Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You know, this whole time, Charlie’s been telling himself it’s fine. He didn’t ask for that producer to slide into his DMs on Instagram, but when he did, what, was Charlie going to say no to the chance to appear on a hot new reality TV show? Think how big this could be, and he’s not just talking about the potential prize pot.

A show themed around going to private concerts and meeting god knows how many famous bands for a whole month of filming? And if he wins, think of what the publicity could do for Charlie’s band. Surely Charlie’s got this show, whatever it is, in the bag. He’s a drummer. He knows music. He doesn’t need to know how the elimination criteria work to know that he’s going to easily win this thing.

Plus, the host is Jack Henry Maddox. You know, the famous English scholar-turned-keyboardist for Spare Parts? Charlie loves Spare Parts, and he loves Maddox—you know, a totally reasonable, heterosexual amount. Charlie’s allowed to admire other men, isn’t he? Especially when that man is hosting the show Charlie’s slated to appear on. Frankly, it would be rude of Charlie not to fanboy a little once the cameras are rolling.

So what if it also happens to be a dating show? So what if that producer wanted to make absolutely sure before signing Charlie that Charlie was also a total sex maniac? It’s not like he’s not. A total sex maniac, that is. And he flaunts it. If he’s not ashamed to tweet and Snap about being a player—all for the sake of getting more exposure for Queen Intentions, of course—then why should he be ashamed to say it on a Netflix show?

But he can’t deny that he’s maybe he’s a little bit out of his depth when he actually shows up on set for his first day of filming. Charlie’s so busy taking in the confessional room—black walls, black floor, and a backdrop of zigzagging LED tube lights barely illuminating a cushy black barstool halfway from the wall to where he assumes the camera will be—that he’s missing half of what the producer, Harry, is saying to him. When Charlie remembers to tune back in, Harry’s carrying on about the daily schedule—the in-home chef who will be cooking all their meals and the double beds Charlie will get to share with whichever beautiful women he wants.

“Never mind that,” says Charlie thoughtlessly. “What about the bands? When do we get to meet Jack Maddox?”

Harry snorts. “You’ll meet him soon enough. You’re the first confessional we’re doing, and from here, we’ll send you out to the villa along with the second one to start filming the meet-and-greet scene. Each cast member will join you once their confessional is done, and we’ll film a bit in between each. Then you’ll meet Maddox. He’ll explain everything about how the rules work, but not until tonight at your first party scene.”

Charlie decides that he already doesn’t like Harry, who’s coming across like he’s a bit too pleased to be in control of all the information that Charlie doesn’t have yet. Harry’s gelled brown hair makes him look sort of like a teenager, to be honest. A teenage bully. The kind that used to bully Charlie before he had his glow-up and became a famous drummer. Famous enough, anyway. Come on—Queen Intentions has two hundred thousand followers on Instagram. That’s certainly more than Harry has for his unknown little dating show that hasn’t dropped its first season yet. He should be thanking Charlie, really, for bringing all his fans here.

“So are all the cast musicians?” asks Charlie, trying to push down the bad feeling Harry gives him. Harry may be behind the camera, but he’s still going to have to interact with this guy every day for the next month: Charlie may as well not make that any harder for himself than it has to be.

Harry smirks. “You’re gonna have to find that out for yourself when you meet them.”

“No spoilers?”

“No spoilers. Come on, let’s get the camera rolling, gents!” he adds, raising his voice to the crew behind him.

One of them, who appears to be operating the extensive lighting equipment stretching up to the ceiling, rolls her eyes. “We’re not all gentlemen here, I’ll remind you, Harry.”

“Ignore her,” Harry tells Charlie in an undertone. “Singh always thinks she’s so clever, but she forgets I sign her paychecks.”

The bad feeling intensifies. Charlie frowns.

“Singh is our gaffer,” adds Harry, and he starts pointing between the crew. “Lange here is our mixer, and Ajayi and Farouk are our camera operators. That’s basically the core and covers everybody you need to know. PAs and rubbish don’t count.” (One of what Charlie assumes are the production assistants gives Harry a very dirty look when Harry’s not looking; Charlie grins at her.) “In fact, you don’t even need to know the core crew. If we’re doing our jobs right, you’ll forget we’re here catching everything on camera at all. That’s the most important thing, all right? You want to act natural. Don’t think about the fact you’re being filmed. I want you to ignore everyone here but me, all right? But when I ask you questions, don’t answer me. Look into the camera.”

“Uh, which one? There are two.”

“Mine,” says Farouk, an Arabic man who’s cocking his head toward Charlie. He has huge, bushy eyebrows and a stern gaze. “I’m the principal camera, so in confessionals, you always want to be looking straight at me. Ajayi will capture side shots, stuff like that.”

He says this so commandingly that Charlie gets the strong impression that Farouk is not someone to cross. The dark-skinned Ajayi, on the other hand, is smiling amusedly. “You’ll have to be patient with Farouk here. He forgot his people skills in the trunk.”

Farouk ignores this entirely, even as Singh snickers at him. “Go ahead and take a seat, Charlie. It’s going to take us a few minutes to get set up. We’re going to need to do a sound check on you, too, before we can really start rolling.”

So Charlie takes a seat on the barstool and attempts to pay attention to Harry’s prattling without losing his patience. Charlie used to take a lot of shit from guys like Harry, you know? And now that he doesn’t have to anymore, he doesn’t want to turn back.

Things are different now. He’s in a band that has two hundred thousand followers on Instagram. He gets a different woman in his bed every single night back at home, and he’s sure it’ll be the same here. However unpleasant Harry may be in here, in the confessionals, didn’t he just say that his job is to be invisible out there? Charlie’s going to get a month’s worth of private concerts and hot girls, and isn’t that enough to make this experience worth it?

That’s when he’s practically blinded as Singh turns on the overhead light. “Don’t mind me,” she tells him, pulling her brown hair into a sloppy bun at the back of her head before returning to the lights. Her smile is warm and inviting. “It’s going to take a few minutes to adjust these, but they won’t be so blinding in just a minute.”

“Right,” says Charlie, fidgeting. “Uh, I know Harry said to treat you like you’re invisible, but—”

“No chitchat,” Harry says sharply. “If you start now, you’re going to forget later that you can’t, and that can ruin a whole take if it happens out there in the villa in the middle of something that could have made it into the final cut. In here, I’m the only person who exists to you.”

Charlie bites his tongue very hard and purses his lips.

It doesn’t take as long as he expected before Singh announces that she’s good to go, and then Lange comes forward and hooks Charlie up with a microphone on a round black cord that goes over his head. “This thing is going to be on me—on all of us—in every take?” says Charlie in slight disbelief. “That’s pretty visible.”

“It’s a necessary evil,” says Lange cheerfully. “You’ll be in swimsuits most of the time, so you won’t have proper clothes on to hide mics behind, especially the men. Give me a sec to get back to my equipment, and then I just want you to talk at me for a moment, all right?”

“Talk at you?”

“Say anything. Doesn’t matter what. I just need to make sure the sound is good before we can really start rolling.”

“Right,” says Charlie a little self-consciously as Lange backs up a few pages and gives him a thumbs-up. “Um, I don’t know what to… say. I guess I—”

“That’s good,” interrupts Lange. “We’re good to start rolling, Harry.”

Harry smiles smugly. “Excellent. Charlie, walk off camera.”

“I—what?”

“We’re going to actually film you walking onscreen and sitting down. Walk off camera. Get to the left. My left—your right.”

“Oh. Okay.”

So Charlie walks off camera to the right, Harry’s left, and waits for Harry’s thumbs up. Feeling very stupid, attempting to walk normally and not seem too contrived for any reason under the sun, he then walks back to the stool and sits down.

“So quiet,” Harry complains. “This is a confessional. You need to be quipping at the camera, giving us workable material. Tell jokes. Laugh at them when you do.”

“I hope Jack Maddox isn’t as bossy as this,” mutters Charlie. “I was looking forward to meeting him, you know.”

He’s caught off guard when Harry praises, “Perfect. Lange, how was that for sound?”

“Good,” grunts Lange. “I caught enough of your line to be able to use it, I think.”

“I thought your dialogue wasn’t supposed to make it on-camera,” says Charlie, frowning.

“It almost never does, but we like to use it when jokes evolve organically in introductions sometimes,” Harry says. “So tell me about yourself. Tell me why you wanted to be on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll.”

Charlie clears his throat. Is it just him, or are these lights still really bright in his face? “Well, I wanted—”

“No,” Harry interjects.

Charlie frowns. “Um, what?”

“You always want to rephrase the question and speak in present tense. Remember, the audience is never hearing any of what I’m saying—or almost never. ‘On Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, I want…’”

“Oh. Yeah, okay. So—okay. On Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, I want to combine my two true loves, which are music and women.”

“But not falling in love with women?” Harry prompts. “Fucking women.”

It feels a bit crass to put it like that, so Charlie says instead, “Well, yeah. Playing the drums and playing women. Put it that way.”

“So serious. Give it to me with a bit of a laugh.”

Charlie summons all of the acting prowess he ever learned that one summer he did theater camp before deciding he wanted to be in a rock band instead. “Playing the drums and playing women,” he repeats, chuckling.

“Good. Talk to me about the drumming. Is that what you do full-time?”

“Yeah.” Remembering what Harry said about rephrasing the question, Charlie goes on, “So I’m a drummer for this band called Queen Intentions.” And then he parrots what he’s been saying about his band’s name for literally years now. “For the record, I did not pick the name, but it’s fitting enough. It’s thanks to this band that I get a different queen in my bed every night, after all.”

Harry smirks again. “That’s good, Charlie, but we’ll come back to the women. Tell me how long you’ve been doing it—how you think it’s going to help you on the show.”

“Well, I don’t know how it’s going to help me, do I? I don’t actually know any of the rules. I just know there will be concerts and fit girls.”

“Okay, but say that as if I hadn’t asked you about it. Make sure you’re looking at Farouk’s camera.”

Forcing himself not to roll his eyes, Charlie looks back into the camera. He tries to focus on Farouk, who has a much less annoying presence than Harry does. “I’ve been drumming since I was, like, fifteen? We started up Queen Intentions when I was nineteen, and I’ve been doing it professionally ever since. I’m hoping it helps me win the prize money this season, but I suppose I don’t actually know if it will. All I really know about the show is that there will be concerts and fit girls.”

While he’s talking, he can see Ajayi panning his camera around to the side, but Charlie tries not to let his eyes wander in Ajayi’s direction. The fewer reshoots he has to do, the better.

“And you said you’re a Maddox fan?”

“Oh, definitely. Huge fan.” A smile slips onto Charlie’s face. “I’ve been following him since Spare Parts’ first single.”

“Play it up for me. Make it dramatic,” says Harry. Right: this is a reality TV show. “But don’t sound so excited that it sounds artificial. You want to seem believable.”

“Oh. Uh—I guess I could definitely say I’ve got a bit of a man crush on Maddox. I don’t really fancy him—not in, like, a weird way—but I still have saved the autograph I got from him when I saw Spare Parts live when I was sixteen. I don’t know. Maybe that’s a bit weird,” Charlie says, forcing a laugh, trying to sound natural.

Harry grins. “Great. Doing great, Charlie. And what about the women? Fit girls, you said?”

“Fit girls,” repeats Charlie. “They haven’t told me much about the women who are coming on the show with me, but I’m hoping they’re alt rock fans. I do know they’re coming from all over the world, and I can’t wait to get some international girls in my bed on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll.”

“And you get a lot of that back home?”

“It’s not exactly hard for me to get girls back home, just not always the international kind. I mean, I go on tour with Queen Intentions half the year, but mostly just in Britain. I’m a sucker for an Australian accent, though.”

Harry narrows his eyes thoughtfully. “And what would you say your type is?” he asks. It’s funny, honestly, how ridiculous it is that he’s asking that so seriously.

“My type?” Charlie echoes. “Short blonde hair, dark eyes, sweet smile, small chest.”

“Small chest?” Harry raises his eyebrows.

Charlie shrugs. “Big boobs are overrated.”

When he doesn’t elaborate, Harry shrugs. “Okay, then. So you implied before that you’re something of a player. Can you tell me more about that?”

“Oh, I’m definitely a player. A different girl every night, just how I like it.” Feeling like he may as well commit to it, Charlie adds, “I’ve probably broken my fair share of hearts. I’ll give you the best night of your life, but I won’t come back. I get bored. My mum thinks I’ll settle down when I find The One, but I don’t really believe she’s out there. I’m having too much fun to find her, anyway.”

“And you’re looking forward to having fun on the show?”

“The only problem is there are only so many girls,” says Charlie, grinning. “I’ll run out in a week, two tops.”

“So you don’t plan on finding a serious relationship while you’re here.”

Snorting, Charlie repeats, “A serious relationship? Are you kidding me? I can’t imagine anything I want less.”

“Excellent,” remarks Harry. “I think I’ve got all the dialogue I need from you, Charlie, but we’re not quite done with you yet. We’ll need to get some sexy poses from you before we can let you go.” He says this so clinically that it, again, sounds bizarre coming out of his mouth.

Charlie raises his eyebrows. “Sexy poses?”

“You know, filler shots. Look enticingly at the camera. Give us some smiles. We’ll have you take off your shirt and get a bunch of shots of those abs. I know you’ve got some on you. We did do our research before we contacted you.”

Feeling intensely uncomfortable, Charlie shrugs one shoulder. “Um, okay. But I’m not going to kiss my bicep, all right?”

On Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, I want to combine my two true loves, which are playing the drums and playing women.  

Electropop music begins to play in the background as a Spanish man, maybe in his mid-twenties, laughs and smiles at the camera. His curly black hair flops in his eyes as the camera pans down another shot of him, this one shirtless, lingering on his abdomen. While the music continues, letters start to flash on the screen from black to white within a neon purple outline: CHARLIE.

I’ve been drumming professionally ever since we started up Queen Intentions when I was nineteen. For the record, I did not pick the name, but it’s fitting enough. It’s thanks to this band that I get a different queen in my bed every night, after all.

The electropop music cascades down in pitch suddenly, like it’s emphasizing that Charlie’s just told a bad joke. Then a different song resumes, and Charlie continues to speak after a few more moments of images of him.

I could definitely say I’ve got a bit of a man crush on Maddox. Huge fan. I’ve been following him since Spare Parts’ first single. I guess I don’t really fancy him—the camera cuts to Charlie blowing a kiss at the camera—but I still have saved the autograph I got from him when I saw Spare Parts live when I was sixteen. I don’t know. Maybe that’s a bit weird. Charlie laughs again as crickets chirp in the background during another momentary pause in the music.

They haven’t told me much about the women who are coming on the show with me, but I’m hoping they’re alt rock fans. I do know they’re coming from all over the world, and I can’t wait to get some international girls in my bed on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll. I mean, I go on tour with Queen Intentions half the year, but mostly just in Britain. I’m a sucker for an Australian accent, though. Short blonde hair, dark eyes, sweet smile—the camera pans back to another shot of Charlie pouting—big boobs…

The camera continues to flash shots of him at various angles, mostly smiling, a few of them pouting, all of them shirtless. Oh, I’m definitely a player. A different girl every night, just how I like it. I’ve probably broken my fair share of hearts. I’ll give you the best night of your life, but I won’t come back. I get bored. My mum thinks I’ll settle down when I find The One, but I don’t really believe she’s out there. I’m having too much fun to find her, anyway.

I’m hoping drumming since I was, like, fifteen helps me win the prize money this season, but I suppose I don’t actually know if it will. All I really know about the show is that there will be concerts and fit girls. The only problem is there are only so many girls. I’ll run out in a week, two tops.

The music drops off in pitch to silence again as Charlie stares blankly at some point behind the camera. “So quiet. Tell jokes. Laugh at them when you do,” suggests a producer offscreen as the video cuts to an animation of more crickets chirping—then back to Charlie.

I hope Jack Maddox isn’t as bossy as this. I was looking forward to meeting him, you know, Charlie continues as another animation plays onscreen, this one of a heart enclosing Charlie’s smiling face beside Jack Henry Maddox’s, a big black signature scrawled over Maddox’s side of the screen, just like an autograph. He adds, Not in, like, a weird way. There’s a brief animation of a drum kit as you hear behind it two taps of a snare drum followed by the crash of a cymbal.

The camera jumps back to Charlie. A serious relationship? Are you kidding me? I can’t imagine anything I want less. How overrated.

Another shirtless smile—and that’s a wrap.

Chapter Text

Okay, so Nick didn’t actually want to join the cast of a reality show this summer. For the record, they approached him, not the other way around. But the rugby season doesn’t start up again until September, and Nick’s been bored, all right? He gets tired of his friends, and he gets tired of the parties and clubs he goes to, and he especially gets tired of spending all his time trawling for new women to sleep with—not that he would ever, ever admit that out loud. He has a reputation to uphold, after all.

So when this guy Harry Greene contacts him with an offer of private concerts and ready-made women who will give Nick all the sex with no strings that he wants, he takes it, albeit apprehensively. He’s not sure he quite believes that the sex will have no strings—this is television, after all, and the producers are going to want to manufacture as much drama as possible if Nick doesn’t commit to one woman the whole time (and even if he does). But it at least will mean he’ll be able to quit parading himself around as Nick Nelson the Semi-Professional Rugby Player, praying somebody takes the bait.

It’ll be a change. And Nick could use a change.

But Harry didn’t cast Nick to have an existential crisis on camera: he cast him because he’s fit and he flaunts it and there’s a good chance he’ll be able to have multiple hookups on camera this season. So when the cameras start rolling on Nick’s confessional, he does his best to play the part. That part isn’t really a change, but he hopes it’ll lead to something good, anyway. Fake it ’til you make it, right?

“This season on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, I’m here to shake things up,” he says confidently to the camera guy, Farouk. “I want what I want, and I always get what I want, and I’m gonna get it here, too.”

“Excellent, Nick,” praises Harry, who’s absolutely lapping all of this up. He seems like a tool to Nick, but at least Nick probably won’t have to talk directly to him much outside of confessionals. “Give me more. What do you want?”

“Women, obviously.”

“Remember to rephrase the question,” Harry reminds him.

“Right, okay. I always get what I want—and what I want is women, obviously. It’s like, the second I tell them I’m a rugby player, their panties just drop right then and there.”

“Give me some character,” prompts Harry. “What angle do you want to lean into?”

Nick frowns, his eyes sliding from Farouk’s camera to Harry’s eyes. “What angle?”

“You know, what do you want to be known for from this confessional? This is your introduction to the world. You want to make it count. I’m getting player vibes here. We know you’re a player, but what makes you a player?”

Smiling sheepishly, Nick says, “I don’t know if the only thing I want to be known for on international television is being a player.”

“It is now,” Harry informs him. “It has been ever since you joined the cast. Let’s go, Nick. What’s it gonna be?”

Nick really doesn’t like this guy, but it’s fine. Harry doesn’t control him. Anyway, Nick did kind of already agree to this when he signed the paperwork.

So he replaces the sheepish smile with a cocky grin and looks back into the camera, trying to focus on Farouk and not Harry. “I guess you could say I’m allergic to commitment. You don’t even want to know how many notches are in my bedpost at this point.” Nick laughs.

“Have you ever committed before?”

Nick shrugs. “I did commit once, but I don’t recommend it. I was young and stupid at the time.” He grins again. “I’m still young and stupid, to be honest, but at least I’m smart enough now to find a new woman every single night. Life is just better when you’re not tied down to someone who will hurt you.”

“Boring,” Harry complains. “Don’t talk about women hurting you in the past. We want to see your fun, flirty side. Talk to us about—I don’t know—your sex fantasies or something.”

It’s weird as hell to hear Harry bluntly requesting to see Nick’s “flirty side,” but then, everything about this experience is going to be weird as hell. Snogging women on camera? That’s going to be a change from the norm, unless you count that one time things got a little heated between him and his ex in a video Nick had meant to upload to Instagram. He’s probably still got it on his phone, actually, even though he never posted it.

Starting to feel uncertain, he says, “Okay, but these are still parasocial relationships you want me to build with viewers, right? There have to be some limits on what I say. Plus, like, my mum is going to be watching this.” Nick glances back at the camera. “Sorry, Mum.”

“Yeah, but they have to be parasocial relationships where our viewers feel like they really know you.”

Nick bites his lip. “If they were really going to get to know me, they would be hearing about how I swore off steady relationships when my ex and I broke up, not—you know—my sex fantasies.”

Harry looks like he’s starting to get aggravated. “We want them to get to know the sides of you that they want to get to know. At this stage in the game, that’s the sexed-up commitment-phobe.”

Trying to regroup, Nick takes a deep breath. “Shit. Okay. Yeah. Um, next question?”

It takes a while for Nick to get through Harry’s interrogation, then take a bunch of shots of himself smiling, laughing, smoldering, showing off his abs, and otherwise generally making a fool of himself, before Harry’s finally satisfied. Finally, the crew stops filming as Harry beams at Nick and claps him on the back. Nick wishes Harry would stop touching him, honestly.

“All right!” declares Harry. “We’re just going to take you out of the villa, where we’ll get some slow-mo footage of you walking down to the beach with another lad who’s just been filmed right before you. We’ll film you two chitchatting for a while, and then the cameras will turn off for a while while we get the next confessional—and so on and so forth. Now—very important—save as much of the new developments as you can for the cameras, yeah? You can flirt and snog and fight off-camera, but the first flirt—the first snog—the first fight—you want it all to happen onscreen so that our viewers aren’t confused by sudden shifts in the relationship dynamics.”

“Right,” says Nick, liking the sound of this less and less by every second.

“And remember, we have more cameras than just Farouk’s and Ajayi’s,” Harry adds. “It’s a stopgap measure, but we do have cameras propped up on the walls of the bedroom, the bathroom, the room where you’ll get dressed every morning—all the essential places. We’ll blur out any full-frontal nudity, so you don’t have to be shy.”

Somehow, this isn’t helping Nick feel any less shy. Why did he get himself into this again? Why did he say yes? Was it just that he was bored of waiting for rugby season to start back up, or did he—was this—?

“When is the first concert?” he asks.

Harry smirks. “Jack Maddox will explain everything tonight. Let’s get our first two cast members introduced, shall we? You can leave your clothes here, by the way,” he adds, nodding at the shirt Nick discarded on the floor earlier. “Take off your shorts, too. We’ll take care of all your laundry all month, of course.”

Feeling very self-conscious, Nick reaches down to unzip his fly and step out of his cargo shorts. Standing there in nothing but tight-fitting swim trunks, he somehow feels way more aware of his own body and how he’s presenting it to others than usual. Maybe that’s because, back home, there’s usually a camera separating him from anybody when he takes selfies for Instagram that are this exposed. It’s not like Nick ordinarily walks around in his day-to-day life in a swimsuit. Plus, he’s the only person in the room who’s not fully dressed—and there are a lot of other people in this room.

Seeming to sense his discomfort, Singh smiles at him. “You’ll get used to it,” she tells him. “I know it feels odd now, but—”

“No talking to the cast,” Harry reprimands her sharply, sounding like he’s loving every second of this. “Come on, Nick. Let’s go.”

So Nick follows Harry out of the darkly-lit confessional room and onto a landing where he has to squint until his eyes adjust to the sunlight streaming through the windows. The confessional room is technically part of the villa where the show is set, but it feels like it’s in a totally different universe from the rest of the place, which is bright and reminds him of a Spanish hacienda with its white stucco walls, round archways, and exposed wooden beams.

He’s not, of course, in Spain or in Mexico. The villa is on a tiny island off the coast of god knows where—someplace in the Caribbean. And it’s apparently going to be Nick’s home for the next month.

They round the corner to another landing, then another, then yet another. “The dining room is just to your left here,” Harry indicates, “but we’re turning right right now. He’s waiting for you right—there.”

And past the door Harry ushers Nick through, outside the villa, Nick sets eyes on pretty much the most beautiful man he’s ever seen. The stranger fits right in with the architecture here: Nick suspects that he’s Spanish, with his light olive skin, but he could be wrong about that. But he’s got curly black hair spilling onto his broad forehead, bushy eyebrows over striking, pale blue eyes, a pointed jaw, and—when he looks up at Nick and smiles—dimples.

Something weird settles in Nick’s belly as Nick smiles back at the unfamiliar man, his eyes unconsciously tracing down the man’s abs. He ignores it and forces him to look back up into the guy’s face. “Um, hi.”

“Hi,” the stranger says back breathlessly.

“I’m—”

“Not now,” snaps Harry. “Save it for the cameras. Gents, how much time do we need?”

Singh rolls her eyes. “I’m still not your gent,” she mutters. Harry looks pissed, but Nick and the stranger look at each other and grin.

