Hide(18)
“Buck up, buttercup,” Logan whispers to himself. What better way to conquer a fear than to go into the very belly of the beast—or in this case, the mouth of the clown. Logan climbs in, finding a perfect body-shaped space between the teeth and the tongue.
See? Clowns can’t hurt him. This clown will help him. It’ll be a funny story to tell his employees someday, when he’s part of Frye Technologies. Or, better, when he owns Frye Technologies. He won’t even have to change the name when he takes over. Imagining his future—glossing over what app, exactly, will somehow lead to this chain of events—is like drinking a warm glass of milk, bland and soothing and soporific.
Logan, once plagued by nightmares of clowns, falls asleep in one. Much like the clown, Logan needs a new nose, or at least major sinus surgery. His snores saw through the air, amplified by the cavernous clown mouth he sleeps in.
* * *
—
By two p.m., Isabella has had enough.
It’s hot. She needs to pee. She hasn’t heard a single noise all day. The whole thing feels like a practical joke. Like that Sydney woman planned it. Oh, god. What if she did? What if when she told them all about her prank show, it was dramatic irony for her audience?
It can’t be that. No YouTuber could afford this. Unless she was only pretending to be a YouTuber. Isabella’s heart races, her breaths getting fast and shallow. She closes her eyes, regains control. No. Ox Extreme Sports has to be real.
She has a lot of notes for them, though. She’ll present them smartly. Articulately. Mixed with praise and an action plan for how to improve and market their brand through this stupid competition. She doesn’t want to win, anyway. She wants a fucking job. She wants these miserable fuckers who can afford to run a $50,000 children’s game to give her a salary and benefits.
She pushes free of the clump of topiary she had shoved herself into. Her suit jacket snags and she can feel the pulled thread down to her very bones. She can’t afford to replace this. It’s her best interview outfit.
Humiliated and angry, Isabella refuses to stoop any lower. She will not pee in the bushes. Her pumps are almost silent as she winds her way back toward the camp, mentally practicing the speech that will get her a job with these fucktrumpets. Maybe, she thinks, carefully timing the smile that will soften her words, the efficacy of offering a $50,000 prize for a competition that wasn’t advertised or broadcast is worth reviewing.
After thirty minutes of walking and composing, she’s sure her speech will come across as both polished and unpracticed as soon as she can get in front of someone from the company. But she’s made a mistake. There are no landmarks to look for. The trees are so tall and crowded that, combined with pathway walls, they obscure everything. And she’s been walking way too long now.
She turns at a towering hedge, hoping it borders something worth getting to, and follows it. There’s an offshoot that looks less overgrown. She follows that. By the time she takes her fourth turn, trying to course-correct, she’s blistered and ready to cry out of exhaustion and frustration. This is the stupidest fucking game ever.
She takes off her jacket and her shoes and sits in the middle of the path. Her bladder is so full it’s making her ovaries hurt. She’s not going to convince anyone to hire her in this state. Hell, right now she’d take a restroom over a job offer without hesitation.
Then she hears soft padding. Approaching.
“Thank God,” she says, wiping under her eyes and standing. “You found me.” She turns to greet her savior.
* * *
—
The sun setting has never felt so momentous. Mack watches, enthralled, as blue fades to purple and then soft indigo. She hasn’t seen a sunset in so long—it wasn’t worth giving up her bed at the shelter for. But tonight she wonders if maybe it was, after all.
Even though Linda said sunset, Mack doesn’t move until she’s counted ten stars. Her whole body protests almost as loudly as the roof beneath her. Everything creaks and groans. She crawls carefully off, then drops to the ground. There’s a painfully tight knot in her back she’ll never be able to reach, and she has to pee so bad she knows it will hurt. But she made it without wetting herself, which is no small victory.
It’s going to take her forever to find the camp again, so she squats behind the piano building and waters the weeds there. When she looks up, relief almost as powerful as an empty bladder hits her. A spotlight is shining straight into the sky, calling her back to the camp.
Even with the beacon, it takes her nearly an hour to wind her way there. No path is straight. They loop and twist and curve, doubling back constantly. She pays as much attention as she can, chugging water and devouring protein bars. She’s happy with her spot. She’ll try to find it again tomorrow. And she’ll try not to think of Maddie, or Poopsie, or anything other than hiding.
To her surprise, even with her slow pace, she’s the third person back. Linda waves at her from the spotlight. Jaden, he of the sculpted muscles, and beautiful Ava are at the food table, heads close together, deep in discussion. They jolt apart when Mack walks up.
“I’ve never been so bored or missed my phone more. Worst day of my life, and six more to go!” beautiful Ava chirps, rolling her eyes to contradict her cheery tone.
Mack drains a couple of water bottles, then takes an apple and heads to the showers. If drinking water was nice, standing under even this lukewarm stream is divine. She stays in as long as possible, rinsing everything, wiping away the strain of the day.