it first.

  “A lawyer, huh? Must be nice to be so fancy,” Cody observed as she walked back to the beach.

  “This, you saved?” I asked Maren, because it must have been one of the things she’d rescued from his bag. “I can see salvaging his notes, but a legal waiver?”

  I meant it to be an inside joke, but she glowered at me.

  AJ answered instead. “Nah, Maren never saw this. I had this in my duffel. Anyone who signs can come with me. Oh, and I’m going to film myself reading this as you sign it, so there’s no confusion later.”

  “Dude,” Cody said, shaking his head in wonder as he took the pen. “You are one of a kind. You know this doesn’t even matter, don’t you? The show owns all of us, including you.”

  “Then it won’t matter if you sign it.”

  Alex signed next while AJ used his phone to film us. Not that he needed it, because Lou was holding his camera, capturing the whole thing. Rohan had told me that Deb intentionally rotated the cameramen so we didn’t form relationships with them.

  Porter winked at me and signed, too.

  “Even me?” I asked AJ.

  “Yeah,” Maren interjected. “Even special Riley has to sign? But her daddy is the reason you even know your theory is half-right. You’re going to hold her to the same standard as the rest of us mortals?”

  I stared at her. Why couldn’t she drop this obsession with my father? It was as if she’d been at my school and signed the “Fair Is Fair” petition to get me expelled. Had Deb told her to get under my skin?

  “This again? Are you going to go after me every morning?” I grabbed the pen. “Whatever. I’ll sign it, I don’t care.”

  Everyone took in the Riley and Maren Show. It was really poor form to be arguing in front of the competition.

  Maren watched me sign. “You know what? I’m going to take a break from the treasure thing today. Think I’ll get my work shift over with early. You guys go without me.”

  AJ followed her out of the Snack Bar with the waiver. I could hear him telling her that it was retroactive, that she needed to sign because of the previous search.

  “Awk-ward,” Alex said, in a singsong.

  “Yeah,” I agreed. It was hard to keep my expression neutral because Maren’s comments echoed the views expressed by most of my online harassers. There was such malice lurking behind those tiny screens. I really hadn’t expected it to bleed into the real world in this setting halfway around the world. So far, my image repair efforts were doing more to reinforce my reputation than correct it.

  AJ came back, holding up his waiver in victory. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go. Time to par-tay.”

  17

  The morning search was unproductive, and because we were being filmed, we didn’t even really talk about anything interesting. Worse still, it seemed like Porter was keeping his distance, staying near his Sol teammates whenever we split into groups to cover different areas. It was a bust all around.

  Everyone felt it. AJ kept giving the finger to the drone whenever it appeared overhead.

  We returned to camp for lunch, sweaty and tired, and immediately split apart to pull ourselves together. For that, I had antagonized Maren? Definitely not worth it. The others went swimming or to nap in t
he hammocks, and when it was all clear, I slipped away to see if I could find out more about MrJackSparrow.

  His name popped up a number of times when I searched the archives. He was a regular contributor to various discussions, but not a regular one—there were plenty of gaps between posts, which meant there were blocks of time where he could have come to the island.

  And then I found something from April, just two months ago.

  Think Twice: Hey @MrJackSparrow. What’s the word? Find anything?

  MrJackSparrow: I will

  ThinkTwice: Is that a no?

  MrJackSparrow: I didn’t find it yet, but I found some caves that no one else knows about. Something’s there, I’m sure of it. When I can get back to Black Rock, it will be quick. I know right where to go

  ThinkTwice: How did you get on the island? I’ve heard of hunters getting arrested and sent out of the country and never allowed back again. I wouldn’t want to risk it

  MrJackSparrow: and that’s the difference between us, and why I’ll be rich while you spend all day online on the couch in your mother’s basement

  MrJackSparrow wasn’t afraid to burn bridges, apparently. After that, his name came up in a few conversations, but nothing too interesting. I’d have to look more later—it was hard to concentrate on anything but the realization that he hadn’t found the gold. It was still there, and not only that, we were on the right track. He had to have been talking about the same caves we were looking for.

  I hurried back to camp, running smack into AJ—who was refreshed, ready, and appeared to be on his way toward Black Rock.

  “Are you going without me?” I asked, not really expecting him to say yes.

  At least he looked sheepish. “Early bird catches the worm and all that,” he said.

  I’d been right—he was only out for himself. I knew he’d leave me behind when it suited him.

  “Nice try, but I’m coming with you,” I told him sharply. “So you might as well wait for me to get my sneakers and backpack.”