“I’m good to go whenever lighting and sound are a go,” says Ajayi distractedly.

“I am, too,” Farouk agrees. “Lange?”

“Yep.” Lange grabs his headset that’s currently resting around his neck and puts it around his ears. “Can I get some dialogue here, please?”

“I don’t know what to—” Nick starts to mumble at the same time as the stranger says (in a British accent, no less), “Uh, I’m talking, I’m talking, I’m talk—”

“Great. Good to go. How much time do you need to set up, Singh?”

“Longer than Harry would like, I’m sure,” she sighs in a put-upon sort of way. She and a whole team of people have walked down the landings and out here onto the sidewalk, where there are a bunch of giant light fixtures set up already. Still, she points out, “We’ve got everything rigged and tested already, but the sky and the amount of sun we get changes every hour, you know. We’ll just need to do some tweaks. Boys—”

At first, Nick thinks Singh is talking about him and the stranger, but another member of the crew turns to Nick and says, “You’re fine. She means us. I’m Sai, our key grip. That’s Christian, our best boy—no, really, it’s called that—and Otis is our genny operator.”

“No socializing with the cast,” snaps Harry.

“No socializing with the cast,” Otis mocks him under his breath. Nick represses a laugh.

It’s pretty awkward just standing there and not saying anything to anybody. He wants to talk to the stranger—wants to get those dimples back onto the man’s face—but he’s also really not in the mood to get told off by Harry again, who Nick gets the impression definitely gets off on giving people orders.

It feels like it takes forever before the lighting crew is all set up. Nick keeps catching himself sneaking glances at the stranger, and he can feel himself blushing furiously every time he catches the stranger staring back at him. What is wrong with Nick? It’s not like he wants this guy in his bed. That’s what the women are for. Where are they, anyway?

Finally, Singh announces that she’s good to go. “At long last,” says Harry dryly. “Okay. Farouk? Ajayi?”

“Yeah,” grunts Ajayi, swiveling until he’s at about a two o’clock angle from Nick.

Farouk comes in at the same angle, except on the stranger’s side. “Ready whenever, Harry.”

“Beautiful. Now, cast, remember—we’re not here. It’s just the two of you.”

Ajayi adds, “Don’t worry if it feels strange at first. We can keep filming for as long as it takes to get some comfortable footage.”

Harry levels a glare at Ajayi. “No talking to the cast, Ajayi. Let’s shoot in three—two—one—”

Nick does his best to act like a person when the cameras start rolling. He can barely remember that he’s a hotshot rugby player when he looks to his left and locks eyes again with the stranger—his costar, Nick realizes in shock—who’s just so pretty. He’s pretty. Nick has never seen a man so pretty before.

His eyes roll back down the stranger’s abs toward—and then Nick forces his eyes back up. He can feel how hot his own face is right now, but the stranger just smiles through his own blush and says, “Shall we?”

“What?” says Nick stupidly.

“Um, I think we’re supposed to walk over there,” says the stranger, pointing down the sidewalk toward the beach.

“Oh. Yeah.”

So they start to walk. Nick feels like he doesn’t know what to do with his arms—it feels weird to hold them stiff, but he doesn’t want them to swing stupidly, either. The stranger keeps looking at him, and Nick’s so focused on not looking back that he almost trips over his own feet at one point. When he catches his balance and looks up sheepishly, the stranger is grinning at him and biting the bottom corner of his lip with his perfect white teeth.

What is happening?

It’s just that this experience is so weird, Nick decides as he smiles back and quickly rips his eyes off of the man. He’s being filmed for a television show. Nick’s had his rugby games filmed plenty of times, and he’s done some interviews and stuff, but that was different. That was his professional life. That wasn’t his personal life on display. And this man has the misfortune of being caught in the crossfire of Nick’s emotional breakdown because he’s the person Nick’s filming with—the first person Nick’s ever filmed with like this.

Okay. That makes sense.

Emotional crisis subverted, Nick manages to make it the rest of the way to the beach without tripping himself again. There are a couple of tiny glass tables down there in the sand—no chairs or anything—both topped with a small assortment of liquor bottles and champagne glasses. He considers asking the stranger if he drinks—Nick sure as hell needs a drink—then decides he doesn’t want to risk sounding like an alcoholic on international television.

Unfortunately, they both talk at the same time. “I don’t—I wasn’t sure if—” Nick stammers at the same time as the other man stammers, too, “So I reckon—I mean—”

They both stop, then both laugh. The other man does the lip-biting thing again. Nick’s stomach still feels weird as hell—stage fright, obviously.

“Let me start over,” Nick suggests.

“Me, too,” the man agrees. “Nobody needs to see whatever—that—was.”

“Oh, thank god. So it’s not just me who’s nervous about being—filmed?”

The man smiles. “It’s not just you. I don’t—think anything’s just you. But, uh, we probably shouldn’t be talking about this. I don’t think they like us breaking the fourth wall.”

“Right. I did a bad job of that in my confessional,” Nick admits.

“However bad you were at it, I was worse,” says the stranger. “But—shit—we’re still doing it.”

“We’re a mess,” agrees Nick, grinning.

“Yeah, but we’re a mess together,” points out the other man.

Nick’s eyes flick to Farouk’s and Ajayi’s cameras to the side, and he blushes again. Dammit. Harry looks like he’s about to boil over, so Nick decides to move on. “Okay. Trying again. Hi. I’m Nick.”

“I’m Charlie,” says Charlie.

Oh, thank god. At least now Nick can stop calling him the stranger in his head. “Can you even believe we’re here?” he asks for lack of anything smarter to say.

“I know. That view is insane.” Charlie gestures toward the water, crystal-blue and picture-perfect, unlike Nick.

It takes Nick a second to process what Charlie is saying. After all, there’s quite another view that Nick’s entirely preoccupied with.

It’s time to get eyes on our first two sexy singles together—but there’s a plot twist. I think they seem to be preoccupied putting eyes on, uh, each other?

Two shirtless men in swim trunks can be seen walking forward, but like our narrator tells us, they’re not looking where they’re walking and are definitely eyeing each other up. Their names and hometowns appear in white on the sides of the screen: CHARLIE / KENT, U.K. and NICK / LEEDS, U.K. The sexual vibes are intensified by the slow-motion effect, the dramatic music, Nick’s blush, and the way Charlie keeps biting his lip when he smiles at Nick—until the music grinds to a halt as Nick trips and stumbles.

Uh, careful there, Nick. Contrary to popular belief, you have not actually died and gone to heaven.

The men make it down to the beach somehow and congregate at one of the little glass tables of drinks, but neither of them makes a move to grab a bottle. Instead, they both talk at once.

“I don’t—I wasn’t sure if—”

“So I reckon—I mean—”

There’s a pause, a laugh, another closeup of Charlie biting his lip, and then Nick says, “Let me start over.”

“Me, too.”

“We’re a mess.”

“Yeah, but we’re a mess together,” insists Charlie.

That’s definitely a blush, right?

Yep—the camera confirms that Nick’s cheeks are pink again. “Okay. Trying again. Hi. I’m Nick.”

“I’m Charlie.”

“Can you even believe we’re here?” continues Nick.

“I know. That view is insane.”

Charlie’s pointing at the water, but Nick can’t seem to take his eyes off of Charlie—and it’s only a second before Charlie’s eyes are back on Nick. The narrator coughs. Uh, is it just me, or are they totally making heart eyes at each other? Jack Maddox, I think you’ve got some competition. Can somebody put me out of my misery and roll tape on Nick?

The scene changes—and so does the point of view. We’re back in the confessional room, but this time, instead of Charlie, we’re looking at Nick, who’s grinning cockily at the camera.

The only thing I want to be known for on international television is being a player.

We cut to a shot of Nick laughing merrily into the camera, then cycle through a few clips of him pouting and narrowing his eyes and flexing those abs as we see his name outlined in neon purple: NICK. After a few more seconds of filler over pop music, we start to hear a voiceover.

I guess you could say I’m allergic to commitment—and you don’t even want to know my sex fantasies. There’s a pause as we only hear music, and then Nick continues, Shit. My mum is going to be watching this. We see him in realtime again as the music pauses, he looks at the camera, and he adds, Sorry, Mum. Um, next question?

When the song changes, so does the view as the camera lingers on Nick’s bare chest. He goes on, It’s like, the second I tell women I’m a rugby player, their panties just drop right then and there. I did commit once, but I don’t recommend it. I was young and stupid at the time. With a grin, he continues, I’m still young and stupid, to be honest, but at least I’m smart enough now to find a new woman every single night. Life is just better when you’re not tied down.

For a few more moments, all we hear is music as we get additional closeups of Nick’s face and body—mostly body, to be honest. Then he adds, I want what I want, and I always get what I want, and I’m gonna get it here, too—and what I want is women, obviously.

As we cut back to Nick and Charlie on the beach, we hear the narrator again: But is it really obvious that what you want is women, Nick? Is it really?

Chapter Text

Charlie doesn’t really feel like he can breathe until the cameras stop rolling and the crew goes back into the villa to film whoever the next confessional is. He doesn’t really realize how tightly wound he feels until Nick nudges Charlie’s foot with his toes and says, “Hey. How was that? Um, am I the only one feeling really weird about everything being caught on camera?”

Oh. Right. Filming jitters. That would perfectly explain the knot that’s been sitting in Charlie’s stomach ever since he laid eyes on Nick.

Plus, it’s just—Nick is Charlie’s type in male form, you know? Blonde hair, brown eyes, tall, no boobs (obviously). Charlie’s sure it’s normal to feel a bit weird on the inside when you find someone of the same sex whom you just really—admire. That must be it. It’s been happening to him his whole life, anyway, and Charlie’s straight as a rod. Combine that with the fact that their every action has been being filmed ever since they first met, and it makes total sense that Charlie’s feeling nervous right now.

Nick doesn’t need to know that he’s Charlie’s type, though, so Charlie shoves this down and smiles at him. “It’s not just you. This is hands-down the weirdest thing I have ever done.”

“For what it’s worth, you’re doing great on there,” says Nick now. “I’m the awkward one. I swear I’m not normally this much of a mess back home.”

Nick feels like a mess? Really? Sure, he stumbled a bit on the walk down to the beach, but that smile and those eyes, dear god—and Charlie’s sure Nick’s not having any kind of thoughts about Charlie like Charlie’s having about him. Like, of course Charlie’s thoughts are totally heterosexual and normal, but still.

“You’re not a mess,” says Charlie in a low voice. He maybe accidentally taps a little into the quiet confidence he usually turns on women when he’s looking for someone to hook up with. “You’re fucking fit.” And then, because that maybe came out a bit strong, judging by how hard Nick is blushing right now, Charlie adds, “I’m sure the girls here are going to eat you up.”

“You, too,” says Nick in an odd voice. “They’re going to be all over you. Uh, looks like I definitely have some competition.”

Competition? Oh, right—because Charlie and Nick will both be pursuing the same women. Right. That’s what they’re here for, isn’t it?

It feels like no time at all before Charlie hears the villa doors burst back open to reveal the return of Harry and the crew. He’s sure it actually took some time to film whatever confessional just happened—it took a while to film Charlie’s, after all, and it felt like he was waiting a long time for Nick to get done with his earlier—but talking to Nick just passes the time so easily. Still, Charlie has been here a while, and that’s when he notices it—notices his stomach starting to growl in protest at him.

“Hey, can we get some snacks or something out here?” he asks Harry. He doesn’t really want a full lunch, but he doesn’t want to make himself sick, either.

“You’ll get lunch after all ten singles make it to the beach and after you meet Maddox,” Harry informs him crisply. “Drink as much as you want, though.”

Nick frowns. “On an empty stomach?”

“You can drink whatever you want,” Harry repeats. “All right, are we good to film? Singh, are you going to make we wait for fuck knows how long again before lighting is set up?”

“No, this should just take a minute,” grunts Singh. “The lighting hasn’t changed much since the last scene we did out here.”

The crew parts a little to reveal the next cast member who will apparently be joining: a short black woman with long, pretty braids who’s wearing a striking red bikini. When she turns around to say something under her breath to Christian, Charlie can see that her bikini bottom is the most revealing thong he’s pretty much ever seen.

It really does only take a minute for Singh’s people to get set up to go—and then they start filming again. Charlie has a feeling it’s going to be a long day if they have, what, seven more of these to do?

Harry instructs Charlie and Nick to act for Ajayi’s camera like they’re just seeing the girl for the first time, so they do so, calling hello to her as she strides confidently toward the beach. “She is gorgeous,” Nick tells Charlie in a low voice, and Charlie’s stomach clenches.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Gorgeous.”

“Hi,” the woman says when she reaches them. “I’m Tara. Lovely to meet you.”

She hugs Nick first, which makes Charlie’s stomach feel even sicker, but then she turns to Charlie and gives him an equally compelling smile. Right. The goal of this show is for Charlie to sleep with women just like her. He’s supposed to be scoping her and the others out as potential hookups, not—whatever he was just thinking a second ago.

“So tell us about yourself,” says Nick warmly. “What do you like to do?”

“You said who do I like to do?” asks Tara blankly.

Nick laughs, so Charlie makes himself laugh, too. “That, too, I guess,” Nick tells her.

“Well, I’m a professional dancer,” says Tara as Charlie and Nick kind of make interested noises at her. “And my type is—well—blonde hair, dark eyes, extroverted, confident.”

“So basically, you’re describing me right now,” fills in Nick, beaming like an idiot, in Charlie’s opinion.

Tara laughs. “Oh my god, you’re so forward.”

“You did say you like your men confident.” Nick’s still smiling.

Right. This is fine. Charlie’s just jealous because he wants Tara all to himself. She is beautiful, objectively speaking, and it makes sense. It all makes sense.

It’s a relief, though, maybe twenty minutes later when the next person arrives. As Charlie gets hungrier and hungrier—and dizzier, too, as he starts sipping on vodka—he tries to keep track of the names as people continue to arrive: Isaac, Imogen, Elle, Tao, Sahar. These are the people he’s going to be getting to know for the next month, he reminds himself, not the crew. Harry is nothing to Charlie outside the confessionals.

And then, when there are two people left to join the cast, Charlie sees her.

She’s exactly Charlie’s type—or close enough, anyway. Her eyes may not be brown, but they’re hazel-ish, right? And she’s got cute, short blonde hair that shows off her dark roots in two French braids—but honestly, Charlie kind of really likes the contrast. She’s got an incredibly pretty smile, too, that lights up her whole face like she’s delighted to be here, and that is something that’s really important to Charlie in the women he goes for. They have to look happy. They have to be bright enough to keep up with him—or maybe overtake him.

This blonde, sparkling goddess walks about halfway to the beach for the benefit of the film crew, then skips the rest of the way and comes to a halt next to Sahar. “Hi, fam!” she declares. “What an actually good-looking group of people. I mean, they promised me sexy people, but wow. I’m Darcy, by the way.”

She’s speaking in an Australian accent. Oh, shit.

She promptly hugs Sahar and starts going down the line. When she gets to about the fourth or fifth person, Darcy adds, “There’s no way I’m going to remember this many names all at once, by the way, so you’re going to have to keep reminding me who you all are every time we talk. The downsides of being one of the last people to show up here, right?”

“That’s okay,” says Tara, kissing Darcy on the cheek. “You are gorgeous, babes.”

“Oh, me? You’re too sweet,” gushes Darcy, patting Tara’s cheeks and beaming before moving on to hug Nick.

When she reaches Charlie at the very end of the line, Charlie pointedly gives her a kiss on the cheek, too, before telling her his name.

“Hi, Charlie,” says Darcy cheerfully—and then she adds, “Somebody pour me a drink. I need some alcohol in me, stat.”

“I got you,” chuckles Tara, fiddling with the bottles.

Charlie doesn’t understand why he’s not feeling more butterflies when he looks at Darcy. She’s beautiful, right? She’s stunning, and she’s his type, and he’s supposed to be feeling butterflies. But when he looks at her—sure, he thinks she’s pretty, but she doesn’t make him nervous. She doesn’t make him lose control.

This—this—if he’s being honest with himself, anyway—is a big part of why he agreed to sign up for Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll in the first place. He’s been getting bored of the chase back home and even on tour. Maybe he’s always been bored of the chase. Maybe he’s been cycling through a new woman every night because he’s never found one who hasn’t bored him. He keeps looking and looking for someone who will get his attention, and he thought he’d find her on reality TV, where all the women were hand-picked to be beautiful—but what if he doesn’t? If even Darcy isn’t getting Charlie’s attention—

Yes, she is. She’s breathtaking, even if he hasn’t lost his breath. That’s the story, as far as anybody else needs to know, and he’ll repeat it until it’s true. Besides, nobody’s actually expecting Charlie to stick with Darcy the whole month. He’ll chase her into bed, and she’ll be as boring as everybody else, and he’ll move on. It won’t come as a surprise.

However, the last person to arrives gets Charlie’s attention a whole lot more than Darcy ever did—and it’s another man. Great.

He’s not even Charlie’s type. He’s slight and tan with dark brown hair, brown eyes, and a shifty sort of smile that Charlie doesn’t trust one bit—but somehow, when he locks eyes with Charlie and his eyes wander down Charlie’s body and back, the attention makes Charlie feel flustered.

It’s just the attention. It’s not anything about the other man—it’s just that he’s noticing Charlie, and being noticed always makes Charlie feel some type of way.

Yeah.

Ben doesn’t greet everyone individually like Darcy and all the others did. Instead, he just goes straight for the alcohol and says, “I’m Ben. Pleasure to meet you,” while staring straight at Charlie.

Oh, god help him.

Fortunately, it’s not long before someone else joins the group. Charlie thinks he might pass out when he gets his first glimpse of Jack Henry Maddox, who’s as flawless as he’s ever been—because he makes Charlie jealous. Yeah, that’s it. He’s wearing his signature glasses and a freaking tux for the occasion, looking crisp and smart and fit as shit as he wiggles the fingers of both hands in a wave and approaches the crowd.

Harry’s advice is ringing in Charlie’s head. This is reality TV, and they’re all supposed to play up their reactions with as much drama as possible. So when Nick clutches Charlie’s forearm and starts to cheer, Charlie cheers, too, and tries not to think anything of it. He tries not to think anything, either, of the way Nick’s hands on Charlie’s skin makes Charlie feel faint.

He likes Darcy. The one he fancies is Darcy.

“Well, hello, party people, and welcome to Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll!” Maddox declares, bringing Charlie back to reality. Charlie and the others continue to cheer. “I trust you’re having a good time getting to know each other and enjoying this gorgeous view?”

More cheers. Seriously, Charlie’s starting to feel pretty silly, even if Maddox does make him want to fall all over himself.

“I know you’re all dying to hear more about the rules of the game and how this little excursion of ours is going to unfold over the next month,” says Maddox, “and all I have to say is this: everything will be revealed in due time. For now, just relax, have a drink, and take your time mingling with each other. This is a dating show, after all, and you’re all going to need to decide today who will be sharing your bed with you tonight.”

Darcy whoops at this, making everyone laugh.

Maddox goes on, “I know you’re all probably itching to go to your first concert, yes?” More cheers. “Now, it won’t be tonight—” some of the men boo loudly “—but you will be getting more information at your first party tonight about when it will take place. And tonight, you’ll even get to meet our first very special V.I.P. guest.” A chorus of oohs goes around the group. “So hang tight, have a good time, and I’ll see you all again very soon!”

Even more cheers. A couple of the girls—Imogen and Sahar—are screaming and jumping up and down.

Maddox beams at them before exiting the beach—and then Harry calls, “And cut.”

Charlie starts a little: he hadn’t exactly forgotten that this was all on camera, but he wasn’t expecting Harry to jump in and interrupt the scene like that.

As Farouk and Ajayi emerge from behind their cameras, Harry continues, “Great stuff, everybody. Great stuff. We’re going to show you to the dining hall for lunch next. Remember, we don’t have a camera feed in there, so try to keep the drama to a minimum. While you’re there, I want you all to think about who you’re most interested in partnering up with and filming with. Afterward, we’re going to get some footage of the ladies together and the gents together, talking about each other, and then we’ll have you let us know who you want more screen time with so that we can film you in pairs for the rest of the day until it’s party time tonight. The confessional room will be open all day, too, and we’ll want to get your reactions in there to what happens with the people you film with. All right?”

There’s a chorus of yeses that’s noticeably muted compared to when the cameras were rolling. Okay, so some of that enthusiasm from Charlie’s castmates really was just for the camera.

It’s got him overthinking things a bit as the crew starts to disperse and Charlie and the rest of the group follow Harry back into the villa. How much of the socialization Charlie just had with these people was real, and how much of it was for the benefit of the show? He knows they weren’t filming the whole time they were all talking for the past few hours, but would people really have been the same if there hadn’t been cameras around at all? What about if Charlie hadn’t had his glow-up and were as dorky and unattractive as he was in grammar school? What then?

“Charlie, right?”

Startled again, Charlie glances up from where he’s staring down at the tray he’s loaded up with his chef-cooked lunch: juicy steak, chopped salad, huge purple grapes, and champagne. Suddenly, despite everything he said to Harry earlier, he doesn’t think he’s going to be able to get much of this down except the champagne.

It’s Ben who’s looking intently at him as he sets his tray across from Charlie’s and sits down. “Um, yeah,” says Charlie awkwardly. “And you’re Ben?”

“Yeah.” One of Ben’s feet bumps against Charlie’s own underneath the table. “You know, there’s no cameras in here. We can just be us.”

For some reason, though, Charlie gets a funny feeling—and not the nice kind—when Ben says this. Ben is—okay—captivating for some reason to Charlie, but the way Ben’s looking at Charlie right now, talking about how nobody’s watching, sliding his foot up Charlie’s leg a little like he doesn’t want to get caught, just screams…

“I was myself out there,” says Charlie a little stiffly. “What you see is what you get. I’m a fucking fit professional drummer, and I’m here to meet women and—”

“Yeah,” snorts Ben softly. “Sure you are. But just remember—”

He breaks off abruptly when Imogen arrives at their table, asking brightly, “It’s cool if I sit with you, right?”

“Yeah,” says Ben without smiling or taking his eyes off of Charlie. “Totally cool.”

It’s obvious from the moment TARA / CAPE TOWN, SA walks onto the scene that Nick is smitten. We see a slow-motion closeup of her striding toward the two boys before the camera cuts back to said boys. “She is gorgeous,” Nick murmurs to Charlie, who agrees, “Yeah. Gorgeous.”

You don’t sound too enthusiastic about that, Charlie. Try saying it with a smile next time—or maybe direct those heart eyes you keep aiming at Nick her way. That’d work.

“Hi,” says Tara cheerfully before hugging Nick. “I’m Tara. Lovely to meet you.”

Tara seems just as fixated on Nick as he is on her, at least in terms of how much screen time is given to her hug with Nick, compared to her teeny-tiny hug with Charlie. Even as she’s hugging Charlie, Nick invites in a voiceover, “So tell us about yourself. What do you like to do?”

Cut back to the whole trio as Tara asks, “Who do I like to do?”

Nick and Charlie both laugh as our narrator says, Freudian slip much?

Tara answers, “Well, I’m a professional dancer.”

Buckle up, Nick. I bet she’s flexible, if you know what I mean.

“And my type is—well—blonde hair, dark eyes, extroverted, confident.”

“So basically, you’re describing me right now.” Nick is grinning uncontrollably.

Yeah, and she’s also describing what Charlie said is exactly his type. Well, minus the big boobs.

“Oh my god, you’re so forward.”

“You did say you like your men confident.”

The camera pans to a closeup of Charlie, whose smile looks rather fixed. Huh. Trouble in paradise? I sense a love triangle brewing…

…At least, until ten minutes or so later, when the penultimate sexy single comes out to the beach: DARCY / PERTH, AU. The camera focuses on Charlie’s face as he appraises the newcomer with an interested sort of furrow to his eyebrows. Oh, Charlie. Finally, a woman who can compete with Nick—and she’s even got big boobs. Just wait until you see the back of her, our narrator tells us as the camera cuts to her round, swaying bum for an extremely long, swaggering moment.

The slow-mo effect abruptly stops when Darcy speeds up her walk to a skip all the way down to the beach. “Hi, fam! What an actually good-looking group of people. I mean, they promised me sexy people, but wow. I’m Darcy, by the way.”

And she’s Australian. What did Charlie say was his type again?

While Darcy’s hugging the gang in the background, a text table rapidly appears, item by item, on the screen with a list of attributes—short blonde hair, dark eyes, sweet smile, big boobs, Australian accent—in the far left column. A column labeled “Nick” is in the middle, another labeled “Darcy” on the right. Both columns get checkmarks beside the first three traits, but only Darcy gets checks for the last two, for which Nick just gets big red Xs instead. A “red buzzer” noise sounds off on Nick’s final X, whereas the television dings on Darcy’s last checkmark.

We focus back on Darcy when she reaches Charlie, who gives her a kiss on the cheek. Darcy smiles at him and says, “Hi, Charlie. Somebody pour me a drink. I need some alcohol in me, stat.”

And as Tara pours one out, our narrator tells us, Girl, I think you’re all going to need some alcohol soon because, in twelve hours, this cast is about to find out that they’re not on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll—and are actually on Too Hot to Handle, where they’re about to get hit with a total sex ban. Bye-bye, private concerts and Jack Henry Maddox, and hello—

Chapter Text

Way too soon, the cameras come back on. Everybody’s aware of the purpose of this scene—for them to talk to each other (and so inform the viewers) about who they all fancy—but, although it isn’t scripted, it’s still staged: they still have to make it look like this topic of conversation just organically came up. Nick wonders how many viewers are going to see straight through it when Tao asks conspiratorially, “So who is everybody feeling out there?”

There’s a short pause as Nick contemplates how he’s going to answer this question. Like—he knows how he’s going to answer it. The fittest girl here is Tara, and that’s who he’s going to reveal having feelings for onscreen. That’s the whole point—to fancy someone onscreen. He can’t just say no one, and he definitely can’t say right here, right now, right in front of Charlie, that there’s maybe kinda sorta a lad in this group who twists Nick’s stomach into knots.

It’s the stage fright, he reminds himself. It’s the stage fright, and he only thinks one person here is shag-worthy, and that’s Tara.

The vibe is definitely awkward as Isaac kind of uncomfortably giggles. Mercifully, someone else—Ben—ends up going first. “Definitely Imogen,” he says smoothly. “I mean, have you seen her ass? Fucking bunda.”

For some reason, Charlie, who’s sitting tantalizingly close to Nick on a cushioned bench, looks surprised by this. Wait, Charlie doesn’t fancy Imogen, does he? Nick didn’t really particularly get the feeling that Charlie fancied anybody—which doesn’t make Nick happy, to be clear. Charlie can fancy whoever he wants, and it’s all fine with Nick, who fancies Tara. He and Charlie are just friends—barely friends. They didn’t even eat lunch together.

Nick still noticed Charlie at lunch, of course. Charlie was one of the first to sit down, and while Nick made a point of sitting with women—he is here to get to know women—his eyes kept sliding over to Charlie’s table. Charlie looked a little downcast, to be honest, and barely ate any of his lunch, even though he’d mentioned being hungry earlier to Harry—even though Nick had heard Charlie’s stomach growling unhappily while they were doing the meet-and-greet earlier. It also didn’t escape Nick’s notice that there were a couple of times Charlie flinched when others addressed him directly.

And Nick just feels weirdly protective over Charlie, okay? It’s probably just because Charlie was the first other cast member he met and helped make Nick feel a little more comfortable when Nick was freaking out about the cameras (and just about the cameras)—but Nick wants Charlie to be comfortable, too. Nick wants Charlie to feel safe, too.

So when they came outside to shoot this scene, Nick made a point of sitting beside Charlie, who quickly glanced over at him and flashed him a tiny smile. Well, good. Anything Nick can do to make Charlie’s day brighter.

He tunes back into the conversation when Tao adds, “I mean, Elle is for sure my number one, so if any of you have your eyes on her—” He sticks out two fingers and motions between his own eyes and the group with a dead serious glare on his face.

“Which one is Elle again?” asks Nick, trying to think back.

Isaac starts to recite, “Black, curly hair—”

“Wait,” says Ben. “She’s not the transgender one, is she?”

“Uh, yeah, she is,” Tao snaps, leveling all the energy of that glare at Ben. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“I don’t. I think Elle is the coolest girl here,” Isaac says, cutting off whatever was about to come out of Ben’s mouth. Truly, Nick doesn’t really want to know what Ben was about to say. He’s shifty, and Nick doesn’t like him.

Anyway, Tao looks a little scandalized. Charlie is relaxing a bit, at least, his jaw wide open as he laughs and looks between Isaac and Tao. “You did not,” says Tao, but he doesn’t sound like he’s going to murder Isaac like Nick would have expected. It sounds more like he’s putting on a serious facade as a half joke. “She’s obviously going to choose me. I’m clearly the most entertaining person here, and she was all over my interpretive dance moves down at the beach.”

“She called them ‘annoying,’” points out Charlie, laughing.

Isaac adds, “She said she could recognize talent and you weren’t it.”

And Tao takes down the facade—cracks a huge grin. “But I made her laugh, didn’t I? That’s more than could be said for you, my quiet, nonthreatening competitor.”

“Oh, I’m nonthreatening now?”

“Don’t worry, Isaac,” says Nick, now smiling, too. “We’ll make sure they send you an invitation to the wedding.”

“Wedding?” asks Tao, still laughing a bit, but now also narrowing his eyes. “You’re not the only player here, Nick, and I’m not talking about rugby.”

“Don’t let Elle overhear you saying that,” says Charlie in a low voice.

Nick chances a glance over at Ben, who’s snickering—a bit meanly, in Nick’s opinion. Tao may not be ready to settle down and find a wife, but Nick still doesn’t like the look on Ben’s face—doesn’t like the thought of Ben (and, really, Nick himself) being in on anyone deliberately leading Elle on.

Then again, the women here are probably just as happy to be unattached as Nick and the men are, aren’t they? It certainly seems like the producers were going for, uh, a certain type when they were seeking out potential cast members.

“Okay, okay, okay,” Isaac interjects. “Who else? Charlie?”

Nick’s whole body suddenly feels tense—but what’s he expecting, anyway? What does he want Charlie to say? Why does he want Charlie to say anything?—as long as he doesn’t say Tara, of course.

Still, for no apparent reason, Nick feels a little sick when Charlie grins and says, “It’s gotta be Darcy. She’s exactly my type, and it sounds like the field is clear, isn’t it? Unless…”

Nick is blushing like a moron when Charlie chances a glance at him, but even if his face is betraying him, he can still act normal. He knows how to act like everything’s normal. He’s been doing it his whole life.

So he says, “No way. She’s yours, mate. I just want Tara.”

“I KNEW IT,” declares Tao. Nick and Isaac both bust out laughing.

Is he absolutely batshit crazy, or does Charlie look a little disappointed? The others—Tao and Isaac, at least, even if not Ben—seem supportive, but even though Charlie’s smiling, Nick just gets the feeling…

But maybe he’s imagining it. He seems to be imagining a lot of things today.

The women have already filmed their “who likes whom” scene, which means Harry can tell them as soon as this scene wraps which of them wants to film with which of the men. “I’ve got requests for—let’s see—Tao with Elle and Isaac with Sahar and Darcy—separately, of course. Are you two good with that?”

Tao’s obviously happy about it, while Isaac just looks a bit baffled. Meanwhile, is it weird that Nick feels a little lighter to learn that Darcy wants to film with Isaac and not Charlie?—especially given that Tara hasn’t requested a scene with him. And neither has—

“What about Imogen?” asks Ben sharply.

“She didn’t say anything,” shrugs Harry. “We’ll ask her in a bit, or you can go find her and talk to her in a room with a camera. There are ten different feeds around the villa, you know. If she decides she wants to film a proper scene, you can after we get the others. Same for you, Nick, if there’s anyone you’re interested in.”

“So I just… find Tara and talk to her?”

“Tara, huh? Called it,” says Harry rather smugly. “Yeah, I was surprised when she didn’t say something about you. Go find her and negotiate if you want a real scene together. Anybody else want to film with somebody we haven’t covered here yet?”

Surprisingly, Isaac doesn’t say anything about Elle—and Charlie doesn’t say anything about Darcy, either. Nick represses a smile and tries to look normal as Harry informs them that they’re going to film Tao and Elle together somewhere first.

Because he—well—honestly, Nick doesn’t really know why he does it—he grabs Charlie’s wrist when Charlie makes to get up off the bench they’re sitting on. When Charlie flinches, Nick lets go immediately.

“You okay?” Nick asks in an undertone.

“I’m fine,” says Charlie softly. “Why wouldn’t I be fine?”

“You just seem… here. Over here.”

As Harry and the crew go to set up for Elle and Tao’s scene together, Nick gets up off the bench and leads Charlie a little distance away from where Isaac stays seated and pulls out a novel to read seemingly out of thin air (but probably from underneath his chair). Some of the women are starting to reappear now that the men’s scene has disbanded, and Nick can see Sahar sitting down beside Isaac and asking him what he’s reading.

Eventually, Nick and Charlie end up sitting at the pool. While Nick takes off his shoes and sits on the pool edge with his legs fully submerged in the water, Charlie sits slightly to Nick’s left with his own feet on the ground, his knees drawn up underneath his chin.

“So… what’s up?” asks Charlie in an open-ended sort of way when Nick makes no move to explain why he’s dragged Charlie out here.

And Nick doesn’t really know why he’s dragged Charlie out here. All he knows is that Charlie looks—off. Ever since lunch, Charlie’s looked off. And it’s insane for Nick to even be sitting here saying that when he doesn’t even know Charlie, but—

“You barely ate anything at lunch,” Nick blurts. “And I’m sorry—I’m not trying to, like, police what you eat or whatever—it’s just—I was worried. You looked stressed out every time I looked over at you.”

It takes a long time for Charlie to reply. “You were looking at me?”

Nick hesitates. “You’re my friend,” he says finally.

“I am?”

“I think so. I hope so. I want you to be.” Nick smiles nervously. Feeling like an idiot, he blusters on, “Anyway, is anything—uh—wrong? Did anything happen that made you feel…? It’s just—you were so much more talkative before lunch, and then you just sort of… shut down. Like, not all the way, but kind of. And… I was expecting you to want to film with Darcy. I was surprised you didn’t.”

Charlie purses her lips. “I mean, I like her, sure. She’s everything I want. But do I like her enough to pursue her on camera? I don’t…”

Frowning, Nick probes, “And earlier?”

Charlie looks around shiftily. Farouk and Ajayi aren’t nearby, but Charlie still asks, “Do you know if there’s a camera feed by the pool?”

Oh, shit, that sounds serious. “I can’t remember,” Nick admits. “We can move somewhere we know there isn’t if—”

“No. No, it’s fine. There’s not really anything to say, anyway. Lunch was fine. I’m fine. Um, thank you for asking, though. I appreciate it, Nick. I really do. I’ve never really had a friend who wanted to look out for me like—shit. Sorry. That’s the alcohol talking.”

Charlie contorts his face into a passably confident smile, but the damage is done: Nick’s heard. And he’s concerned. “You don’t have friends who take care of you? No one?”

“Way to rub it in.” Charlie is still smiling weirdly.

And Nick is still concerned. “But you’re amazing. You’re so fit, and you’re funny, and you’re nice, and I know I don’t really know you, but—but I trust you. People like you should have people banging down their doors trying to be there for them.”

“Do you have people who take care of you?” Charlie asks breathily.

And—that’s a fair question, actually. He’s got his team, but his team sees Nick as a good player (of rugby) and a fun time and not really anything more. He finds hookups all the time, but friends? People to confide in who will listen to him and love him? Other than his mum, anyway?—and his mum doesn’t count because he can’t tell her what his life is really like, not if he wants her to be proud of him.

But he can’t say any of that if there’s a chance there’s a camera near them, not when any of the people in his life might watch this some day and get hurt feelings. What about the friends he does have? Are they going to be insulted, like Nick is calling them shitty friends just because they’re not close friends who have big, sappy conversations with him about their feelings all day? Nick doesn’t even want that, anyway. Nick is fine.

“I should go find Tara,” stammers Nick. “I’m really sorry. But—we’ll talk later? I’ll come find you after Tara and I are done filming?”

“Yeah,” Charlie says.

And then—god knows why—Nick adds, “Away from the cameras?”

Charlie stiffens slightly, like he’s anticipating—something. Nothing. Nick’s overthinking it. Nothing’s going on. Anyway, Charlie agrees, “Okay. Away from the cameras.”

And Nick gives him a slight smile and starts to heave himself out of the pool.

Talking to Charlie has given him about a million and one things to think about, but he tries to shove all of them out of his mind when he starts scanning the villa in search of Tara. She doesn’t seem to be anywhere outside, and he ultimately finds her stretched out on one of the beds in the bedroom with Darcy. When Nick walks in, they both stop laughing and look up at him, looking rather like little kids who’ve been caught shoplifting or something.

“Hey,” says Nick. “I’m not interrupting, am I?”

From the looks on the women’s faces, he definitely is interrupting, but it seems Tara and Darcy are both too polite to say that to Nick’s face. “I’ll go,” says Darcy.

Nick immediately begins, “No, Darcy, that’s okay, you don’t have to—”

“It’s chill. You two crazy kids enjoy yourselves.” And she waggles her eyebrows, hops off the bed, and high-fives Nick on her way out the door.

Smiling slightly nervously, Nick turns his attention to Tara. “She’s a ball of energy, isn’t she?”

“I know,” laughs Tara. “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like her in my life before.”

Nick smiles. Shit, Tara is beautiful. All he has to do is ask to film with her—he’s not supposed to make any big reveals about his feelings off camera—and yet he’s still so nervous even to ask her, he’s shaking.

“So, um,” he starts to say, “I noticed—I just mean—Harry let us know what scene requests the crew had gotten from you girls, and…”

Tara smiles knowingly at him. “Are you trying to say you were wanting to film a scene with me?”

He reminds himself not to say anything stupid. “Do you want to film a scene with me?”

“Nick—”

“Because it’s okay if you don’t. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do. I guess I just—actually, I shouldn’t say. That’s the whole point, right? It’s not supposed to be scripted. I’m supposed to save it for the cameras, and you’re not supposed to know what’s coming.”

“There is a camera in this room. There are actually several, I think.”

“I know, but still,” says Nick softly.

Tara gives him a very tender smile. “I know it’s shit that we pretty much signed away our rights for almost a whole month. I think everyone should be entitled to some privacy. We shouldn’t have to save up our very scariest moments for, like, public consumption.”

“Why did you come on the show, then?”

She shrugs. “The exposure, mostly. I—um—my contract is up with my ballet company, and I haven’t found another gig yet. I was hoping—well—I was hoping to win the prize fund to tide myself over, but if that doesn’t happen, then the publicity might help me get another job somewhere. Unfortunately, reach matters.”

Nick winces. “I’m so sorry to hear that. I, uh…” Very aware that this conversation is being filmed, very aware that Harry is going to be pissed Nick’s telling Tara this now, he stutters, “I play full-time on a hybrid team, so I make enough to get by now, but… for a while there, I was part-time making barely anything. My ex and I relied on her salary. Then we broke up, and… yeah. It was bad for a while before I got on the team I’m on now. I’m not trying to make it about me, but I guess what I’m trying to say is, I can relate.”

“I appreciate that. I’ll be fine, don’t worry. And I’m glad you’re doing better now. I want that for you.”

“Um, thanks.”

Tara takes a deep breath. “I’m not… totally opposed to filming with you. I know it’ll make the most sense for my career to get as much screen time as possible, so I know it would be smart of me to film with you today. But… I don’t know if I’m…” She exhales, then continues, “If we queue up a big scene with Harry and the crew, they’re going to expect some kind of outcome from it. They won’t want to just film us for an hour and see where it goes, if it goes anywhere. Harry says he doesn’t want us to stage things, but I think that’s a lie. And I only want to stage something with you if we get to know each other at least enough to feel comfortable with each other.

“If whichever story editors and producers who are watching this footage back a few weeks or months from now want to cobble a story together from it, then great—I’ll take the airtime—but I want us to know where we stand with each other before we stage anything on purpose. I want us to build some kind of relationship based on real conversations.” Biting her lip, Tara asks, “Does that make any sense? I don’t know if that makes sense.”

“You know,” says Nick, smiling slightly, “in a weird way, it makes perfect sense.”

Tara sighs in relief. “Good. Sometimes, I think I’m the only person I make sense to. I worry a lot about being alone. I don’t mean, like, not being in a relationship—I don’t want or need a relationship—but I want to have people in my life that I make sense to when it comes to the big stuff.”

“Yeah,” Nick murmurs. “I want that, too. I think everyone wants that. Like, to be validated. To be heard.”

“Yeah.” Tara purses her lips. “Anyway, I’ll share a bed with you tonight if you want to.”

“Share a bed…” Nick repeats blankly.

“Well, we can’t sleep alone. There’s only so many beds in this room,” Tara reminds him.

“True,” Nick acknowledges breathlessly.

“And we’ll probably get more screen time if we share with each other than, you know, if I share with Darcy and you share with Charlie or whoever.”

Nick raises his eyebrows. “What makes you think I’d default to Charlie?”

“Were you going to default to Charlie?”

“No. I was going to ask to share a bed with you.”

“Really?”

“…No. My brain hadn’t quite made it online enough to get that far,” Nick admits.

Tara snickers. “See, this is why you need me. You don’t want to end up getting kicked off the show because you’re not doing anything for the ratings, do you?”

Frowning, Nick repeats, “Kicked off the show?”

“Well, yeah. All the dating shows do this—eliminate cast members. I’m sure it’ll happen to at least one of us before we finish shooting.”

“I hope it’s Ben,” Nick mutters. “I have a bad feeling about that guy.”

Tara’s face falls. “Yeah. If I’m being totally honest with you… I have a bad feeling about that guy, too.”

Now that we’ve gotten the obligatory “who wants to bang who” conversations out of the way, and two of our couples—images flash across the scene of Elle and Tao kissing, followed by Ben and Imogen kissing—have gotten halfway there already, let’s check in with Tara, who’s looking suspiciously quiet this afternoon—and Nick seems to have noticed.

We cut from a closeup of Tara smiling nervously to the confessional room, where Ben, of all people, is sitting. If you look closely, you’ll notice he’s wearing different swim trunks than we’ve seen him in before—he must be filming this scene on a different day. His eyes keep flickering between the camera and some undefined point behind it as he tells us:

Okay, so here’s the deal. There’s definitely some kind of friction between Nick and Charlie—we’ve all noticed it—but Nick seems to be ignoring it because he’s putting the focus on Tara, at least for now. I don’t know if it’s gonna last, but he just went into the bedroom to talk to her one-on-one. Charlie hasn’t noticed, at least not yet, but it’s probably gonna get even weirder when he does.

The narrator adds over Ben’s unmoving face, Don’t you wish you could be a fly on the wall for that conversation? I know I do. Oh, wait—I can be!

We refocus on the bedroom, where we see Darcy awkwardly bowing out to give Nick and Tara some privacy. Within a second or two—on camera, anyway—Nick is sitting on the bed with her.

“So, um,” he starts to say, “I noticed—I just mean— is anything—uh—wrong? Did anything happen that made you feel…? It’s just—you were so much more talkative before lunch, and then you just sort of… shut down. Like, not all the way, but kind of.”

Tara looks pretty dejected as we zoom in on her face. It’s pretty clear from the angle that these shots are coming from a fixed camera in the room and not proper closeups from a real camera crew. “I—um—my contract is up with my ballet company, and I haven’t found another gig yet.”

Nick winces. “I’m so sorry to hear that. I, uh…” 

Oh, shit. Is he stuttering? Is a meaningful connection forming before we even laid down the sex ban? Now that’s a first.

“I play full-time on a hybrid team, so I make enough to get by now, but… for a while there, I was part-time making barely anything. My ex and I relied on her salary. Then we broke up, and… yeah. It was bad for a while before I got on the team I’m on now. I’m not trying to make it about me, but I guess what I’m trying to say is, I can relate.”

“I appreciate that.” When we see Tara’s face again, she’s smiling. “And I’m glad you’re doing better now. I want that for you.”

But Nick doesn’t seem satisfied. “You don’t have friends who take care of you? No one?”

“Nick—”

There’s a closeup of Tara’s face changing for the first couple seconds as Nick says, “But you’re amazing. You’re so fit, and you’re funny, and you’re nice, and I know I don’t really know you, but—but I trust you. People like you should have people banging down their doors trying to be there for them.”

“I know it’s shit,” Tara murmurs. We flash back to her as she continues, “Sometimes, I think I’m the only person I make sense to. I worry a lot about being alone. I want to have people in my life that I make sense to when it comes to the big stuff.”

“Yeah,” Nick murmurs. “I want that, too. I think everyone wants that. Like, to be validated. To be heard.”

“Yeah.” Tara purses her lips. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone like you in my life before. If I’m being totally honest with you… I was hoping—well—to share a bed with you.”

Well, that escalated quickly.

There’s a short pause, then Nick says, “You want to share a bed with me?”

“Nick—”

“Because it’s okay if you don’t. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.”

Uh, Nick, you did hear that she offered, didn’t you? It looks weird as hell to see you trying to be a gentleman, my friend. You’re obviously out of practice.

Nick continues to babble, “I guess I just—”

Tara interrupts, “If we share a bed, I don’t expect some kind of outcome from it. We can see where it goes, if it goes anywhere. I want us to get to know each other.” She adds as her face replaces Nick’s stunned one, “And we can’t sleep alone. There’s only so many beds in this room.”

“True.” And then Nick’s voice gets lighter. “You know, it makes perfect sense.” The camera cuts back to him as he continues, “I was going to ask to share a bed with you.”

Probably so that he can fuck her when he thinks the rest of us are sleeping, Ben complains from the confessional room.

Our narrator snorts, You know, Ben, you really don’t have to worry about that—at least, not as much as you think you do. Then again, every good season does have a sex cop. Does that mean you’re volunteering?

Chapter Text

By the time that night’s party rolls around, Charlie’s feeling pretty eager for it. He manages to avoid talking to Ben any more for the rest of the day, and getting to know Tao, Elle, and Isaac somehow calms him down enough that he can forget about Ben being creepy and Nick being fit and just remember why he’s actually here: to meet people, party, and hopefully win some money.

He knows it’s really not good for him for all this alcohol to go to his brain on an empty stomach, and he can tell he’s starting to lose control—starting to let things slip to the others that he wouldn’t normally say to strangers. So he decides to try and sober up at least a little, cutting himself off from any more drinks and forcing himself to eat something at dinner. When it’s time to get dressed up—in costume, because this is apparently(?) a costume party—Charlie’s feeling a little more like himself, albeit still kind of tipsy and nervous and hyperaware that there are cameras in the dressing room.

The theme of the party is first responders—sexy first responders, of course—which means there are a bunch of costume options in a chest to make everybody look like scantily clad police, firefighters, and paramedics. Charlie ends up going for a firefighter costume that leaves his chest completely bare because the shirt isn’t closed in the front. He feels ridiculous, but that seems to be the point. It’s pretty clear that Harry wants everybody to look—and act—silly.

“How do I look?”

Startled, Charlie whips around to face Darcy, who’s looking all dolled up as a sexy policewoman with her midriff exposed and her cleavage fully on display in a tiny push-up bra. “What?” says Charlie dumbly.

“It’s super over-the-top, right? It’s not quite big enough to fit me, but I kind of like it. My tits look fantastic in this.”

Charlie’s eyes slide down to Darcy’s chest—gross—then back up to her face as soon as he can stand. “You look great,” he tells her.

She grins at him. His stomach should be somersaulting, but it isn’t. Why isn’t it? Why doesn’t it ever, even with women who are his type? Why does Charlie always get so bored with everyone he pursues?

Just as the women are putting the finishing touches on their makeup, Harry pokes his head into the room. “We’re all set up outside,” he informs them. “We’ve got some shots to stage, and then Maddox will come back and give you all some more information about the rules of the show. When the party wraps up, we want short confessionals from everyone before bed. You ready for it?”

“Yeah,” everybody choruses, Charlie included, even though he’s totally grossed out. You know, Charlie thinks he might hate Harry and his stupid little American accent. He really does.

“Great. Get on out here. We’re kicking things off with a toast.”

So they, uh, kick things off with a toast. Charlie really doesn’t think it’s a good idea for him to drink any more tonight, but he obediently fills up his glass and calls, “To rock ’n’ roll!” with everybody else before taking just a sip, trying to pretend like he’s drinking more of it than he really is. It’s tequila, though, and tequila is always dangerous for Charlie, who starts to feel hot and lightheaded almost immediately.

“Let’s do it at least one more time,” Harry says now. “We want to film the same thing from different angles.”

“Seriously?” protests Tao. “I thought this show was staged, not scripted.”

“It’s a necessary evil when you only have two cameramen,” smirks Harry. “We have to do reshoots occasionally. Come on, everybody fill those glasses back up…”

So, reluctantly, Charlie takes another couple shots of tequila as they film it two more times. Ah, Charlie doesn’t like this. Charlie really doesn’t like this at all. He drinks often enough, sure, but generally not for the whole day like this, and he’s not liking how foggy he’s feeling—or how often he’s noticing his eyes uncontrollably jump to Nick, who’s all dressed up as a policeman with his chest out, like Charlie’s, and… oh. Wow. His crotch is really visible in those leather pants.

That’s all it is, Charlie tells himself. It’s just that it’s noticeable. It’s not that Charlie likes seeing it or anything. If anything, seeing it makes Charlie uncomfortable—only because he doesn’t want to look, not because he wants to.

But Charlie keeps finding his eyes stuck on Nick and Tara as Farouk and Ajayi start to film the cast dancing. Other couples are definitely starting to form, too: Elle and Tao are really grinding against each other, and Imogen and Ben are looking pretty cozy, too. Charlie sort of wants to warn Imogen to be careful with Ben, but he doesn’t even really know exactly what to warn her about. What would he say, anyway? Ben kicked my leg at lunch, and I didn’t like it? It might have been meant as a harmless kick. Anyway, Charlie doesn’t want to risk that information—or his reaction to it—making it onto anybody’s television screen.

That just leaves Charlie, Isaac, Darcy, and Sahar as the remaining singles so far. It’s a bit weird because Isaac knows both that Charlie fancies Darcy and that Darcy (and Sahar) fancy Isaac, even though Isaac himself fancies Elle? But none of them is really acting like it. Charlie and Isaac have both barely talked to Darcy or Sahar today. Isaac has had plenty of time to get to know Elle, but it was when Charlie and Tao were around, and no matter what he said on camera, Isaac made no move to try to steal Elle’s attention away from Tao.

Is Isaac even interested in Elle like that? Or did he only say it for the cameras?

“Cut for a few minutes,” says Harry over the sound of the music. It takes a few tries to get Elle and Tao to stop grinding. “Can we get everyone to move to the patio?”

“Why?” complains Ben, who’s looking very comfortable with his hands all over Imogen’s bum.

For her part, Imogen doesn’t seem so unhappy with this turn of events. “Is it Jack Maddox? Is he here to announce our first concert?”

Oh, shit, Charlie almost entirely forgot about Jack Henry Maddox with everything going on. Just the thought of Maddox showing up and getting to know Charlie has Charlie feeling even fainter than he already does from the tequila.

“Not yet,” says Harry, smirking. “We’re gonna film a little game, and then Maddox will come and lay out how this is all gonna work. Come on.”

Some more reluctantly than others, they all follow Harry onto the patio and get themselves seated on various benches and chairs. As luck would have it, Charlie finds himself—not on purpose; he sits down first—next to Nick, who, uh, also seems tipsy, tipsier than Charlie has seen him all day. “Charlie!” he yelps happily, draping his arm around the back of the bench just centimeters from Charlie’s neck and shoulders. With his free hand, he pinches Charlie’s cheeks between his fingers and squishes Charlie’s lips into a pout a couple of times before releasing him.

Charlie blushes furiously. “Having a good time?”

“Fuck, yeah, I’m having a good time. Are you having a good time? I haven’t seen you all—” Nick burps “—day.” Suddenly, his face turns concerned. “I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry I avoided you. I said I would catch up with you, and I didn’t.”

Charlie’s sluggish, drunk brain is racing as fast as it can, but he can’t seem to put the pieces together. “You were avoiding me? Like, on purpose?”

“You make me nervous. I don’t know why. It’s dumb.” Nick pokes Charlie lightly on the nose with his index finger. “Boop.”

Fortunately, Charlie is spared having to come up with any kind of sensible and sober response to this by Harry calling everybody to attention again. “All right, all right, all right. Can I get one of our ladies to volunteer to tell the group the rules of the game?”

“What are the rules of the game?” calls Darcy, scowling.

“It’s about kissing,” says Harry smugly. “Each of our girls will give her best siren call—like an ambulance, you know, but sexier—and then whichever boys are attracted to it will go up to her and give her a kiss. You can get racy if you want, but no nudity—not in this scene, anyway.” Harry grins like a douchebag. “Anybody want to start us off?”

“I got you,” says Sahar, dragging herself upright and swaggering over to stand in front of the group. “You’re going to want to film me repeating all that, right?”

“Yeah. We’ll start recording in three—two—one—”

So Sahar repeats all that as Charlie finds himself really starting to panic about which girl he’s supposed to kiss. It makes sense for the storyline if he kisses Darcy, right? It makes sense for him if he kisses Darcy. He’s supposed to kiss Darcy. Darcy is the one Charlie wants to kiss.

It surprises Charlie a little when Isaac promptly hurries up and kisses Sahar once she’s given her siren call. Seriously, Charlie cannot read this guy at all. Did something happen between Isaac and Sahar when they filmed together? Of course it did: Sahar must have had a motive for wanting a scene with him in the first place. But Isaac filmed with Darcy, too, and then ignored them both and hung around Elle all day. Why would Isaac have blown Sahar off after their scene if they were a thing now?

Elle goes next and gets kissed by Tao, to the astonishment of no one. They take Harry’s permission to “get racy” to the maximum and are up there snogging for god knows how long as everybody catcalls at them until Tara finally declares, “Okay, porn stars, your time’s up. Somebody better be getting ready to kiss me!”

Tao withdraws looking incredibly proud of himself, but Tara doesn’t get her wish until after—there it is—Isaac goes up and kisses Elle next. But Charlie’s burning curiosity is going to have to wait because then it’s Tara’s turn and it’s time for Charlie to stomach the absolute discomfort of watching Nick go up there and kiss her.

He’s pretty sure he’s showing something all over his face because Nick, who at first pulls away from Tara looking triumphant, falters when he starts to approach Charlie again to sit back down. “Oh,” says Nick stupidly.

“It’s fine.” Charlie doesn’t sound convincing at all.

“It’s just—”

“It’s fine,” Charlie repeats. “We all knew it was coming. Congrats, man.”

Nick sits unsteadily down beside Charlie—and puts his hand on Charlie’s knee. “You don’t understand. I had to.”

At first, Charlie thinks he’s misheard. It wouldn’t be surprising, given how much he’s had to drink. “You what?”

“I had to. I—”

“Come and get it!” squeals Darcy, interrupting them.

And Charlie just panics. He wants to stay right here on this bench and talk to Nick and figure out why he “had to” kiss Tara and why he seems to think that’s a problem for Charlie, who doesn’t care, like, at all, except maybe he kind of does because he didn’t like how he felt when Nick kissed Tara and he’s freaking out and he just wants to spend the whole rest of the night curled up in a bed with Nick, gazing into those beautiful brown eyes. Fuck. Fuck. Charlie doesn’t have time to kiss Darcy. He doesn’t have time for any of this. He wants to go home, back before he ever met Nick, back to getting a different blonde girl in his bed every night—

Only partly surprisingly at this point, Isaac buys Charlie some more time when he goes up and kisses Darcy first. Shit. Charlie’s eyes flicker to Isaac and Darcy kissing, then back to where Nick is still staring at him like they’re all alone and not being filmed by a television crew—

—and that’s when Charlie remembers. This is being caught on camera. This is going to be broadcast on Netflix to god knows how many hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of viewers. He’s going to have to pull it together. Maybe Nick had to kiss Tara, but Charlie has to kiss Darcy.

“It’s fine,” he tells Nick a third time over the sound of everybody cheering. Without leaving Nick any time to respond, Charlie follows Isaac right up there, strides in as straight a line as he can manage up to Darcy, and takes her cheeks into his hands.

“Hi,” says Charlie.

“What are you just standing there for, you tease?” she asks, giggling.

Right. This is the part where Charlie kisses her.

It feels pretty much exactly how it feels when Charlie kisses anybody—weird and boring and empty. God, why are all women this soft in his hands, and why doesn’t he ever like it? He feels like he’s always chasing the thrill—goes deeper and deeper with so many women until he’s literally shagging them—and it never pays off: he’s still bored. He’s bored right now. Charlie’s entire brain—or what’s left of it that’s still online through the alcohol haze—is back on the bench with Nick right now. Why are they kissing these women when they’re supposed to be kissing—

Darcy squeals at him when Charlie pulls away. “Sorry,” he tells her for reasons he can’t even begin to explain to himself, and then he goes and sits back down next to Nick, avoiding Nick’s eyes as best he can.

The only girl who hasn’t gone yet is Imogen, and it just gives Charlie the slimiest feeling in the world to watch Ben go up there and kiss her—and that’s when Charlie gets it in his drunken brain to maybe do something about that. Something stupid.

But he doesn’t get his chance—not yet—because right before he’s about to get up from the bench again and go to her, Sahar gets out of her chair, struts up there, and confidently kisses Imogen on the mouth.

And Charlie couldn’t even begin to tell you why seeing that upsets him so much. It’s not like he’s a homophobe, okay? Boys can kiss boys and girls can kiss girls as much as they bloody well please. He’s never had a problem with that.

So why does he feel so uncomfortable and—and called out? Why is he making this about him? Sahar kissing Imogen has nothing to do with him.

And why is Sahar kissing Imogen, anyway? She requested to film with Isaac. Her love interest is Isaac. And didn’t she seem happy about it when Isaac was kissing her ten minutes ago?

People around them are whooping, but Imogen just looks shocked when Sahar pulls away. Charlie would like to note for the record, however, that before she got that look on her face, Imogen kissed back—enthusiastically, might Charlie add.

For a second, Charlie thinks he’s chickened out. That’s going to be the end of the game, and Imogen’s kissed all the people she’s ever going to kiss tonight. And then he feels himself getting unsteadily to his feet.

Imogen’s still smiling, but her eyebrows are narrowed. “Charlie?”

Kissing her is the easy part: Charlie kisses girls he doesn’t want to kiss all the time, not that he’ll admit that to himself in the morning. She’s not a bad kisser, and neither was Darcy, not that he enjoyed either. No, the hard part comes after, when he leans into her ear and whispers, “Be careful with Ben.”

“What?”

“Be careful with Ben. Don’t trust him.”

“What?”

But Charlie’s too drunk to do this properly. Stumbling and knocking his forehead against her shoulder, he backs up, gives Imogen a small smile, and lugs himself back to the bench where Nick is waiting, looking flabbergasted.

“Charlie?”

“Hi,” says Charlie like an idiot.

“You fancy Imogen?”

“No, I…”

“What did you whisper to her?”

“I—”

And that’s as far as their conversation progresses before Harry starts to inform them that Jack Maddox is about to make his reappearance. It’s a good thing, too, because Charlie’s just remembered that everything he whispered to Imogen probably got caught on tape.

Fuck.

Maddox is ninety kilograms of muscle and sporting a thousand-watt smile when he reappears in all his glory. Jack Henry Maddox, we hear Charlie tell us in a confessional voiceover. I am bloody smitten with this man. I mean, come on. Aren’t you?

Uh, maybe not the way you are, Charlie, but you keep telling yourself that, says the narrator as Maddox smiles at our cheering crowd of ten sexy singles—or can we even call them all “singles” anymore? Isaac may be a complete playboy, but couples seem to be forming between Tara and Nick, Elle and Tao, and Imogen and Ben—although we’re still trying to figure out why exactly Charlie is trying to sabotage Ben’s attempts to romance Imogen. When we saw his confessional right after he whispered to Imogen not to trust Ben, Charlie just smiled coyly for a long moment at the camera, then looked down at his lap. It’s especially strange since Charlie is clearly still pursuing Darcy, who, as you’ll recall, is totally his type.

In any case, our horny hotties and hunks are delighted to see Maddox return to them, and it takes a few tries before Maddox can even get them to settle down enough to let him speak. “What’s up, party people!” he shouts.

We go through another few seconds of clapping and screaming and foot-stamping before Maddox can reclaim everybody’s attention. “I hope you’ve been making the most of your first night on my private island—because I’m about to hit you with my V.I.P. guest who’s going to change everything. Are you ready for it? Yeah? Yeah?”

You may remember that our producers have a bit of what we can call a hit-or-miss history of this reveal, divulges the narrator. In a slightly greyed-out sequence, we get our first glimpse of this show’s real host reveals in past seasons: appearing inside of a treasure chest, levitating out the sunroof of a car against a backdrop of fireworks… and, in two different shots, being ushered in by nothing but a smoke machine. Right. Here’s the thing, you guys: apparently, when you blow your budget on Jack Henry Maddox, there’s not a whole lot left for my favorite moment of the show. Hang on. She continues in an aside, Uh, producers? Can you at least tell me there’ll be fireworks?

We cut back to our cast, who are now chanting, “V.I.P.! V.I.P.! V.I.P.!” over a crescendo of dramatic music. As we pan across their excited faces, we start going in and out of confessionals with different people, all still dressed up as sexy first responders.

Tao: Who’s it gonna be?! Who’s it gonna be?!

Sahar: Is this about to be another artist?

Imogen: Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo—

Ben: I’m so excited that it’s making me fucking horny. Can we get an orgy in here, please?

Back to Imogen: Chappell Roan, Miley Cyrus, Sabrina Carpenter—

Nick: Honestly, I don’t really give a shit. I just need to know what’s going on with Charlie.

The music cuts off abruptly. Right, says our narrator over Nick’s frowning face as he falls silent. Because that’s totally what somebody straight would have to say right now.

Darcy: SHUT UP AND TELL ME WHO IT IS ALREADY!

Well! You heard the woman! says our narrator, raising her voice.

The music resumes as the camera shows a half-second clip of each cast member’s face—and then there’s a deep, hollow beat of a drum, and we cut to the floor of the patio, where a trapdoor opens and starts spitting out steam as ascends—

—a large white cone with a translucent grey band near its base. After a tense few seconds of the cone rising from beneath the ground, the grey band turns fluorescent purple, and we hear a series of three technological dings: doh doo DEE!

Darcy: NO!

Tara: FUCKING hell!

Immediately, the cast starts to react. A few of them—Charlie, Nick, Imogen—seem confused, but the others immediately start to groan and shout things like “FUCK!” and “NO, NO, NO, NO!” We cut back to Jack Henry Maddox, who smirks at them and says, “Have fun, fellas!”

“No, no, no, Jack, don’t you dare leave us with her—!” protests Elle, but it’s too late: Maddox has given them all a salute and dashed offscreen. Tao has thrown himself to the ground, moaning.

“This is Too Hot to Handle,” Ben is explaining, sounding pissed as all hell, to Imogen. “We’re on Too Hot to Handle.”

Meanwhile, Charlie seems to be seeking answers from Isaac. “I don’t get it. What is that thing?”

“It’s the biggest cockblock in the history of reality TV,” Isaac is saying, rolling his eyes.

“It means our sex lives are OVER!” declares Darcy.

The narrator starts a slow laugh. Now this is what I’m talking about. Can we cue the slow-mo, please?

We cut the film speed to about twenty percent as we continue to pan across the cast’s furious reactions. Still on the ground, Tao has resorted to beating his fists on the floor, moaning in an artificially low pitch, “Noooooooo!” Sahar is wagging her finger at the purple cone, saying, “Fuuuuuuuuck youuuuuuuu!” while Elle roars, “Iiiiiiii caaaaaaaame heeeeeeeere foooooooor diiiiiiiick!” Charlie, Imogen, and Nick don’t seem to have fully figured out what’s going on yet, but they’re starting to catch on, anyway.

We jump to a shot of the sky, where slow-motion fireworks start to erupt—some of them white and purple in the shape of the cone. And that’s what I call a reveal, praises the narrator.

Finally, we resume normal speed and refocus on the cone, which has started to speak in a bored, female British drawl. The purple band around the base of the cone seems to be swirling in a circle. “Hello,” she says. “My name is Tori, and this is Too—Hot—to—Handle.”

More screaming and groaning. You get the idea by now, right?

The cone—Tori—continues, “I have been busy collecting data over the past twelve hours and analyzing your behavior. You have all been selected for focusing on meaningless flings over genuine connections—”

“FUCK yeah, we have been!” bellows Sahar.

“I’m here to change that,” Tori continues coolly as if uninterrupted. “From now on, you must all adhere to the rules of my retreat.”

Charlie: Rules? What rules?

Tori adds, “To aid in your development, I have allocated a prize fund of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”

The vibes change immediately as the cast begin screaming in shock and excitement. “Holy shit!” shrieks Imogen as Tao, who has climbed up off the ground, hollers, “Bags of money, baby!”

Tara: Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars?! Is that, like, the biggest prize fund in Too Hot to Handle  history?

Our narrator assures us, It sure is, Tara. But—

“Two hundred fifty K to spend, babes!” laughs Sahar.

—Yeah. I was afraid of that.

Undeterred, Tori goes on, “But this prize fund will be depleted for every single rule break. No kissing.”

“DAMMIT!” erupts Ben.

“No heavy petting.”

“Jack Maddox, you get back here right now!” Darcy demands.

“No self-gratification.”

A renewed chorus of boos breaks out at this news. “You’re fucking joking,” growls Imogen, her eyes narrowed. “My own body? I can’t touch my own body?!”

Elle: This is seriously fucking sick. This shouldn’t even be legal.

Oh, honey, it’s more than legal. You signed a contract. Maybe try reading the fine print next time?

“And no sex of any kind,” Tori concludes.

“Jesus!” yelps Isaac.

Tao: You expect me to go without sex for a month? An entire month?

You better believe it, my friend. The cockblocking cone is back, and she’s badder than ever.

We cut back to Tori. “Welcome,” she says in a dangerously low voice, “to your long—” a drum beats “—hard—” another drum “—sexless—” yet another drum “—summer.”

A gong rings out behind the enraged cast—and the first episode cuts to black.

Chapter Text

It would make sense for Nick to be freaking out right now about being a contestant on Too Hot to Handle. He signed up for a summer of parties, concerts, and all the sex with all the women he pleased, and instead, he’s getting—okay, yes, parties, but no concerts, no sex, not even kissing, not even masturbation. All his fantasies of having sex with Tara—poof—gone. All his fantasies of—

But he barely even cares. Like, he’ll care tomorrow, but he doesn’t care tonight. He volunteers to do the first confessional after Tori ends the party, and all he even bothers to say is, “Honestly, I don’t really give a shit. I just need to know what’s going on with Charlie.” Even when Harry starts to complain at him that he hasn’t given Harry anything to work with, Nick just adds, “All I have to say is this: kiss my ass, mate,” kisses his middle finger, and holds it up in the air for the camera to see.

Okay, so maybe Nick’s a little drunk. He certainly tries a lot harder than that when he’s sober to rein in his feelings and make other people feel comfortable. He’s just not in the mood to stage any more bullshit right now when he has this friend and his friend is kind of fit and Nick’s worried about him and—

Harry’s going to be holed up in the confessional room for a while, which means his second-in-command, Kieran, is the one going around with the camera crew, capturing people’s reactions to the sex ban. Nick’s vaguely aware that Kieran is asking everybody who wants to stage rule breaks—Nick himself has to flip Kieran off, too, when Kieran starts asking him if he plans to break a rule with Tara—but he’s not paying a whole lot of attention. It’s still going to be a few hours before Kieran and Harry film everybody going to bed, and Nick’s got shit he’s got to get done before then.

Kieran seems to be filming Tao and Elle in the cabana right now, so Nick makes his way to the dressing room, where he can at least change out of this ridiculous sexy police costume and into his pajamas. In there, he finds Imogen and Isaac, who are talking in low voices and break off abruptly when Nick enters.

“You’re not changing out of those?” he asks them, frowning. Sure enough, they seem to have made no move to get out of their paramedic costumes since leaving the cabana when Nick did before his confessional.

Imogen shrugs. “Harry said he wants everybody still in costume if they’re filming any more scenes before bed. I’ll change afterward.”

“You’re filming? With Ben?”

“I don’t know yet. I at least have my confessional left to do.” Furrowing her eyebrows, she asks him, “You’re not going to tell me not to trust Ben, too, are you?”

Okay, Nick’s confused. “Who said you can’t trust Ben?”

“Charlie did. He whispered it to me after he kissed me. I think it’s the reason he kissed me—so that he’d have the chance to tell me tonight before things with Ben went any further.”

Now Nick’s starting to get a bit alarmed. “What happened between Charlie and Ben?”

“We don’t know,” says Isaac quietly.

Imogen adds, “I was kind of hoping you knew. You and Charlie are close, right?”

It feels insane to call Nick and Charlie “close” when they only first met this morning and have barely spoken all day, really—but it feels like they are. It feels right. And Nick can panic about what that means later. “Yeah, but we don’t… we haven’t talked about Ben. He’s never said anything about Ben to me. I mean, Charlie looked kind of uncomfortable eating lunch with Ben earlier, and I was noticing he wasn’t—”

Nick breaks off awkwardly, remembering that there’s a camera in this room and anything he says in here might make it onto the show. It doesn’t feel right to risk telling anyone in the world who has a Netflix account that Charlie ate too little and drank too much all day.

“Wasn’t what?” asks Isaac with a frown.

“Nothing. I just—I’m gonna go find him. I have to talk to him.”

“Okay, but can you please ask him to find me when you do?” requests Imogen.

“And me,” Isaac adds. “I want to ask him to share a bed with me tonight.”

Nick frowns. “You want to share a bed with Charlie? Not Sahar or Darcy? You kissed both of them—and Elle, for that matter.”

Is Isaac—is Isaac blushing? “I know, but—but—but it’s Too Hot to Handle. Think about the money, Nick. I can’t risk it. It’ll be safer with Charlie in my bed.”

“Um, right. Okay. Yeah. But I was assuming he’d want to ask Darcy, so I can’t guarantee what his answer will be. If he’s off somewhere asking her right now—”

“Well, then, go. Hurry,” says Imogen. “I’m stressed out enough as it is. If there’s some reason Ben is dangerous—”

“Okay, okay, okay, I’m going,” says Nick, holding up his hands. In truth, he doesn’t know when Imogen and Isaac haven’t hurried up and found Charlie already if it’s so important to them to talk to Charlie—but Nick doesn’t mind, really. For the record, he needs to talk to Charlie more badly than they do.

And why is that? he finds himself asking himself as he leaves the dressing room in pursuit of Charlie. Why does it feel so urgent to find Charlie and clear the air with him? Isn’t Tara the one Nick should be thinking about right now? He ought to be filming with her right now, maybe complaining with her about being on Too Hot to Handle, maybe breaking a rule or two. Well, he supposes there’s still time later, before bed, if he feels like it. He realizes belatedly that he forgot to change out of his costume: he’s still dressed up to film if he wants to.

But he doesn’t really want to. He likes Tara, sure, but he doesn’t… he’s not…

What is wrong with him?

It takes a few false tries, but he finally tracks Charlie down in the bathroom, where he’s splashing water on his face. It makes Nick feel like he’s walked in on something terribly personal at first: Charlie’s staring at his face in the mirror with the most gaunt, distraught look that Nick can imagine anyone putting on it, and he wants it to stop. He wants to make it go away and make Charlie happy. He wants—

Charlie hears Nick in the doorway, apparently, because he straightens up awkwardly and coughs. “Hi, Nick,” he says in a low, hoarse voice.

“Imogen and Isaac both wanted to talk to you,” says Nick stupidly. “Isaac wants to share a bed with you tonight, and Imogen… has… questions.”

God. What a fucking idiot Nick is. Why can’t he just tell Charlie that he wants to talk to him, too, most of all?

“Oh,” replies Charlie, surprised. “Uh, that’s fine. I hadn’t made plans with anybody yet. I’ll just go and—”

“I wanted to talk to you, too.” Somehow, this sounds even stupider coming out of Nick’s mouth. “Not here. Away from the cameras.”

Charlie’s reaction is… surprising. “‘Away from the cameras,’” he repeats. “Why is it so important to us to talk away from the cameras? What do we have to hide? I don’t have anything to hide. Do you have anything to hide?”

Nick bites his lip. “Charlie, you don’t sound like yourself. I really think—”

“Because you know me so well, don’t you? We met this morning, Nick. We’re not friends. We’re just two assholes who got stuck on Too Hot to Handle together, and now, we can’t even shag other girls. We’re just… we’re stuck. For a whole month. I don’t want to be stuck with you. Why do you want to be stuck with me?”

Wounded, Nick tries, “Charlie—”

Charlie looks back into the mirror and starts fiddling with his hair. “You know, just go back to your little girlfriend. Go running back to Tara. At least she wants you.”

And Nick is trying valiantly here to be the bigger person—but his feelings are fucking hurt, okay? He’s drunk, and he’s tired, and he’s on Too Hot to Handle, and the one person he properly wanted to be his friend is suddenly picking a fight with him—and for what? What is the point of what Charlie’s saying here?

He’s vaguely aware that Harry would want Nick to play up his anger for the camera sitting in the wall, but Nick doesn’t really give a shit. Nick is too tired to give a shit about any of this.

“You’re drunk,” he says, sounding a bit drunk himself. “I’m going to let you take that back in the morning, but you should really go down to the dining hall and eat something—drink some water. You’ll feel better if you can clear out some of the alcohol.”

“Yes, Mum,” sneers Charlie, still looking in the mirror and not at Nick.

Properly hurt at this point, Nick backs out of the bathroom without saying anything more. He only lasts a few seconds before he can feel his eyes starting to prickle. Thankfully, he doesn’t think he’s facing any cameras right now.

And he thinks that’s the end of it, right? He’s expecting to go find Tara, spend an uneventful rest of his night complaining to her about being on Too Hot to Handle, and fall asleep in bed with her—minus anything sexual, of course, because did he mention that they’re on Too Hot to Handle?

Except that’s not what happens. Not exactly, anyway. He does find Tara, and they do complain about the show—but it doesn’t go the way Nick’s expecting it to go.

“Do you want to stage a rule break?” she asks him.

And oh, Nick was not expecting that to come out of Tara’s mouth. “Do I want—what?” he says blankly.

“To stage a rule break,” Tara repeats, like this is all totally normal. “I wanted to ask your permission first. I didn’t think it would be cool of me to spring that on you while the cameras were rolling.”

“But—you want to?”

“Break a rule?” Tara smiles devilishly. “Of course.”

“Even though it’ll cost us money?”

“Nick, no one actually comes on a reality TV with a prize fund in the hopes of winning the prize fund. It’s all about getting screen time and gaining followers. And we’ll get more screen time if we kiss tonight.”

Nick cannot believe that he’s sitting here in a mansion negotiating his first kiss with the girl he likes for screen time. It just feels so weird and clinical—but then, at least she is asking for his consent to do it. He reckons it would be worse if she kissed him and then he didn’t find out until after that it was all a show.

“Okay, but just… I have questions.” Fuck. He’s really not sober enough to handle any of this.

Tara smiles apologetically. “I know it’s a lot.”

“This feels like… a change from earlier,” says Nick slowly. “You didn’t want to film earlier today.”

“Because I didn’t know you earlier today. I didn’t want to make out with a stranger.”

“But… you do want to make out with me now? Or is it just for the cameras?”

She hesitates. Fuck, that’s not a good sign that she has to think about it. “Nick… I like you. I’m still figuring out how I like you, but I like you. Put it this way: if we were back home, I’d have snatched you up and regurgitated you into my bed already.” (Nick smiles at this turn of phrase.) “I’m not saying I want a committed relationship, but… I didn’t let you pick me all for the cameras. I let you pick me because I wanted to let you pick me. If that’s not enough for you, I completely understand, but—”

“It’s enough,” says Nick hastily. Maybe he’s jumping the gun here—maybe he’s being impulsive because he’s still a bit drunk—but—“I don’t want a committed relationship, either. I don’t… do… committed relationships. And I… if I’m being honest…”

Tara raises her eyebrows and waits, but Nick bites his tongue and doesn’t continue. When she figures that out, she says, “Okay. So—I’ll go find Kieran and set it up?”

“Wait,” Nick blurts. “Uh, two things.”

“Sure.”

“I kind of—I—said something in my confessional earlier about Charlie, and Harry’s probably going to want me to follow up on that at some point. There’s nothing going on, I promise. I just—thought he was acting weird when we, uh, met Tori, and that kiss with Imogen was weird, and I’m trying to piece it together. I’m worried about him. I…” Fuck. He wasn’t going to tell Tara or anyone this, but—“I ran into him a few minutes ago in the bathroom, and he was acting really…”

“Weird?” prompts Tara.

Nick purses his lips. “Mean,” he whispers. “He was acting really mean. I think there’s something going on with him. Anyway, I don’t know what he’s going to tell people or what Ben is going to go round saying—”

“What does Ben have to do with Charlie?”

“I have no idea, but that’s why he kissed Imogen: to get close enough to tell her to watch out for Ben. Anyway, I just… thought you should hear it from me. I’m trying to figure it out. As his friend, I’m trying to figure it out. I don’t want you to be blindsided by that.”

“Okay. I hope he’s okay.”

“Me, too,” Nick mumbles.

Tara adds, “We’ll leave it out of our scene tonight, okay? But I understand if you say something about it in a confessional that gets spliced into my scene with you. Do whatever you have to do. I get it. They’re going to be totally distorting everything we say anyway.”

Hardly able to believe that this is his actual life, Nick says, “Right. Um, thanks.”

“No problem. Uh, what’s the second thing?”

At this, Nick blushes beet red. “It’s stupid.”

Tara’s forehead wrinkles. “It’s not stupid if it matters to you. What is it?”

“I just… maybe don’t want my first kiss with you to be staged on camera,” he mutters.

A hint of a smile trickles onto Tara’s pretty, pretty mouth until it’s a full-blown grin. “So you’re saying you want to kiss me? Right now? Before we stage a rule break?”

Mortified, Nick goes on, “I’m sorry if that’s weird—”

“It’s not weird. Hey. It’s not weird, I promise.” They’re sitting at right angles to each other right now, but when Tara says this, she leans in to grab Nick’s hands and hold them in his lap. “The fact that we’re negotiating a fling on reality television is what’s weird. You having reservations about that is totally, refreshingly normal. I kind of wish I were less jaded and more like you.”

Nick smiles weakly. “Okay. So do we just… uh…?”

“Oh. Yeah. Um… here.” And Tara pulls herself out of her chair, positions herself right in front of Nick, and delicately sits down in his lap, her knees planted on either side of his hips. “Sorry that this isn’t more romantic.”

Nick, who forgot how to breathe when Tara sat down on top of him, Jesus, shakes his head. “You don’t have to apologize,” he chokes out. “You’re perfect. I mean—you’re good.”

Tara—who Nick is positive knows exactly what she’s doing right now—bites the corner of her lip and smiles at him. Shit. Is this what Tara’s like when she turns the charm on? Before, it felt like she was just getting to know him as a friend, but this—

“Okay, then,” she murmurs to him. “Close your eyes.”

“What?”

“Close your eyes. Then I can kiss you.”

Obediently, he closes his eyes.

Now that Elle and Tao have broken Tori’s rules within a whopping eight minutes, let’s check in on Nick and Tara and see if they’re faring any better. With Nick seeming upset about how it went talking to his “friend” Charlie, my hopes, personally, are that he’ll take some time to himself. Think things through. Not do anything—

We cut to a shot of Nick approaching Tara outside, both of them still in costume, as we hear his voiceover overlaid across it. Charlie clearly didn’t want to talk to me when I tried, so all I have to say is this. Cutting back to Nick in the confessional room, he concludes, Kiss my ass, mate. He kisses the middle finger on his right hand and sticks it out at the camera, looking pissed.

…Rash. Agh, dammit, I spoke too soon.

“Tara?”

“Oh, hey, Nick.” Tara’s sitting in an outdoor lounge chair looking glum, though she perks up a little when she catches sight of Nick. “Can you fucking believe we’re on Too Hot to Handle? I can’t remember the last time I went more than a day without at least touching myself, if not somebody else.”

Reclining in the chair next to Tara’s, Nick agrees, “I know. It’s starting to feel real, and I don’t like it. How long until I can have sex again?”

Twenty-six days, twenty-two hours, and forty-seven minutes, but who’s counting, right?

“I mean, take us, for example.”

Nick’s eyes go round and boyish. “‘Us?’”

“Yeah,” says Tara, narrowing her eyes. “Like, out there, I would have jumped your bones the first night. On Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, I definitely would have jumped your bones the first night.”

“You would have?”

She laughs a little. “God, Nick, you act like you’ve never had casual sex before. Aren’t you supposed to be Nick Nelson, Rugby Player Supreme, Playboy Extraordinaire? Girls knocking down your door just begging to get into your knickers?”

Nick brightens up a little at this. “Is that your way of begging to get into my knickers, Tara Jones?”

Um, can someone bring Tori back online in here? I think we’re in need of an intervention.

We jump back to the confessional room, where Tara has her legs crossed and her hands folded around her knee. I’m looking at Nick, and he’s just so cute, all flustered because, like, he’s talking to a girl and he thinks I might like him. It just makes me want to kiss the little scared pout right off of his lips.

“Tara Jones doesn’t beg,” says Tara, grinning, now back outside with Nick. “What Tara Jones wants, Tara Jones gets.”

“And does Tara Jones want to break a rule right now?”

Come on, Tara. Stay strong. It’s just a cute boy with dreamy brown eyes and the most perfect little blush on his cheeks, and do you see his junk in those leather pants?—we zoom in on the faint outline of Nick’s bulge in the pants of his policeman costume—and—oh, no. I think I just jinxed myself.

“Are you saying you want to break a rule right now?” Tara fires right back.

“I mean, I would if you would.”

“No, for real, though. Is this really happening? Are we kissing?”

“Or something,” says Nick evasively. Damn, son, you really are a playboy when you put your mind to it! “I’ll kiss you right now, anyway, and if we happen to want more in bed tonight…”

Remember everything that happened earlier today, Nick? the narrator prompts him as Tara, giggling, climbs out of her lounge chair and into Nick’s, straddling his legs and hovering over him, her long braids falling around his face. Remember when you were making a real connection with Tara that didn’t have anything to do with sex? Remember before Charlie hurt your feelings and told you to go and run back to your new girlfriend?—when you didn’t think you had to follow the advice of a guy you’ve known for fourteen hours who’s had more drinks tonight than his entire band has followers on Instagram? Remember that?

But it’s too late: Tara’s leaned down and started to kiss him. Sassy guitar-charged music starts to play in the background. Gasping breathily, Nick puts his hands right on her bum and gropes as he kisses back.

No? Just me? Aw, man…

The screen is suddenly tinted lime green with the word RULE in all caps in pink in the middle; a second later, the colors reverse, and we see BREAK in lime green against a pink backdrop. Meanwhile, Nick and Tara continue to snog, broken only by the occasional sigh of Nick whispering, “Fuck.”

Yeah. Let’s just hope you don’t fuck when you two get back to the bedroom tonight, or what’s shaping up to be a seriously expensive night is going to cost you even more.

Chapter Text

Charlie knows Imogen and Isaac and probably Nick and definitely Harry and pretty much the entire  cast and crew of this season of Too Hot to Handle want to talk to him tonight, but really, he’s not in the mood for any of it. He just wants to go back home, sit down in front of his drums in his blessedly empty house away from all these people, and bash on them with his drum sticks until he sobers up and literally breaks his drums. Or maybe he wants to fall asleep and never wake up. He’s still deciding.

He just feels like a dick. He attacked the hell out of Nick tonight, and for what? Because he was drunk? Because Nick suggested talking away from the cameras and it triggered something in Charlie to feel like he and Nick had some kind of secret relationship that they needed to hide? Well, too late for that: Charlie’s little outburst happened on camera and is definitely the kind of drama that he would guess is going to make it onto the show. And it’s too late to take it back: he signed his rights away. Anything that gets caught on camera from here on out is fair game.

And he knows he wouldn’t have done it if he weren’t so drunk. God, Charlie really needs to lay off the drinks a little from here on out.

Now, Nick’s probably off snogging Tara somewhere like Charlie told him to, and Charlie? He’s all alone. And he’s not saying he wants to be snogging Darcy or any woman right now, but it certainly doesn’t feel good to think that Nick’s going to have somebody else in his bed tonight while Charlie…

He wants someone to understand. He wants anyone to understand.

So he’s feeling a little dangerous when Elle finds him and says, “Hey, Charlie? Harry’s asking for you in the confessional room.”

Charlie groans. “Yeah. I’ll be right there. Thanks, Elle.”

She hesitates. “Everybody’s talking about what you said to Imogen when you kissed her, you know. Can I ask what that was about?”

“No. Just leave it,” he mutters.

Pursing her lips, Elle says, “Okay, but you’re not going to be able to avoid it forever. Imogen checked with Lange, and he was able to capture the audio. She said she wants to film with you.”

“Well, tell her I’ll film with her tomorrow. I’m too drunk. I don’t want to film with anybody else tonight.”

“But Harry—”

“Fuck Harry. I’ll do my confessional, and that’s it. I just want to be alone, Elle. Please.”

Looking unsatisfied, Elle sighs. “Okay. But we’re all here for you, okay? I’m here for you. You look miserable, and I don’t like it.”

Something pulls at the strings of Charlie’s cold, dead heart. “Thanks, Elle, but I’m fine. I just need to sober up, that’s all. I had too much to drink.”

Elle smiles halfheartedly at him. “Okay. If you say so. I can walk you down to the confessional if—”

“No, I’m good. Really.”

So Elle leaves him to walk alone down to the confessional room and film his bit. Now that they’ve all filmed their intros and met each other, Ajayi and Farouk’s camera crew is doing actual scenes around the villa, while Harry is alone in the confessional room with just a pre-set camera in the wall in front of the sofa to record everything that happens in there at the same angle.

Charlie’s not totally sure why it’s even necessary to have a producer in there, but Harry informs Charlie when he gets there that it’s still Harry’s job to ask leading questions and make sure he’s getting workable material that will fit into the storylines the show puts together. Kieran, who’s with the rest of the crew on site right now, and several other producers monitoring the fixed camera feeds have apparently been texting Harry updates on what else is going down that might make it onscreen.

“We’re gonna start all the way back this morning when you first started meeting the rest of the cast. I want details on your thoughts about Nick and Darcy in particular, but if you have any funny quips about anybody else, I want to hear those, too.”

“Okay,” says Charlie hesitantly, trying to focus his fuzzy brain on what’s happening right in front of him. “Um…”

“And don’t look so glum, for god’s sake,” Harry complains. “You’re on television. You’re surrounded by hot women. Jack Henry Maddox is here. You don’t know you’re on Too Hot to Handle yet. You’ve just met nine sexy singles and who you think is your host. I want to see some enthusiasm.”

“Right. Uh…” Closing his eyes, he pretends Harry is someone else—someone Charlie actually likes. “Darcy Olsson. I am bloody smitten with this woman. I mean, come on. Aren’t you?”

“Good. Great. Keep going. Give me more. What was it like seeing her skip down that sidewalk and join you on the beach?”

It’s not too bad at first, trying to get back into the headspace he was in earlier in the day—especially when Harry’s just talking about Darcy and Jack Maddox and whom Charlie wanted to kiss. It’s even okay talking about the beginning of the party, back when Charlie was excited to see Maddox again and wanted to find out more about the first concert—back when Charlie had his first kiss with Darcy. But then Harry gets to the part where Charlie kissed Imogen—and it turns out that they caught what Charlie said to her on tape.

“Why warn her about Ben?” Harry needles. “What’s happened between you and Ben that we can work in here? We barely have anything between the two of you on camera yet.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” says Charlie stiffly.

“Charlie, come on. You signed a contract. You have to tell us—”

“Well, I’m not going to.”

“Don’t be an ass. It’s all in good fun, come on—”

“It is not. There is nothing fun about that guy, and I don’t want to talk about him.”

Harry rolls his eyes. “Fine. But I’ll have you know that we’re going to cobble together whatever material we can of you to explain this one.”

Feeling increasingly uncomfortable, Charlie mutters, “Fine. Do what you have to. But I’m not talking about it.”

“Fine. Whatever. Let’s skip ahead, shall we? I want to hear your reaction to meeting Tori and finding out what show you’re really on.”

Again, Charlie starts feeling comfortable during this part. Sure, yeah, he’s kind of wigging out that he doesn’t get to have sex for a whole month, and he leans into that a little, trying to show his emotions—the safe ones—for the camera. This is what he wanted, isn’t it?—screen time? And the more dramatic his reactions, the more screen time he’ll probably get.

But then Harry brings up the fight Charlie just had with Nick in the bathroom earlier tonight. And Charlie has no idea what to say. If he’s smart, he won’t say anything, but he’s still a little drunk, and it just—

“I fucked it up, okay?” he says in a hush. “I fucked it up. I don’t even know what he was trying to talk to me about, but he was being nice to me, and I always do this. I don’t know how to handle it when I’m drunk and pretty boys are nice to me. And you can fucking—he’s looking at me with those eyes, telling me I don’t ‘sound like myself,’ whatever that means, because he doesn’t even know me, but I feel like he does. I feel like he does know me. And it scares the shit out of me. So I lashed out at him, and I regret it. Okay? I regret it. I’m sorry. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. Don’t put any of this onscreen in the final edit, okay?”

And ignoring all of Harry’s complaints, Charlie lunges to his feet and flees.

He manages to stay away from everyone until bedtime, which is getting filmed, apparently. It’s staged so that everybody goes into the bedroom one by one—staggered deliberately, Charlie assumes, by Harry and Kieran, who make sure to maximize the potential for drama. Tao, Elle, Tara, and Darcy are already in there when it’s Charlie’s turn, which means the cameras are probably making a big show out of how he spurns Darcy in her bed to grab an empty one for himself and Isaac. Then Sahar enters and joins Darcy, followed by Ben, who grabs the remaining bed, glaring daggers at Charlie as he does.

Fuck. Imogen’s probably told him by now that Charlie warned her about him. Why did Charlie do that again? What evidence does Charlie even have that Ben’s not a good guy besides that they had a weird moment at lunch and Charlie has a bad feeling about him?

When Imogen comes into the room, she gives Charlie an uncertain sort of look even as she’s walking toward Ben’s bed and climbs into it. Charlie’s heart sinks.

It’s Nick who appears next, giving Charlie the weirdest look in the world before pivoting and joining Tara. It pisses Charlie off, honestly. What, does Nick think Charlie wants him in his bed with him? Like Charlie could possibly believe that was an option, even before they got into that fight.

Nick’s with Tara. Everybody knows that. Charlie’s fucked it all up, anyway, and knows that, too. So why is Nick looking at him all guilty and sad? Charlie is the one who should feel guilty and sad after how he blew up at Nick earlier.

Isaac is the last to appear, claiming the empty spot next to Charlie. “You okay?” he asks Charlie in an undertone.

Why does everybody keep asking Charlie that? “Fine,” he says back, trying not to lose his temper. Again.

“Good,” Isaac murmurs. Then, louder, he tells the room at large, “I just want to make sure everyone’s ready to have a nice, clean, rule break-free night tonight. We’re on board with that, right?”

A few people give positive reactions—Charlie and Sahar both nod, while Darcy flashes a thumbs-up—but others look less enthused about this. Ben rolls his eyes melodramatically, while Elle purses her lips, Tao mumbles, “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” under his breath, and Tara simply smirks. And Nick? He’s sitting there staring directly at Charlie while his cheeks turn bright red.

Why is Nick being so weird about this? Why can’t he just leave Charlie alone and let Charlie be straight in peace?

Isaac interrupts Charlie’s train of thought. “We haven’t had any rule breaks yet, right? Tao and Elle, you’re good?”

“Golden,” drawls Elle, rolling her eyes.

“Nick and Tara?”

“Of course,” giggles Tara. When she snuggles against Nick with her head buried in the crook of his neck, Charlie forces himself to tear his eyes away.

“We definitely didn’t do anything, either,” adds Imogen.

“Yeah, and I’m gonna be pissed in the morning if I find out Imogen cockblocked me for nothing and you’re all lying through your teeth right now,” seethes Ben.

Charlie accidentally makes eye contact with Imogen, who frowns at him and then looks away. Apparently, whatever she wanted to talk to Charlie about (he says “whatever” as if he doesn’t know exactly what she wants to discuss, god), she doesn’t want to bring it up in front of everyone right now.

Well, good. Charlie needs to sleep off the alcohol before he can be held accountable for anything else he might say or do.

They’ve all gotten into bed still wearing their mics. As soon as Harry calls “cut” on the scene, the lights come back on, and everybody struggles upright enough to at least take their mics off so that they can sleep comfortably without them. “It’s weird, isn’t it, how staged everything is?” Isaac says to Charlie as they’re getting situated. “I knew some stuff would be fake for the cameras, but I guess I just thought it would all be at least a bit more authentic. Even the rule breaks are staged.”

“And you asking everybody who’s broken rules already? Was that staged, too?”

Isaac purses his lips. “I know which couples filmed, but everybody’s keeping pretty tight-lipped about whether they actually broke rules or not. I guess they want our reactions to that to be authentic. And…”

Charlie frowns. “What?”

“Well… every season has a… ‘sex cop,’ basically. An ‘accountant.’ As soon as I knew this was Too Hot to Handle, and we wrapped filming with Tori, I went down to Harry and volunteered.”

Lying down next to him, Charlie asks under his breath, “Why? Why volunteer? And why kiss three different women at the party? And why hang out with Elle all day without trying to film with her? And why actually film with Sahar and Darcy when you didn’t say when we were talking that you were interested in either of them?”

“You ask too many questions, Spring,” mumbles Isaac as he adjusts his pillow and closes his eyes.

With Elle and Tao and Tara and Nick all flagrantly violating Tori’s rules, our last hope is Imogen and Ben—and they just might toe the line if Imogen took to heart anything Charlie told her tonight. I have so many questions. Why does Charlie have a problem with Ben? Who can Imogen trust? Who will Imogen trust?

We cut to Imogen, who’s sitting on the edge of the pool next to a pissed-looking Ben. “I can’t believe this is Too Hot to Handle,” he sulks, glaring out at the water. Imogen is hugging his arm with her head on his shoulder, but he doesn’t even seem to have noticed. “I can’t get laid for a month? A month? Like, I can’t even touch myself?”

“Tell me about it,” sighs Imogen, nuzzling her nose in his shoulder. “I don’t know how long it’s been since I—well—had to go that long.”

“Yeah, but it’s not healthy for a man to have to wait like this. Men have needs. I have needs.”

Imogen looks up at him and scowls. “I have needs, too, you know. Relationships aren’t all about making the man happy.”

We jump back to the confessional room, where Imogen is scowling. Ben’s not very empathetic, is he? It’s like, he showed me all this attention before the sex ban, and for what? He’s just gonna forget about me as soon as he realizes he can’t fuck me? Is that it? I’m important, too. I deserve to take up space, too.

Back at the pool, Ben seems to have realized his mistake. “I know you have needs. Hey.” He twists his neck to look down at her and starts playing with her hair. “I know you have needs,” he repeats.

Oh, shit, Ben tells us in the confessional room. I’m gonna lose her if I’m not careful. I’ve got to stay on my game if I want someone to break rules with. He rubs his hands together and laughs.

“And what about what Charlie told me, huh?”

That little fucker, Ben complains.

At the pool, he furrows his eyebrows. “What did Charlie tell you?”

Imogen narrows her eyes up at him and doesn’t answer.

“What did Charlie tell you, Imogen?”

“He said you couldn’t be trusted. What did you say to him, anyway? That you wanted to sleep with other women here? Was that it?”

So now I’m in hot water with the girl I’m romancing, says Ben bitterly, wearing different clothes now, and Charlie has some kind of vendetta against me? What? Is it because I know things about him and Nick that he doesn’t want me to know?

Our narrator interrupts, Hold on. Back up. What do you know about Charlie and Nick? Has the flirting actually gone beyond just flirting? And isn’t Nick with Tara now? Didn’t we all see them making out a minute ago on the patio? Didn’t we also see Charlie kiss Darcy at the party earlier tonight?

Ben points out, Didn’t stop Charlie from kissing Imogen, too, did it? Moves fast, that one, doesn’t he? He knew she was mine. He knew it, and he kissed her anyway.

Benjamin, if you seriously think you can just drop a bombshell like that and walk away without explaining—

But it seems he does because we’re back to Ben and Imogen in the pool. “Imogen, I seriously have no idea what you’re talking about. Like, genuine. I don’t. I haven’t done a thing to Charlie, and I haven’t said a word against you. All I’ve told anybody all day is that I wanted to get to know you. God’s honest truth.”

We cut back to Imogen’s confessional. I don’t know where the disconnect is coming from, but I know Charlie—

For all of two minutes, our narrator points out.

—And I know enough to believe he didn’t just invent this out of thin air. If he doesn’t trust Ben, then I want to know why.

She squints at Ben—and then sighs. “Fine. But I’m not kissing you until I talk to Charlie.”

Ben narrows his eyes. “And if Charlie never fesses up all month?”

“Then I guess I’m stuck following Tori’s rules for a month—if I stay with you.”

Ben smiles lazily, but his eyes are hard. “If you stay with me?”

“I’m an independent woman, you know. You have to respect me to get my attention.”

“Shit. You’re gonna make me work for it,” snickers Ben.

Imogen snorts and shakes her head. “Looks like it.”

Chapter Text

Nick’s hangover feels a little like someone ran Nick over with a truck when he wakes up beside Tara the next morning, but he’s betting it has nothing on how Charlie’s feeling right now. He can hear Charlie mumbling to Harry, who’s trying to get him to put on his mic right now, “Can’t you talk a little quieter? And do the lights really need to be this bright?”

“The lights are about to be a lot brighter when we start filming this scene, princess. Now help me get this on you. I have nine other people to mic up before we can start.”

Technically, Harry doesn’t have nine other people to mic up because the rest of the crew is pitching in, too. The lighting department is still getting set up, but Ajayi, Farouk, and Lange are apparently good to go and also going around waking up the cast and putting microphones around their necks. Case in point: Ajayi is beside Nick’s bed right now, bending in close to Nick with a mic in hand.

Nick’s expecting this to be all fine and normal—and then Ajayi murmurs, “You need to be careful, Nick.”

Nick blinks. He’s so hungover that he’s half convinced he imagined this, except why would he imagine Ajayi saying something like that out of the blue? “I—what?”

“You need to be careful. You and Charlie got caught on camera fighting last night, and Harry wants to turn it into a thing.” Ajayi is talking fast and soft, like he doesn’t want to be overheard saying any of this. “The show’s been facing some backlash in recent seasons for—”

He breaks off abruptly when Tara, who’s got her arms looped around Nick’s waist, stirs and opens her eyes. “Is this how you’re going to wake us up every morning?” she asks Ajayi.

“Pretty much,” he tells her. His voice is mostly back to normal, but he still sounds oddly worried. “Hang tight, Tara. I’ll get you next.”

Nick attempts to put this weird exchange out of his mind as he slumps back down into bed for what precious few minutes (or seconds) he can. “We don’t actually have to wake up now, right?” he mumbles. “Like, we’ll film ourselves waking up, and then if we want to go back to bed, we can?”

“If you insist, you can when we finish filming, but not for the whole day. Sooner or later, you’ll have to get back up again to film. We’re not here to police what you do off camera, though.”

“Great,” mutters Nick.

It doesn’t take long for everyone’s mics to get on and Singh’s crew to finalize the lighting. “Okay,” says Harry, in his element. “Isaac, I’m gonna want you to ask everybody if anybody had any rule breaks overnight, all right? And Charlie, I want to hear some dialogue about that hangover. Everybody good? Now get back in bed—we’re going to need to film you all stretching and sitting up as if you were asleep when the lights come on. Three—two—one—”

“They’re not gonna do this every morning, are they?” Nick murmurs to Tara, who giggles.

The lights, which had been turned off right before filming commenced, switch back on all at once, and Nick winces as he struggles upright again.

“You look like hell a little bit,” Tara informs him.

“I feel like hell a little bit,” he agrees.

Isaac’s doing his whole routine, checking if any of the couples broke rules overnight; when he gets to Nick and Tara, Nick just shakes his head before burying his face in Tara’s neck. She drapes an arm around his shoulders and rubs bracingly.

“How pissed are they gonna be at us when they find out?” Nick whispers.

“Not very if they broke rules, too,” Tara whispers back. “My money’s on Tao and Elle doing way worse than us.”

“You mean your money’s off them. We spend money with every rule break, remember?”

Tara snorts.

Doh doo DEE!

A collective round of groaning and cussing goes around the room as the purple cone nestled into the wall opposite Nick comes to life. “Already?” protests Sahar as Isaac shouts, “And you all just said you had a clean night! Lying through your bright white teeth, I see—”

“Can you lower your voice?” mumbles Charlie, plugging his ears as best he can. “Some of us have hangovers, you know, and I’m right next to you.”

Undeterred, Tori says, “Good morning, guests.”

“Good morning, Tori,” everybody choruses—except for Charlie, who slides back down and buries his head underneath his pillow.

It seems Tori has little sympathy for Charlie’s plight because she says in a bored, sarcastic drawl, “I’m sorry to see that some of you had too many drinks last night. I’m even more sorry to see that others of you broke too many rules last night. Clearly, I have my work cut out for me.”

“Fucking really?” complains Isaac (albeit a little quieter, presumably for Charlie’s sake). It’s about the same reaction as everybody else has—except for Tara, who giggles, and Nick, who blushes furiously and wishes he could melt through the bed and beneath the floor right now. It’s not like Nick didn’t think he’d get caught, but—

“Please, everyone, get dressed and gather in the cabana.”

Nick groans, ignoring the “Thanks, Tori” going around the room right now. Apparently, when Ajayi said Nick would have to film before he could go back to bed, he meant Nick would have to film before he could go back to bed.

“I’m not going in there until I have to,” Charlie announces as the others start to drag themselves out of bed. “Somebody wake me up when everybody’s dressed and I have to get up.”

Shit—that’s what Nick was going to do. But what’s he going to do, stay behind alone in a room with Charlie with five cameras in the walls? Being alone with Charlie after last night feels humiliating—doubly so if they’re being filmed.

“Dibs on the shower,” Nick says instead. Maybe splashing some water on his face will make him feel more alive.

It ends up taking what feels like a really long time for everyone to “gather in the cabana.” A few people showered last night, but everybody else has to take turns in the bathroom (and how is there only one bathroom in this entire villa?), and it takes a very long time for the women in particular to do their hair and makeup in the dressing room. There’s also a makeup artist on site who puts a bit of foundation and concealer on the men’s faces to get them camera-ready, which feels weird at the time but probably will make Nick look a whole lot more alive onscreen than he would otherwise.

Nick ends up hanging out in the dressing room far longer than he needs to, unsure what he’s supposed to be doing with his time when the promise of a scene to film is hanging over his head. Finally, Harry calls, “Okay, gents, we’ll probably be ready to film in the cabana in, what, ten minutes? Fifteen? We’ll need someone to go and fetch Charlie—”

“I’ll do it,” Tao offers, but Harry shakes his head.

“No. I want Nick to go get him.”

Nick frowns, feeling entirely self-conscious in his swim trunks. “Harry, I’m sorry, but I think I’m the last person Charlie wants to see right now.”

“Exactly why I want to get the two of you alone on camera. The lighting is still set up in the bedroom and everything. Go on. Farouk, Ajayi, and Lange will meet you in there.”

Rolling his eyes, Nick complies. The bedroom is close by the dressing room, and when he gets there, he finds himself hovering stock-still in the doorway, staring at Charlie as Charlie sleeps. Holy shit. Charlie’s unburied his face from beneath the pillow now that there’s no noise to block out, and he looks like a bloody angel with his eyes closed and one perfect cheek exposed to the open air, curly hair sticking out at all angles, and Nick—

“We’re rolling,” whispers Farouk as the lights come back on.

Shit. Okay.

Nick approaches the bed and, after deliberating for a moment, murmurs, “Um, Charlie? Time to, uh, get up.”

No response.

Right. Nick’s going to have to actually touch him, apparently.

When sitting on the edge of Charlie’s bed doesn’t jostle him enough to elicit a reaction, Nick puts a hand on Charlie’s shoulder and shakes gently. “Charlie? I’m supposed to wake you up. It’s time to film.”

Charlie stirs, his forehead wrinkling. “Nick?”

“Yeah. Hey.”

“Fuck. My head is pounding.”

“I know. Mine, too. I… can’t imagine how you feel right now. Sorry. I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant—”

“I’m so sorry,” Charlie croaks. “I never should have said those things to you. I’m an ass. You didn’t do anything wrong, Nick, I swear. I was just… confused, and…”

Ajayi’s words suddenly shoot back into Nick’s mind: You need to be careful. Harry wants to turn it into a thing. Nick’s still not exactly sure what Ajayi meant by this, but he has a sudden, instinctual feeling that—

It makes Nick want to warn Charlie that the cameras are rolling right now, but what if Charlie blows up at him again for mentioning it? That was the whole reason Charlie got upset last night: because Nick made a point of saying he wanted to talk off-camera. Anyway, even if Charlie doesn’t realize Ajayi and Farouk are in here right now filming, he should at least realize that there are cameras in the walls pointed at all the beds. If Charlie knows that and is saying all this anyway, then he must be okay with the idea of it making it onscreen, right?

Fuck. Being a reality TV star is so fucking confusing.

“It’s okay,” says Nick in a stilted sort of way. “I told you last night I’d let you take it back in the morning, right? So I’m letting you take it back. Apology accepted.”

“I… you… you’re so…” That’s when Charlie opens his eyes—and seems to notice the cameras behind them. “The crew is here?”

“Sorry. I thought… after last night…”

“When I blew up at you for wanting to talk offscreen,” Charlie mutters. “Right.”

“Sorry,” Nick repeats.

“No, I’m sorry. It’s fine. You haven’t done anything wrong,” Charlie says again. “Um, we should go to the cabana—or—?”

Nick clears his throat. Charlie is so close. If Nick were smart, he’d back up—get some personal space—but Nick isn’t smart. “You’ll have to get dressed and get makeup on first, but they think they’ll be ready to film soon. Fifteen minutes tops?”

“I’m starving,” Charlie mutters. “Will there at least be breakfast after?”

“I think so, but you can go back to bed after—or instead—if you want. That’s what I was gonna do, at least after I ate.”

“Oh. Yeah.” Charlie pulls himself into a sitting position and winces. “It’s so bright. Why is it so bright?”

“Television,” says Nick weakly. “And hangovers. I have one, too, if it’s any consolation.”

“I’m gonna lay off the drinks from now on. I promise. It’s no excuse for me to act like I acted to you just because I was drunk, but—but I’m not normally like that when I’m not drunk.”

“It’s okay,” Nick mumbles. “Um, can I help at all?”

“That depends. Can you get me off this show?” Charlie mutters.

But Nick thinks it’s too late for that. Nick thinks it’s too late for that entirely—and not just because they signed a contract.

When he doesn’t answer, Charlie sighs. “Just tell me one thing. Did you and Tara break a rule last night?”

Nick doesn’t answer that, either.

Our ten horny hotties look a lot less horny and a lot more stressed as they file into the cabana and distribute themselves among the benches and chairs. Charlie and Nick may have made up, but they don’t seem to be bosom buddies just yet, with Nick planting himself by Tara’s side at the opposite end of the cabana from Charlie. When we see a closeup of Charlie’s face, it definitely looks at least a little like he’s gazing longingly across everybody else down at Nick, just wishing he were the one down there with him.

Once everybody’s seated, Tori comes back to life from where she’s been placed at the center of the coffee table in the middle of the screen. “Hello, guests.”

“Hello, Tori,” chants everyone around her.

We cut to Tara in the confessional room. I’m feeling pretty embarrassed about last night. Like, it felt so good to do what I did with Nick, but I’m not looking forward to seeing everybody’s reactions.

After panning across several cast members’ faces, we jump back to the confessional room, this time with Elle. I’m just going to come right out and say it: I’m not sorry I kissed Tao. It’s how much money for a kiss? Out of the two fifty grand available? People can deal. He’s hot, and it was worth it.

Our narrator chimes in, Uh-oh. I think someone needs a cone-shaped intervention.

Tori continues in her bored voice, “You were all selected because you have been choosing meaningless flings over genuine relationships. I gave you strict rules to adhere to banning all forms of sexual contact. However, I can report that, last night, there were multiple breaches of those rules.”

“Multiple?!” shouts Imogen over the din as groans and protests go around the room. We hear the start of a voiceover, which cuts midway through to a confessional view of Tao as he laughs, Damn. I’ll feel a little better about kissing Elle if I wasn’t the only one! His laugh fades, and his gaze turns to a glare. To kiss someone, I mean. There better not be anybody else kissing Elle.

Tense music plays in the background as we see various shots of our sexy singles sizing each other up. Tara looks like she’s trying valiantly not to start giggling again, while Nick and Tao both look embarrassed. Elle, on the other hand, looks defiant, like she’s going to murder the first person who accuses her of anything.

It is tense in the villa this morning, explains Sahar. Everybody’s looking around, trying to figure out who broke the rules…

Ben adds, They probably all think Imogen and I broke a rule, but for once, I actually didn’t do anything. Not for long, though. She won’t be able to resist in the end. No one ever can. He smirks.

I am not happy, complains Imogen. Ben and I were good, and now, I’m still gonna lose money because someone couldn’t keep their hands to themselves? Multiple someones?

In the cabana, Tara is biting her lip and trying not to smile. She tells us in a voiceover, They’re all trying to figure out who it is, and yeah, I’m worried they’re gonna hate me when they figure out it’s me—but I’m also curious. Whose hands are dirty? Whose hands are clean?

Tao adds, Shit. It’s obviously me. It’s not gonna take them long to figure it out. I’m shaking—I’m sweating—I’m blushing—

People in the villa are starting to catch on. “You’re looking real guilty over there, Tao,” laughs Sahar. “Is there something you want to say to the group?”

“Yeah, Tao, come on,” jumps in Darcy.

We cut to Elle’s confessional next. People are figuring it out anyway, and I’m like, I’m just gonna tell them. There’s no point hiding it, and I’m not ashamed of it, anyway.

In a split shot of Elle and Tao, we see Elle wave her hands in front of her and declare, “Fine. I’ll say it. It was us.”

“OH!” cry out several people at once as Tara finds herself unable to resist breaking into a laugh.

“So we kissed. Twice.”

“TWICE?!”

“What do you care? Like you all wouldn’t have done the exact same thing in my shoes.”

“I didn’t,” Imogen protests. “Ben would have been down to break some rules last night, and I stayed strong.”

You go, girl! our narrator roots her on. Set those boundaries!

“Well, then, who else broke the rules?” asks Sahar. “When Tori says ‘multiple rule breaks,’ are we just talking your two kisses, or—?”

“We better be,” says Isaac darkly. “Does anyone else have something they want to confess to the group? Hmm?”

There’s a strained silence in the cabana as the tense music simmers—and then Tara starts to giggle.

“Tara!” chime in several people at once.

In Nick’s confessional, he looks almost as mortified as he does in the cabana. Come on, Tara, don’t crack. Don’t. Please?

Oh, Nicky. I think it’s a little late for that, says our narrator.

In Tara’s confessional, she’s giggling, too. I’m just gonna go for it. I just hope people understand. Fuck, I hope they don’t hate us.

“Okay, so maybe Nick and I had a little kiss after the party?”

“Oh, come on!” complains Ben.

“And that’s all it was? A ‘little kiss?’” probes Isaac, frowning.

In her confessional, Tara says, Nick, help me out here! Say something, at least!

Luckily for her—or maybe unluckily, depending on how you look at it—Nick does just that. “…At first.”

“‘At first?!’” repeats Isaac.

“Well, that’s all it was for a while,” he says with his head bowed, pointedly not looking at anyone. “And then, back in the bedroom, we got a little carried away—”

“‘Carried away?!’” echo Darcy and Imogen.

It’s okay, Nick. They’re not going to attack you. All they’re going to do is parrot everything you say back to you, says our narrator.

“Come on,” whines Ben. “What are we talking here?”

We cut to a shot of Charlie, who’s clearly waiting on tenterhooks to see what Nick says. You were right the first time, Charlie, our narrator remarks. Go back to bed. Sleep off that hangover. If you leave now, maybe you can pretend this was all a dream.

But unfortunately, this is no dream as Nick admits under his breath, blushing furiously, “I kind of—”

BEEEEEEEEP. We don’t hear whatever he says because it’s bleeped out, a purple cartoon bubble covering his mouth.

“And then she—”

BEEEEEEEEP.

“And I—”

BEEEEEEEEP.

It seems Nick’s done talking because the sound is back online to the tune of eight sexy singles shouting at him and Tara. Well, make that seven: when we zoom in on Charlie, there’s not a trace of anger on his face. Mostly, he just looks betrayed.

Ouch, says our narrator. Whatever the hell Nick and Tara did, I think Charlie’s taking it a little personally.

In the confessional room, Charlie has no words. He just gives the camera a morose look, then bows his head, just like he’s doing in the cabana.

Tori comes back online over the sound of all the wailing. “Elle and Tao’s kisses have cost the group…” After closeups of a few cast members’ faces, Tori finishes, “Twelve thousand dollars.”

“TWELVE?” yelps Imogen.

Wow, says our narrator. Somebody didn’t watch the previous seasons.

“Nick and Tara’s kiss has cost the group… six thousand dollars. Nick and Tara’s—” BEEEEEEEEP “—and—” BEEEEEEEEP “—have cost the group…”

There’s a very strained pause over the sound of more tense music, and then Tori concludes, “Twenty-eight thousand dollars.”

“Holy actual shit,” hisses Ben, looking livid.

“These rule breaks have cost a combined total of… forty-six thousand dollars. The prize fund now stands at… two hundred and four thousand dollars.”

“We’ll be flat broke within the first week,” Sahar complains.

Isaac is glaring bullets at Nick and Tara. “I hope you’re happy with yourselves. Forty-six thousand dollars. Do you know how much I could have done with that money? I could have paid for two years of my little sister’s college with that money.”

In the confessional room, Nick is blushing darker than we’ve ever seen him do. Yeah, maybe I regret it a bit now that I know how expensive it was, he admits.

We pan back to Charlie’s dejected face. Our narrator says skeptically, Okay, Nick. Are you sure that’s the only reason?

Chapter Text

Look, Charlie doesn’t actually care that Nick and Tara broke so many rules last night. To say he cares would be to imply that Charlie has some kind of personal stake in their sex life, and he doesn’t. Nick can do whatever he wants with whomever he wants, and—oh, yeah—more to the point, so can Tara. Charlie doesn’t really give a shit whom she’s fooling around with, and he really doesn’t give a shit whom Nick’s fooling around with. They can do whatever they want with each other. It’s all fine.

Obviously, what Charlie really cares about is the money. Last night, Nick and Tara singlehandedly cost the group thirty-four thousand dollars? All so that he could eat her out and they could give each other handies? Who even has oral sex anymore, anyway? Charlie always finds it baffling when women want to suck him off. He’s given a girl head exactly one time in his life, and it was traumatic enough that he knows better than to ever, ever attempt it ever again.

He tries to go back to bed when they finish filming the scene with Tori—he really does—but he finds himself unable to fall back asleep, not after having been up for so long to film and especially not with all the money Nick (and Tara) spent swirling around Charlie’s head (and let’s be clear: he only cares about the money). Eventually, after pushing about the four hundred thousandth unwanted image of Nick and his mouth waist-level with (not Charlie) Tara out of his mind, Charlie gives up on the vain hope that he’ll sleep off more of his hangover and resigns himself to getting up properly.

Unfortunately, Nick and Tara’s little spending spree last night seems to be the only thing anybody can talk about. As Charlie wanders into the bathroom to brush his teeth, Darcy and Sahar are in there discussing it while Sahar plucks her eyebrows and Darcy files her nails. “It was bad enough when Tao and Elle blew twelve grand on two kisses, but thirty-four K?” Darcy is complaining in a hushed voice. “Are you kidding me?”

Oh, right: Darcy. The woman Charlie is supposed to be romancing. The one who’s supposed to be his type. The thing is, Charlie’s just not in the mood to flirt with anybody today, and he decides to give himself permission to forget he’s attracted to her and just exist like a normal person in the same room as her for a minute.

“Is this Nick and Tara we’re talking about?” says Charlie dully as he starts rummaging through his bag for his dental floss.

“Yeah,” says Sahar. “Look, normally, I’d be like, more power to them, you know? Go Tara for being empowered enough as a woman to get head from a stranger on television. God knows there’s not enough of that on Too Hot to Handle, at least not that makes it onscreen.”

“Wait, really?” asks Charlie idly. “Guys don’t give girls oral on this show?”

He still thinks oral is weird and gross, but it also feels weird and gross to him to hear that Too Hot to Handle has apparently been exclusively censoring female pleasure—either that, or the male cast members from past seasons felt entitled to receive it without giving it back? Charlie doesn’t know. All he knows is that, as a man who tries not to be a sexist dick (well, to an extent), he feels squicked out. It’s one thing when a woman offers him, Charlie, oral after he’s been very clear that he’s not comfortable doing the same and doesn’t expect it from her, but it feels like there’s a systemic problem here if it’s always the men on this show, and never the women, feeling the same way Charlie does and being the recipients.

“Almost never. They don’t give women handjobs, either. It’s almost always shown happening the other way around.” Sahar rolls her eyes. “It pisses me off, honestly, just like it pisses me off that there’s almost no bisexual representation, even though multiple past cast members have complained about their gay storylines being cut from the final edit. They’ve only ever shown a couple of girl-on-girl kisses—and they were just one-off kisses between women presented as being probably straight. Nothing boy-on-boy, for the record.” She pauses, then adds, “You know, they better put my bisexuality in the show, or I’m going to be complaining on TikTok about being straightwashed.”

“Yeah, what was that about with Imogen yesterday?” asks Darcy, interested. “You’re actually bi? And are you really interested in Imogen? You never asked to film with her separately yesterday, but then you kissed her in front of everyone.”

Vaguely aware that he’s supposed to be flossing his teeth, Charlie tries to put his attention on tearing off a string of floss and using it. Unfortunately, his head is swimming too hard to focus on flossing and listening at the same time, and for some reason, he wants to hear this. Like, he wants to hear this more desperately than is normal or acceptable.

“Damn right, I’m bi. Proud of it, too,” says Sahar. “And I didn’t want to—spring it on Imogen yesterday, I guess. The plan was to approach her about it off-camera and see how she felt before bringing anything onscreen. I just lost my inhibitions a bit when I got a little too tipsy at the party. I wasn’t supposed to kiss her. I was planning on tracking her down and clearing the air with her about everything today. I’m guessing nothing’s gonna happen—she seems pretty set on Ben—and that’s fine. Isaac’s cute, too, if he can pull his head out of his ass and think about something other than the money for long enough to notice that I exist.”

By this point, Charlie has given up completely on the flossing plan. “But he filmed with you yesterday. And he kissed you.”

“Yeah, but there’s something… off there. I can’t put my finger on it.”

“I’m with Sahar,” says Darcy. “I filmed with him, too, and he kissed me, too, and it was like his head was completely somewhere else during both things. You can have him, Sahar, unless he figures it out and comes begging for my time, because I’ve got no patience for somebody who has no idea what he wants.”

Charlie blushes furiously and tries to distance himself from this conversation by starting to floss in earnest.

The thing is, there’s not actually a lot to do in this villa when you’re not actively filming. He wishes he’d been smart like Isaac and brought books or something to do. What he really wants to do is play his drums, but he thinks it’s too late to ask Harry if he can have his entire drum kit shipped here and set up somewhere.

His stomach is growling, but it’s his own damn fault that he slept through breakfast (or tried to), and the on-site chef won’t have lunch fixed for another couple hours. So he finds himself exploring the villa—the rooms that aren’t on camera. At one point, he stumbles across Tara and Darcy, who look a little startled by his appearance and at least slightly relieved when he says he didn’t mean to interrupt and will get out of their hair. And ten minutes later, when Charlie’s just let himself into one of the sitting rooms and thinks he’s all alone—

“Charlie,” comes a voice as Ben reopens the door and sticks his head inside.

Immediately, Charlie frowns. Ben wasn’t—following him or something, was he? And yet Charlie has no other explanation for how Ben just happened to stumble across the same part of the villa not five seconds after Charlie let himself into a room alone away from the cameras.

“What are you doing here?” Charlie asks. His voice is shaking more than he’d like to admit.

“Just wandering,” says Ben, but Charlie doesn’t trust him a bit. Ben’s smile is rather fixed. “Hey, what did you say to Imogen yesterday about me?”

Oh, shit. With everything else going on, Charlie sort of completely forgot that he made his beef with Ben public when he called him out after kissing Imogen last night.

His first avenue of defense, of course, is to lie his ass off, which he at least attempts. “I didn’t say anything to Imogen about you.”

Ben snaps the door shut behind him and starts walking deeper into the room—closer to Charlie. “Yeah, except that I couldn’t be trusted, and now she won’t go further with me until she gets the full story from you and decides for herself. What’s your problem with me, anyway? What did I ever do to you except be nice to you?”

Being nice? Is that what Ben calls him trying to secretly play footsie with Charlie under the lunch table yesterday without Charlie’s consent in front of a whole cast of people that Charlie wanted to think he was straight?—because Charlie is straight, of course. He wants people to see him the way he is. That’s all he means.

But when he tries to get the words out—to call Ben out on his bullshit—he can’t seem to get his mouth to work properly. Ben is coming closer and closer, and Charlie, who hasn’t yet sat down anywhere, finds himself instinctually backing up. The thought crosses Charlie’s mind that he feels ridiculous having a face-off with Ben when they’re both practically naked in tight little swim shorts and nothing else.

“I gave you every chance in the world,” says Ben slowly. “I was nice to you. I tried to get to know you. I tried to make you feel accepted.”

He’s a meter away—half a meter now—and Charlie’s heel hits the back of the wall behind him. Before he knows it, Ben has got him crowded up against the wall—

—and then Ben smiles. “I know. You wanted me all to yourself, didn’t you? You kissed Darcy for the cameras, and then you tried to fuck up my relationship with Imogen so that you would end up in my bed last night, didn’t you?”

“N-no—”

“Fucking queer,” murmurs Ben, still smiling. “I should have known. Here I just wanted to be friendly when, all along, you had ulterior motives.”

And then Ben reaches forward and traces a line down Charlie’s cheek with the back of his index finger. Charlie’s horrified eyes follow it. Oh, fuck. If Ben leans in any closer—if Ben tries to kiss him—

The ruinous thought crosses Charlie’s mind that, under different circumstances, yeah, maybe he would have wanted that. If Ben had waited for consent—if Ben weren’t such a fucking creep—

Sure, Ben is attractive. Who isn’t on this show? And maybe… maybe under different circumstances—maybe if Ben weren’t a man—

—But maybe it’s because Ben’s a man. Maybe Charlie’s problem is women. Maybe the reason everyone Charlie gets in bed with bores him is because—

No. Charlie’s not gonna have a crisis about this. He’s not. He’s straight, and he doesn’t like Ben that way for all sorts of reasons, starting with his gender and ending with the way Ben has him trapped against the wall, unable to defend himself, because let’s be real: Ben is a lot stronger than Charlie is. Charlie can see it in the way Ben’s muscles flex—how Charlie’s never do.

“I’m not,” squeaks Charlie. “I mean, I don’t. Excuse me. I’m just—I’m gonna—”

He tries to slide out sideways and get out of Ben’s gravity, but Ben slams his forearms onto the wall on either side of Charlie’s face, cornering him. “Going somewhere?” he murmurs.

“Please, no,” Charlie begs. “I just want space. Please. I—”

And then, unbelievably, Ben pulls backward off of Charlie. “Yeah. Sure you do. Repressed little homo.”

Shaken, Charlie suddenly realizes that he’s gasping for breath and probably has been for a while. He splutters, “I’ll see you,” and then he packs up the remaining shreds of his dignity and flees the room entirely.

He doesn’t really know his way around the villa well enough to make it back to anyplace he recognizes, so he finds himself blindly speeding down the landing, looking for somewhere, anywhere, with a camera. If he’s on camera at all times, thinks Charlie, then whatever that just was won’t happen again. If he’s on camera, he’s protected. If he’s on camera, Ben can’t touch him. There aren’t any cameras in the dining hall, but that’s a problem for another hour. Right now, Charlie just needs to get himself somewhere safe.

Off the top of his head, the only places he knows are being filmed at all times are the bedroom, the dressing room, the bathroom, the stairwell, and the pool. The bedroom feels safest, so he decides to check there first—but it’s already occupied by Tara and Darcy, and Charlie just doesn’t have it in him to make nice with Nick’s little girlfriend right now. So he blusters, “Hi. Sorry. I just need the loo,” and awkwardly turns right back around to go there instead—

—and that’s how he walks in on Elle and Tao in front of the entire camera crew. They’re not kissing—yet—but it looks like it’s close. Elle’s got Tao crammed against the sink just like Ben was doing to Charlie a minute ago, and Charlie just—

—he—

—“Charlie?” asks Elle carefully, seemingly coming back to herself a little now that she’s backed up and reclaimed some breathing room. “Charlie, is something the matter?”

“I can’t be here,” wavers Charlie. “Sorry. Um, as you were.” God, isn’t there any room with a camera where he can hide out in peace?

But it appears Elle and Tao aren’t going to give him that option. No sooner has Charlie exited the bathroom than Tao and Elle have disentangled from each other and followed him out to the next closest safe place: the stairwell. He finds himself coming to a complete stop on the little square halfway down where the staircase pauses before making a right angle, and that’s where the others follow him down, Farouk and Ajayi close behind with their cameras still rolling.

He’s safe, Charlie reminds himself. Elle and Tao are way too interested in each other to make a move on Charlie, and anyway, nobody’s going to try anything in front of the cameras.

“Charlie, what’s going on?” asks Tao in a confused voice. “Did something happen?”

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, I don’t…”

God, Charlie doesn’t want to be honest. Charlie doesn’t want anyone to know—because what if Ben was right? What if Charlie is repressing something?—not something for Ben, but—

Abruptly, he decides he needs a drink. But—shit—he told himself he was cutting himself off after what happened last night.

“You’re not making any sense,” says Elle. “Slow down. Talk to us. We’re here for you.”

“I don’t… I was talking to Ben, and…”

“Ben?”

Tao adds, “Does this have anything to do with why you told Imogen—?”

“Yes,” Charlie blurts. “It’s getting worse. I was—we were alone, and—” And then, suddenly realizing, he turns to Lange, who’s a little distance behind Ajayi and Farouk. “Lange, you will have gotten the audio, right?”

Harry’s there, too, and isn’t happy with this turn of events. “Charlie, you don’t talk to the crew during filming—”

“We were wearing mics,” Charlie continues. “There wasn’t a camera nearby, but—but it’s still recorded?”

Lange shakes his head. “Sorry, mate. We don’t retain everything said into the mics. If there’s no receiver nearby, then we don’t pick it up.”

Charlie can’t decide whether this is a good thing or not. On the one hand, he doesn’t want anyone to know ever—but on the other, he doesn’t have proof. If they’d had audio, he would have had proof. Without that—

“Can we please get back to the scene?” Harry complains. “You know, the one you interrupted?”

“Fine, sir,” says Elle in a very nasty voice to Harry. Then she turns back to Charlie and looks intently into his eyes. “Charlie, did Ben do something to you?”

For the second time today, Charlie’s having trouble making the words come out of his mouth properly. It doesn’t help that the entire crew is listening in. “He—he’s not happy with me for trying to turn Imogen against him. He cornered me off-camera—he got really close—and he said—he said—he touched—”

Tao still seems confused—but Elle, at least, seems to be getting it. Her eyes widen. “Charlie, you’re not saying Ben—”

Right. Charlie can’t say this, not on film. “No,” he backtracks. “He’s just pissed at me for fucking things up with Imogen. That’s all. Nothing else. It was stupid. He’s a scary dude, right?” Charlie laughs a little hysterically. “He’s a lot stronger than me. He could do a lot of damage if he wanted. I panicked. That’s all. It was dumb.”

Tao says blindly, “Charlie, all Ben has going for him is a vanity six-pack. He’s not really bigger than—”

“Shut up, Tao,” snaps Elle. “Anyway—Charlie—that isn’t stupid. We’re gonna look out for you, okay? Nobody fucks with you under my watch. We’ll spend the rest of the day together, okay?”

“On camera?” Charlie asks weakly.

She nods firmly. “On camera. Whatever makes you comfortable.”

Tao still clearly doesn’t get it. “I still don’t think Ben could really punch you out if he wanted to, but if you want to hang out, then yeah. We’ve got your back.”

Elle turns to Harry now. “Harry, can’t you do something about this creep?”

“Elle, for the thousandth time, you don’t talk to the—”

“I don’t give a fuck about your rules right now,” snaps Elle. “Write him out of the show. Something. That’s a thing, right? ‘Tori’ boots people for not trying hard enough to follow the rules? So boot Ben.”

And then pretty much Charlie’s worst nightmare is realized. “There’s no proof,” says Harry snippily. “Charlie’s not even saying anything inappropriate happened, are you, Charlie?”

Charlie bites his lip. If he tells the truth—but he can’t tell the truth. He can’t let anyone find out he was involved in something like that, and anyway, what if he says something did happen and Harry ignores it and Ben finds out? What then?

“Everything’s fine, Elle, don’t worry,” he says. “Sorry for freaking you out. I’m so dramatic sometimes.”

He laughs. No one else laughs with him.

Elle’s in the bathroom washing her hands when we see her look over her shoulder at Tao, who’s in the doorway with an embarrassed sort of smile on his face. “Oh, hey,” she says casually. “Did you need something?”

Yeah, just maybe some soap and a towel to wash that besotted look off of his face, says our narrator. Is he gonna look at her like that every time they end up in a room together?

Tao shakes his head minutely. “Oh. You take your time. I was just gonna grab a cold shower, you know, for my—” He gestures down, and the camera zooms in on his swim trunks—and what’s in them.

Oh. And here I thought he might actually like her for who she is. Then again, at least it looks like he’s trying not to spend another twelve K right here. Maybe there’s hope. Maybe there’s—

Elle, meanwhile, is snickering at him now that she’s turned off the water. “Tao, that’s, like, your third cold shower in twelve hours. Do you really feel that guilty about what we did? It was just two kisses.”

“Yeah, and it’ll be a lot more than two kisses if I’m not careful,” admits Tao.

Uh, so maybe don’t go in the bathroom with her alone?

Our narrator has a point: as he’s talking, Tao is edging deeper and deeper into the room until they’re practically pressed up against each other. “What?” murmurs Elle with a smirk. “Worried we’re gonna become the next Nick and Tara?”

She puts her hands on his hips, turns, and backs him up a bit until his bum hits the sink. His hands scrabbling for the countertop, Tao gapes at her. “Aren’t we, though, if we’re not careful? I mean, the things I could do to you for thirty-six thousand dollars…”

Oh, no, Tao. Come on. Stay strong. You can do it!

We cut to Tao in the confessional room. Look, I know I’m supposed to be resisting and thinking about the money and everything, and I know Isaac’s gonna kill me for this, but all I can think about is how fucking good it feels for her to put her hands on me. I want them all over. Hand here—hand there—hand over there—

Our narrator is not impressed. Uh, can somebody get Tao some tentacle porn? Actually, you know what, forget I said anything. He’s better off not knowing.

Oblivious to this commentary, Elle is grinning slyly. “And what would you do to me for thirty-six thousand dollars?” she asks as she steps even closer, nudging Tao’s knees apart so that she can come in between them. Her arms go around his neck.

We’re gonna rule break, Elle confesses as the cameras pan over their intertwined bodies. I can feel it. Just give it four more seconds—three more—two—

And then the bathroom door bangs open to reveal Charlie, who stands there staring at our horned-up couple just as awkwardly as they’re staring at him.

Wow. Cockblock much? Isaac, I think someone’s out for your job.

“Charlie?” asks Elle, stepping back from Tao and taking a couple deep breaths.

“Sorry. Um, as you were,” says Charlie uncomfortably, and then he turns around and leaves again.

Elle and Tao look at each other, and Elle is the first to take action. “Wait—hang on—” she calls, and our cameras start to shake a little as they follow her, Tao close on her heels, out of the bathroom and around the corner.

I don’t know what the deal is, but I know something is off, Elle tells us in the confessional room. I have to find out what.

Tao, it seems, is right there with her when they catch up to Charlie halfway down the stairs. You can tell from the angles that the cameramen haven’t made it down the stairs at all and are filming this from the upper landing, in addition to the candid footage from a camera nestled in the wall near the ceiling. “Charlie, what’s going on? Did something happen?”

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, I don’t…”

“Slow down. Talk to us,” Elle murmurs.

We get a voiceover from future Elle in the confessional room. It’s not like I wanted to get cockblocked, but I don’t really care right now. Charlie is more important.

Ouch, says our narrator. Don’t let Tao hear you saying that. He might get jealous.

Charlie still looks stressed beyond belief. “I don’t… I was talking to Ben, and…”

“Ben?” repeats Elle.

Tao joins in, “Does this have anything to do with why you told Imogen—?”

In the stairwell, Charlie stammers, “No. He’s just pissed at me for fucking things up with Imogen. That’s all. Nothing else. It was stupid.”

“Charlie, that isn’t stupid,” says Elle intently. “Nobody fucks with you under my watch.”

“Everything’s fine, Elle, don’t worry,” Charlie says. “Sorry for freaking you out. I’m so dramatic sometimes.” He laughs.

We jump to a confessional of Charlie, who is looking embarrassed by this point. I didn’t mean to make a scene with Elle and Tao, I swear to god. It’s all my own fault anyway for trying to mess things up between Ben and Imogen. I don’t even know why I did it. I don’t even like her like that.

It’s Tao’s turn in the confessional room next, and he’s looking skeptical. I still don’t get why Charlie’s interfering in Imogen and Ben’s relationship in the first place. As we pan back to the stairwell, Tao continues in a voiceover, It’s not like Ben and his vanity six-pack are anything for Charlie to be jealous of.

The music pauses as our narrator interrupts, “Vanity six-pack?” Hang on. I have to see this. We see a split-screen of Charlie’s abs on the left beside Ben’s abs on the right. Ben’s a little more built, but not by much. Okay. Point taken, Tao. If you want to see whose six-pack Charlie should really be jealous of—

A still shot of Nick’s incredibly built rugby abs crashes on top of the shots of Charlie and of Ben. There we go, says our narrator. Does Charlie want to be him, or does Charlie want to be with him? There’s a question for you, Shakespeare.

Chapter Text

It takes about a day for Nick to figure out that there’s something major going down with Charlie. To be fair, he doesn’t actually see much of Charlie after that second morning in the retreat. Charlie seems to be sticking almost exclusively by Elle and Tao, and when Elle and Tao are filming, he’s with Isaac instead. Sure, Nick sees him around—they’re in the dining hall together for meals, and they sleep in the same bedroom at night—but they don’t really talk. Nick just kind of notices how skittish Charlie looks and then pushes it to the back of his mind so he can put the focus mostly on Tara.

He doesn’t overthink why he’s doing it—at least, not at first. Doesn’t it make sense that Nick would want to spend most of his time with the fittest girl here? They haven’t tried to break any more rules, which is kind of frustrating, but Tara says they should lay off for at least a couple of days: they want to get screen time, but they don’t want to cast themselves as the villains of the season. So they’re just… talking. Getting to know each other. And surprisingly, Nick finds that he likes getting to know Tara, even if he doesn’t want her to be his girlfriend or anything.

It’s not just Tara he’s talking to, either. She seems to be forming a pretty close friendship with Darcy, so when the two of them are together, Nick’s been mostly hanging with Imogen and Sahar. It makes him feel like a little bit of a womanizing dick—it’s harder not to feel guilty about it when he can’t just ghost the girl the second he sleeps with her—but it’s not like he’s making advances on either of them. Nick can have female friends, right? He thinks Sahar and Imogen are both gorgeous, but not, like, in a sexual way. Like, okay, yes, he probably looks at their cleavage in their swimsuits more than is strictly necessary, but he doesn’t really see them as anything but friends, and he’s not particularly planning on ever making a move on either of them.

So Nick has his people, and Charlie has his, and that’s fine. They may have hit it off the first day or whatever, but that doesn’t mean they have to settle into the retreat as besties. Charlie confuses Nick in a way Nick does not have the strength to work through, and it’s probably better if they don’t talk, anyway.

But then the rumors reach Nick.

It happens on day three of the retreat after Charlie skips breakfast and lunch. Nick’s not saying he keeps his eyes peeled on Charlie every single second that they’re in a room together, but he still notices. And he’s talking to Tara and Sahar down on the beach when Tara brings it up.

“Hey, does anybody know what’s going on with Charlie today? Like, does he even eat? Everyone has to eat.”

Sahar narrows her eyes. “Isaac’s been bringing him meals in the bedroom. You haven’t heard?”

“That Isaac’s been bringing—”

“No. I mean, you haven’t heard what’s going on with Charlie?”

For some reason, a weird, sick feeling is starting to bubble up in Nick’s stomach. “What do you mean, ‘what’s going on with Charlie?’” he asks slowly.

Sahar’s forehead wrinkles. “Okay, look, you didn’t hear this from me. The person who told me heard it from Tao, but they suspected Tao was too dense to get the whole picture of—what’s been happening. The only person who probably really knows for sure—besides Charlie, anyway—is Elle, and neither of them is talking. Apparently, Charlie doesn’t want to risk it making it onscreen, which is ironic because—”

“Enough buildup, Sahar,” says Tara. “Cut to the chase. You’re enjoying this way too—”

“I’m not enjoying it,” says Sahar sharply. “I’m really not. It’s really bad.” Her gaze flicks from Tara to Nick and back again. “Something… happened. Between Charlie and Ben. Charlie’s been skipping meals all day today because he doesn’t want to be in a room with Ben that doesn’t have a camera—like, for protection.”

Nick frowns hard. He knew he had a bad feeling about Ben, but what could Ben have possibly done to Charlie that’s got him avoiding Ben to that extent? “I thought you said Charlie didn’t want this onscreen.”

“He doesn’t. It’s complicated,” says Sahar in a rush under her breath. “He doesn’t really want to ever not be on camera because that’s how it happened—that’s how Ben got away with it—but he doesn’t want to talk about it on camera, either. And I get that. I’d want my privacy, too, if somebody…”

“What did Ben do?” Tara presses.

“I mean… I don’t really know, but the rumor is… that it was something sexually threatening.” Nick’s stomach drops right down to the floor. “And the worst part is, Harry knows about it—Charlie told Elle and Tao about it on camera with Harry right there—and he’s not doing anything about it. He just says Charlie doesn’t have any proof, and because Charlie freaked out and backtracked and denied it was anything serious…”

Well, shit. No wonder Charlie flipped out the other day when Nick suggested that they talk off camera. Nick feels like an ass, and worse, he feels terrified for Charlie.

Tara seems to be choosing anger. “That’s fucking awful. What the fuck is Harry playing at, not investigating an abuse report from a member of his cast? Is he that determined to cover up any allegations of misbehavior on his show?”

Sahar says darkly, “That, or it makes him want to keep Ben around for the drama. Nobody knows for sure. I guess we won’t know for sure until the show comes out on Netflix and we see how much was covered up and how much was edited. I’m sure they won’t actually air that Ben did anything potentially abusive, but they might edit the accusations and make it look like they’re fighting over something else.”

And Nick suddenly remembers crystal-clear Ajayi’s warning to him yesterday morning—that the show’s been facing backlash for something, Nick doesn’t know what, but whatever it is has made Harry latch onto Nick and Charlie’s fight the first night as the beginning of a potential storyline. He’s been going over and over it in his mind, trying to figure out how Harry could paint that to worry Ajayi enough that he’d try to give Nick a warning about it, and Nick just can’t figure out—

Shit. He just really wants to talk to Charlie about it—to check that Charlie’s okay. But if Charlie doesn’t want any discussion about it to make it on camera and he’s not comfortable going anywhere in the villa that doesn’t have a camera…

“I have to talk to Charlie,” says Nick abruptly.

Tara frowns. “Nick, I don’t know if that’s such a good—”

“I’ll be careful with my words, but I have to see if he’s okay. I need him to know that I…”

Sighing, Sahar says, “Well, good luck with that. Just—just don’t take it personally if he doesn’t want to engage, okay? I’d have trust issues, too, if I were him, and it’s not like he wanted you to know. He would have told you if he’d wanted you to know.”

It’s a fair point—and an understandable one at that—but it still stings to remember that Charlie didn’t tell Nick, didn’t want Nick to know. Then again, why would he? Nick’s spent the past day and a half completely blowing him off.

So Nick sets off in search of Charlie to say—what, exactly? It’s not like they have anything to talk about, and now that Nick’s thinking about it, it will probably come across rude as hell to be like, Hey, I heard an incredibly invasive rumor about you, and I wanted to stick my nose in your business and get the details from you. But Nick can’t just not say anything. What kind of person would Nick be if he didn’t say anything?

He ends up finding Charlie in the bedroom, where he’s picking at his lunch on the floor with a tray in his lap and listening to Elle, Tao, and Isaac talk. The four of them are quickly becoming—what’s the platonic version of an item? Anyway, it doesn’t surprise Nick that they’re all together. They’re laughing at something Tao’s just said, but when Nick shows up randomly in the doorway feeling out of place and lost, the laughter fades away.

“Hey, Nick,” says Isaac in a decent attempt at a normal voice, but there’s definitely something accusatory behind it.

“Hi.” Nick’s eyes slide right to Charlie, who is blushing. Why is he blushing? “Charlie, um, I…” Shit. How does Nick even word this? He doesn’t want to be like, Let’s talk alone, because Nick knows now that that’s gonna make Charlie uncomfortable, but he doesn’t particularly want to have this conversation in front of other people. And why does Nick care so much about getting Charlie alone, anyway? Since when do they have private business? They’re not friends. They barely know each other.

At any rate, Elle seems to be losing her patience for Nick’s little crisis. “Is there something you wanted to say to Charlie?” she prompts, glaring at him.

“I… heard some things.” Okay, apparently Nick is just going for it. “And I’m sorry. And I’m worried. That’s all. I wanted—I want to be your friend. I want to… help.”

Still blushing, Charlie stares at him—and then turns to Elle. “It’s okay,” he murmurs. “I can talk to him. Just—maybe somebody can wait outside for me and kind of…”

“I’m on it,” says Isaac. “I’m just gonna mind my own business while covertly glancing through the window every so often. Charlie, yell for me if you need anything, okay?”

“I’m not that fragile,” Charlie mutters. “I can take care of myself.”

Elle frowns. “We know that. I don’t think anyone’s saying you can’t, but—”

“Charlie’s right,” interrupts Tao. “Ben’s not around, and Charlie’s got no reason not to trust anybody but Ben. He can make his own choices.”

Elle clearly is a bit insulted by this, but she relents, anyway. “Isaac, if you want us to—”

“I’m good,” Isaac vows. “Go have some alone time, but don’t break any rules. I sleep with one eye open. I mean it.”

Tao rolls his eyes. “You realize you have to lose some to win some, right? If you don’t break the rules and then ‘learn’ from it, you have no hope of winning the prize fund at the end.”

“Uh, let me remind you of the time the sex police character walked away with fifty thousand dollars in the finale.”

“Yeah, as the runner-up that the winner was nice enough to split the money with, and only because he woke up and broke rules in, like, one of the last episodes of the season—”

“Can we not do this now, please?” interjects Charlie softly. “I want to talk to Nick.”

All looking irritated, Elle, Tao, and Isaac reluctantly file out of the room. On his way out, Isaac claps Nick on the shoulder, leans close, and murmurs, “He’s amazing. Don’t fuck him over, okay?”

“No,” stutters Nick. “No, of course not.”

It’s a lot of buildup for the moment that the bedroom door shuts behind them, leaving Nick and Charlie staring blankly at each other, both blushing hard. “Sorry,” says Nick, unsure what exactly he’s apologizing before, but knowing that he needs to be apologizing for something. “I don’t—I’m not—”

“You’re okay. I’m sorry. They’re just protective,” mumbles Charlie.

“Don’t be sorry for that,” says Nick earnestly. He finally gets away from the door, coming to sit down on the ground across from Charlie—not too close, though, because he suspects Charlie wouldn’t want that. He frowns. “You’ve barely touched your lunch.”

“I had a big breakfast,” shrugs Charlie.

Nick is suspicious—it wouldn’t be the first time he’s seen Charlie not eat enough—but he drops it. He’s not here to put pressure on Charlie about his eating habits, especially not on camera. Acutely aware that this entire conversation is being filmed, even without a crew present, Nick bites his lip. “The, uh, stuff I heard. I… don’t want to bring it up on camera if you don’t want that, but—”

“Does everyone know?” Charlie asks quietly. He looks… embarrassed?

“I don’t know. It was the first I heard of it, but I heard it from someone who heard it someone else who heard it from Tao, so… maybe.”

“Great,” mutters Charlie, tipping his head back against the wall behind him.

“For what it’s worth, I don’t think Tao meant anything bad by it. The person I talked to seemed to think that Tao didn’t get… the whole story.”

At this, Charlie stiffens. “There is no whole story. It wasn’t a big deal. Elle’s just—”

“Charlie, come on,” murmurs Nick. “All this—skipping meals—over nothing?”

The fight seems to go out of Charlie’s eyes, and he takes a shaky breath in as his jaw falls open a little. “I don’t want… to talk about it. I’m sorry. I know you’re worried, and I appreciate that you want to check in on me, but I—the cameras—and I don’t really want to talk away from the cameras, either. It… happened off-camera, and when I told Harry without any proof, he just…”

“That absolute fucker,” breathes Nick. “And there’s nothing anyone can do to convince Harry to come around? I know we don’t have a lot of power in here—we don’t have phones or access to the Internet, for one thing, so we can’t tell anyone on the outside—but there has to be something someone can… someone else on the crew who…”

“I don’t know,” Charlie mumbles. “What Harry says goes around here, as far as I can tell, and for whatever reason, Harry seems to like having Ben on the set. The whole camera crew was there when I was telling Elle and Tao yesterday, and clearly, nobody was going to stand up to Harry when Harry said there wasn’t a problem.”

“Yeah. To an extent, I get it. Ajayi said as much to me yesterday morning, actually—like, not about Ben, but about Harry. He, uh, tried to warn me that…”

Charlie frowns. “Tried to warn you what?”

Oh, god, is Nick really going to admit his suspicions to Charlie? Are they really going there right now? If Nick verbalizes it out loud, then he has to admit that the thought has crossed his mind that someone in this retreat sees him and Charlie as—

“I don’t know for sure,” says Nick slowly. “We got interrupted. But I think… I think Harry might want to write a storyline about you and me that…”

“Y-you and me?” stammers Charlie.

Oh, fuck. What if Nick’s wrong? What if Nick misread Ajayi entirely and Ajayi meant something else completely? “I might have misunderstood. You shouldn’t take my word for it. It wasn’t—”

Charlie doesn’t seem to be listening. “Nick, you’re not saying that a storyline about us being… being… is going to end up on international television?”

The utter horror in Charlie’s voice clinches it: Nick can’t have this conversation with him. Nick can’t imply anything about anything. Problem is, it’s too late: Nick’s already gone there.

“I’m sorry. I hope I’m wrong. I know it’s ludicrous. I know there’s no way you’d ever look at me like—I know this isn’t—I’m not crazy. I never thought you were trying to give me any signals.”

That seems to stop Charlie short, at least for a second. “You say that like… you say that like… you maybe were trying to give me signals like—like you were looking at me like—”

Oh, shit. If Nick really just said that—if Nick really just framed it that way—it wasn’t intentional. And yet—

—no. He is straight. He is with Tara. This whole thing is just Harry inventing drama out of thin air. And this is the worst possible drama Harry could invent because Charlie’s had enough trauma from whatever Ben did to him without Nick tacking more on.

“No. Sorry. No. Of course not. I would never be weird or—or push you for anything like that, Charlie. I swear to god, it’s not like that. We’re not even friends. I mean, I want us to be friends, but… but I’m clear on what we are and aren’t, and I don’t want us to be anything other than what we are.”

It occurs to Nick much, much later that this in itself wasn’t answering the question Charlie asked. But Charlie doesn’t push, and the matter drops. For now.

Our next scene starts out in a confessional with Ben. Our narrator says over a clip of Ben sitting there, Wow. How does he always manage to look pissed off and pleased with himself at the same time?

That’s when Ben starts talking. So I might have let slip what I know, and by this point in the retreat, word’s starting to get out. Good thing, too. I’m starting to suspect Charlie only tried to sabotage me and Imogen because he knew he had no chance with Darcy and wanted people to stop looking at him and Nick.

Our startled narrator interjects, Wait, that’s what Ben keeps alluding to know? When he says he knows something about Nick and Charlie, he actually knows something about Nick and Charlie? Like, that kind of something? Hold on—I gotta see this.

We cut to the bedroom, where we find Charlie sitting on the floor and looking up at Nick, who’s obviously just entered from outside. They’re both blushing. Eventually, Nick says, “Sorry. I don’t—I’m not—”

Charlie murmurs, “Does everyone know?”

“I don’t know,” says Nick. We cut back to Charlie’s humiliated face as Nick adds, “Maybe.”

Holy shit, there is something going on between these two. Producers, what else have you been hiding from me?

“Great,” Charlie mutters next. He leans backward until his head tips against the wall, and we look back at Nick as Charlie continues, “I don’t want… to talk about it. I’m sorry. I appreciate that you want to check in—”

Nick interrupts, “There’s nothing I can do to convince you to come around? When you look at me like—” We can see Nick now in all his blushing glory. “—I know this isn’t—I’m not crazy.”

Yeah, and neither am I, mutters our narrator.

As we watch Charlie’s reaction, Nick continues, “There has to be something—some signals—when you look at the whole story—”

“There is no whole story. It wasn’t a big deal.”

“Charlie, come on,” says Nick softly.

“Can we not do this now, please?”

We hear Nick sigh. “Okay. I get it. This is what you tried to warn me.”

So this is what’s going on between these two horny hunks? There was some kind of flirtation—maybe some kissing before Tori laid down her sex ban—and Charlie gave Nick the heads up in advance that he was going to ghost him for it? Ouch.

“I’m sorry,” says Charlie, but the wounded look on Nick’s face says all. Charlie may say he’s sorry, but we know better. We know everything.

Chapter Text

Charlie doesn’t really know where the hell he and Nick stand now that they’ve had this conversation. It seemed clear at the time that Nick wanted them to be friends—he even came right out and said that he wanted them to be friends—but now that he and Charlie have talked, he’s fucked right off and gone back to spending all his time with either Tara, Imogen, or Sahar like nothing even happened.

And honestly? Even though it makes Charlie sad, even though Charlie keeps catching himself giving Nick wistful little looks when they’re in the bedroom together that night, he’s okay with that. Really. He doesn’t want to go off camera, and he doesn’t want to give Harry any more material to fabricate some kind of storyline between him and Nick on camera, either.

The only problem, of course, is that Harry already has some material, and he’s probably already started using it to cobble something together that Charlie doesn’t want to make it onscreen. Nick may not have given Charlie any straight answers about what exactly Harry is planning on doing, but Charlie can use his imagination. And he doesn’t like what he’s imagining.

And the thing is… it probably wouldn’t hurt so much if it were way off base. If Charlie were totally secure in his masculinity, then he would probably just laugh off any storylines that made it into the show portraying him as having a male love interest. He’d go on TikTok and post a rant about how the producers were so desperate for drama, so dead set on changing their reputation for censoring LGBTQ+ storylines, that they did the opposite this season and invented one out of thin air, and then he’d let it go.

But Charlie can’t let it go. Because maybe… maybe there’s a granule of truth to the idea that there’s something going on between Charlie and Nick.

It makes him feel sick to even admit that to himself, but there it is. Maybe Charlie isn’t as straight as he’s always told himself he is. Maybe there is a reason he gets bored of the women he sleeps with so quickly. And maybe his feelings for Nick aren’t just friendly or admiring or whatever the fuck Charlie’s been telling himself they are this whole time.

The worst part is, the way Nick framed it makes Charlie believe—but there’s no way Nick is gay or wants anything but friendship with Charlie. He said so himself, didn’t he? He said he was clear on what they were and didn’t want them to be anything other than that.

But what’s torturing Charlie is that Nick didn’t exactly come right out and say that they’re nothing more than friends to him. And he only even said as much as he did to backtrack after sure as hell making it sound like—like—

—basically, like he had some feelings for Charlie that he thought at the time were unreciprocated. And if Charlie told him the whole story—that maybe Charlie does feel a certain something that he’s been trying to keep buried this whole time—

—but that’s insane. This whole thing is batshit crazy. Nick definitely doesn’t fancy Charlie, and no even Charlie fancies Nick. Charlie is straight. He’s straight. He’s always been straight.

You don’t understand, okay? If Charlie decides that he might not be, then he has to rework his understanding of—of so many things. He has to start seeing himself and his entire relationship history through a totally different lens and accept that nothing was what he thought it was. He didn’t really want any of the women he’d been with—and he maybe did want some of the men he knew over the years. There’s a reason he’s been putting up walls and running the opposite direction from blonde-haired, brown-eyed men with muscled bodies and pretty smiles his entire life.

And he can’t do that with Nick anymore, not when they’re stuck together in this villa for another three and a half weeks. He doesn’t know what the hell Nick wants—whether Nick fancies him or even cares to become friends like he claimed he wanted to—but Nick is everywhere, and it’s making him hard to avoid. More to the point, it’s making Charlie’s sexuality crisis hard to avoid, too.

God, he doesn’t want to do this on Netflix. He just wants to run all the way back to Kent and put this mess back in the box.

Unfortunately, Charlie signed a contract. And that’s not even the real problem, you know? If he really wanted to, he could quit the show. According to Tao, somebody usually quits of their own volition every single season, though usually not until later than this. No, the real problem is—if Charlie’s being honest—that he can’t put it back in the box, even if he does go back home. This shit is still gonna be in his head, and he’s still gonna have to figure it out. Even if he forgets all about Nick, there will be another guy just like him someday. And wouldn’t Charlie rather sort this out now so that it doesn’t blindside him again down the road?

But he’s a coward, so he avoids it, and he avoids Nick. At first.

There’s only so much Charlie can do to stay away from Nick, though, even with them both having completely separate groups of friends. For one thing, the friend groups aren’t staying completely separate the longer they’re all in this villa. The next day, now that Charlie isn’t jumping at his shadow so much, Elle eases up a little on her protectiveness, which means she starts to get to know other people—and one of those people seems to be Tara. And Tara hanging out with Elle means that Nick is now hanging out with Charlie, at least a little.

This is problematic for multiple reasons, and it’s not just about Charlie being dead terrified to spend time with Nick and get exposed as one of The Gays™ on international television. It’s also about the entire Tara problem because—oh, yeah—Nick already has a partner on this show, and it’s not Charlie. If Charlie weren’t already confused as fuck about all this without Tara in the picture, he definitely is when you factor her in.

He feels like an ass. Tara’s a great girl, and Charlie likes her. This would all be so much easier if he didn’t like her, but he does. And he doesn’t want to be the jerk that breaks Nick and Tara up just because he’s accidentally having a gay crisis.

Of course, Charlie’s not breaking anybody up because Nick doesn’t want to be tempted away from Tara. It’s very clear from Nick and Tara’s body language that they’re very happy together and can’t be broken up, and that’s fine. All of this is fine. In a way, that makes it kind of safer for Charlie to have this freakout now because he’s not actually risking ruining any relationships over it, seeing as Nick and Tara are obviously rock solid.

It’s fine. He’s fine. Everything’s fine. Charlie’s even eating meals in the dining hall again, surrounded by people who will keep him the fuck away from Ben.

And then Harry announces after lunch that everybody needs to head to the courtyard for their first workshop.

“Workshop?” Charlie asks Tao under his breath as they’re crossing to the far side of the villa where this thing, whatever it is, will take place.

“Oh, yeah. It’s a thing they do,” says Tao. “The point of them is supposed to be personal growth, but the first one is always a setup to try to get people as horny as possible and tempt them into breaking more rules. Everybody will have to do it in pairs—one guy and one girl in each pair.”

Oh. Okay. That’s not so bad. Harry will probably put the couples together—Nick and Tara, Elle and Tao, Ben and Imogen—leaving Charlie with Darcy and Sahar with Isaac. That makes the most sense, right? Darcy told Sahar on camera the other day that she wouldn’t be interested in Isaac if Isaac wasn’t going to show more interest in her, and Harry will think there’s a bigger chance of Charlie hitting on Darcy than on Sahar, anyway. The only way this could go wrong would be for Charlie and Nick to get paired up, but from what Tao just said, it sounds like that’s not gonna happen.

But Charlie’s only half right. He doesn’t get paired with Nick—but he doesn’t get paired with Darcy. And the person Charlie does get paired with—well, there’s a lot of potential for this to go very, very wrong.

Because Charlie’s partner is Imogen.

With everything else that’s been on Charlie’s mind, he completely forgot that Imogen’s probably been irked with him and itching for answers ever since he warned her not to get close to Ben. She obviously didn’t heed the warning—she’s still sleeping in Ben’s bed every night—but Charlie knows from Nick that Imogen has been wanting to talk to him since their very first night here.

Has Imogen not heard any rumors about what Ben did to Charlie? Charlie thought everyone had heard by now, from the sound of what Nick was saying. Or—worse—has Imogen heard, and does she just not care?

Reluctantly, Charlie goes to stand by Imogen in the sandy courtyard and takes a look around at the other pairings. It makes sense that Nick’s with Tara, but Charlie’s surprised by some of the others: Elle and Isaac, Tao and Darcy, and Sahar and Ben. Is this Harry’s way of trying to introduce friction into Elle and Tao’s relationship, since he knows Elle and Isaac are good friends? Or has he just given up hope that Isaac might generate interesting storylines for the show with either Darcy or Sahar, since he’s made it clear that he’s not really interested in making a move on either of them?

Elle and Isaac look relatively happy to be paired together, though Elle and Tao are calling back and forth to each other across the courtyard, leaving Darcy looking rather annoyed with Tao. Meanwhile, Sahar looks like she’s going to murder Ben. Charlie’s not saying he wishes ill on Ben, necessarily, but it kind of makes him feel validated to see Sahar so obviously unhappy to be coupled up with him.

“Hi, Charlie,” says Imogen, pulling him out of this thoughts.

He glances at her and frowns. “Hey, Imogen. Sorry. I—”

And then he’s interrupted by an unfamiliar man—presumably the person who’s going to be leading this workshop—calling them all to attention. “Welcome, everybody,” says the man, adjusting the collar of his shirt and smiling. A chorus of hellos greets him in reply. “It’s so nice to meet you all. I’m Geoff Lavoisier. I’m told I’m going to be introduced onscreen as a ‘relationship expert,’ but what that actually means is that I’m a couples counselor specializing in intimacy issues.”

“So, basically, you’re here to sex us up even more,” says Tao. A few people laugh at this, Elle included.

Unfazed, Geoff smiles. “You’d be surprised by the kind of cases I deal with. Not all intimacy issues are about encouraging couples to be more sexual. Sometimes, the problem is that two partners have expectations on different levels and need to meet in the middle. Other times, it’s that they’re having sex without intimacy and need to learn a balance between the two. That’s more in the vein of what we’re going to be dealing with today.”

Skeptical, Charlie shuffles his feet a little. When he thinks about sex right now, he’s not interested in learning to have intimacy with Imogen or Nick or—anybody, really. Sure, sex is still his go-to method of destressing, and maybe it’s compounding the problem that he hasn’t been able to have any, but it’s not really sex that he misses. Honestly, he’d be good if he could only lock himself in the bedroom and jack off about six times in a row. That’s the problem. That’s what he’s missing right now.

Unfortunately, that is not the topic of today’s workshop. “You’ll notice that there’s a basket next to each pair of you,” continues Geoff. “I want all of you to go ahead and open that basket up.”

Charlie and Imogen exchange a look, and then Imogen grabs hold of the brown wicker basket and removes the lid. From within it, she removes a small, blue glass bottle and holds it up for Charlie to inspect.

“Massage oil,” confirms Geoff, smiling. Great. Just great. “And linen sheets. I want you to take it in turns, okay? Spread the sheet out for one partner to lie on, and I’d like the other of you to massage up and down their partner’s body. Don’t be afraid to really get in there. Remember, this isn’t going to end in sex. The point of this is not to serve as foreplay. I want you all to focus on the sensations these massages give you and the way they make you all feel. The point isn’t the climax because, this time, there is no climax coming. The point is the pleasure—the emotional connection you build from the pleasure. Okay? Are we all ready?”

Charlie’s definitely not ready, but Imogen’s already pulling their cream-colored sheet out of the bag and laying it out on the ground, so he guesses he’s gonna have to figure it out pretty fast here. Sure enough, it’s only seconds later that Imogen tells him, “You lie down first. I’ll massage while we talk. Okay?”

“Okay,” says Charlie a little grudgingly.

Stretching out on his belly on the sheet, Charlie twists his neck so that he’s facing to the side and can breathe and stuff. From this angle, he can see everything happening between Nick and Tara. Grimacing, he changes his mind and twists his neck so that he’s facing the other way.

“Charlie,” Imogen says in a slightly stiff, prepared sort of voice, “you have to tell me what’s going on.”

“Imogen—”

“You have to. You started it by telling me Ben couldn’t be trusted, and you can’t just drop that in my lap and then avoid me for the rest of our time here.”

“Imogen, there’s nothing going on. I swear. I’m sorry I said it. It was a stupid—” 

“There is something. I know there is.” Charlie feels something cold and wet dropping onto his back, and then Imogen starts to work her fingers into the knots back there so hard it hurts. “You two keep acting so weird around each other. He won’t tell me anything, but I thought—at least Charlie will. At least I can count on one person here to give it to me straight. Can’t I?”

Charlie takes a shaky breath and doesn’t answer.

“And I know there’s been more happening since that party. No one will tell me a thing, and it’s like—it’s like I’m the only one here who doesn’t know, and it has to be something major with how serious everybody is acting. I just want to know. If I have to be worried about the guy I’m seeing here, I want to know what I’m supposed to be worried about. Please, Charlie. I’m always the last one to know anything about any of the guys I like on the outside. That’s already happening here, too, but at least—at least you can tell me before I get in any deeper with him.”

And damn it, Imogen doesn’t deserve this. Imogen doesn’t deserve not to know. That’s what clinches it: if Charlie knows Ben’s not a safe person to be around, then he needs to tell the person who’s seeing Ben so that she has enough forewarning to protect herself. Charlie knows Imogen, and he likes her, and he can’t just leave her to end up in the same kind of situation Charlie did because she doesn’t know to be careful. If he tells her and she dismisses it, then that’s one thing, but she deserves to at least have all the information.

They’re on camera—fuck, he can see Farouk’s and Ajayi’s camera lenses aimed right at them—but he has to tell her anyway. He’s probably safe, right? Harry’s already made it abundantly clear that he doesn’t want this particular storyline to make it onscreen.

“Ben… made advances. On me.” Charlie’s tripping on all his words, but it doesn’t really matter. “It started out small, but then…”

Imogen freezes. “He what?”

“Don’t stop. You’re going to attract attention,” Charlie mutters.

She goes back to massaging Charlie’s shoulder blades even harder than before. “And you—you didn’t want those advances?”

“No.”

“And… he did it anyway?”

“He… yeah. Yeah, he did,” mumbles Charlie. “I mean, it wasn’t anything crazy serious. He didn’t—like—it wasn’t like he kissed me or… uh… worse. But—I guess Ben saw me as an easy target, and—yeah. I panicked. I felt scared. I felt so scared, Imogen. I keep making sure I’m always near a camera because…”

“Holy shit.” She leans down to massage Charlie’s neck underneath the cord with his mic so that she can whisper this in his ear. “I’m so sorry. I had no idea. I can’t believe… I can’t believe he would do something like… and not just because he was with me at the time, but at all.”

“Yeah, well,” says Charlie, unsure how else to respond.

Imogen sighs as her hands move down to Charlie’s upper arms. “I should have realized something was off. When he’s not pushing me to break rules, half the time, I don’t know if he’s even interested in me. He doesn’t pay a lot of attention to me. It’s why I’ve been spending all this time with people like Nick and Sahar. At least they act like they like me.”

“I’m sorry. It sounds like you really liked him—Ben, I mean.”

Imogen laughs shakily. “I did really like him. I always do this. I always go for the wrong guys.” She sighs. “I mean, you’re giving me more attention right now than Ben has this whole time, and I barely even know you.”

“It doesn’t mean I fancy you,” says Charlie quickly. “I’m… working through some stuff, being here.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” He doesn’t elaborate.

After a short pause, Imogen relents. “Do you know how solid Nick and Tara are? He’s the only other man here I really could see myself being attracted to, but I don’t want to get in the middle of something real between anybody else.”

“Nick… is a good guy,” says Charlie carefully. “He hasn’t talked to me much about Tara, but I can’t see him not being loyal to her.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Imogen points out nonchalantly.

Damn. Charlie’s really gonna need to work on being careful what he says and how—especially on camera. “Sorry again,” he whispers, and then he lets out a little hiss when Imogen hits a particularly sensitive knot in his lower back.

The workshop definitely doesn’t seem to be having the intended effect. Elle is giggling and moaning like crazy as Isaac digs into her thighs, and Nick and Tara are getting incredibly frisky with their hands all over each other’s bums. Darcy and Tao seem to be having fun, too, even if Darcy keeps trying to reassure us in the confessional room that it’s all platonic—but she’s not doing a very convincing job of it because she keeps breaking down into giggles every time she says so. Sahar and Ben both look pretty bored with each other, but the camera pans over them pretty quickly, just giving us a brief voiceover from Sahar saying vaguely that she’s not having a good time and doesn’t feel like Ben—or, in fact, anyone here—is someone she could build a deeper connection with.

And… then there’s Charlie and Imogen, says our narrator dryly as we cut to them. Imogen hasn’t even started massaging Charlie, who’s laid out on the sheet, as she says in a rehearsed sort of way, “Charlie, you have to tell me what’s going on.”

Oh, they’re having this conversation? Finally. I’ve only been waiting for the entire episode for it.

“Imogen—”

“You have to. You started it by telling me Ben couldn’t be trusted, and you can’t just drop that in my lap and then avoid me for the rest of our time here.” She finally breaks out the massage oil and drips it onto Charlie’s back. “He won’t tell me anything, but I thought—at least Charlie will. At least I can count on one person here to give it to me straight. Can’t I?”

“Imogen, it’s nothing. I swear. I’m sorry I said it. Just…”

Come on, Charlie. Get those words out.

“…I’m…”

You’re…?

“…Working through some stuff, being here. Ben saw, and I panicked.”

We zoom in on Charlie’s face as Imogen asks, “How serious?”

“Nick…” We cut back to Imogen before Charlie finishes, “Made advances. On me.”

Oh, crap. I didn’t actually think he was going to be honest.

“He what?”

“Yeah.” Back to Charlie again. “It started out small, but then…”

“Holy shit. And you—did you want those advances?”

“Yeah,” murmurs Charlie in a tiny voice. “We kissed, but, I mean, it wasn’t anything crazy serious. It doesn’t mean I fancy him. There’s nothing going on. It was a stupid—”

“But you did really like him.” We’re back on Imogen’s face again as she looks, somehow, both tense and relieved.

Charlie doesn’t answer this. “Anyway, Nick is a good guy. I can’t see him not being loyal to Tara now that they’re together.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Imogen points out nonchalantly. “There is something between you. I know there is. You can tell me, at least.”

But it doesn’t seem like Charlie’s going to say anything more about it as he just buries his face in the sheet underneath him and flexes those fine, fine biceps. Instead, we overhear—though don’t see—a confessional from Imogen. So now I know what Charlie was really talking about at the party, but I still think I want to cool things off with Ben. Charlie’s giving me more attention right now than Ben has this whole time, and I barely even know him. It makes me glad I didn’t break any rules with him, you know? Giving Charlie this massage is really making me realize how much I’m not missing out on with Ben.

Ouch, says our narrator over a shot of Ben and Sahar looking miserable together. I wouldn’t want to be in Ben’s Speedos right now.

Chapter Text

Nick’s expecting everybody to have to film confessionals as soon as they get done with the workshop, but they don’t. Instead, Tori calls everyone to the cabana.

He knows what this means, and it’s been hanging over his head ever since two nights ago, the last time Nick and Tara broke rules. He’s been just waiting for this, wondering how long Harry was going to make them sweat before he would call them out in front of everyone—and now he has. And it has Nick stressed the fuck out because Harry waited until after Nick and Charlie had their… thing yesterday.

It feels like Nick’s utterly betraying Charlie’s trust for them to have… said what they said and for it to come out now that Nick’s been fooling around with Tara again. He just wants to get Charlie alone for two minutes and tell him what he should have said yesterday: that he and Tara did what they did before Nick and Charlie made up. It’s ridiculous, of course, because it’s not like Nick and Charlie were ever in any kind of fight: they’re barely even friends now. Besides, Nick doesn’t need Charlie’s permission to mess around with girls. Charlie even said Harry was making shit up out of nowhere and didn’t have those feelings for Nick. But it’s how Nick feels.

Then again, did Charlie ever actually say that? He looked pretty horrified to think he was going to be painted as Nick’s onscreen love interest, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that the horror was coming from him not having any feelings like that for Nick in the first place. It could just have been that he didn’t want to be outed on international television. And could you blame him? Nick wouldn’t want that, either, if he had any feelings for Charlie.

He doesn’t, of course. Have any feelings for Charlie. Of course, it’s getting harder and harder for Nick to say that to himself with a straight face.

He doesn’t have time for a meltdown about it, though, because it’s time to file into the cabana and take his seat with everybody else, waiting to get fined money by a talking cone for sexual encounters. Everybody here knows that Tori isn’t really a robot or artificial intelligence or whatever the show passes her off as being. Her decisions are made by the producers, and her lines are decided by the writers and spoken, Nick thinks, by a voice actress. So it feels a little absurd to have to play along for the cameras—but it’s fine time and then confessionals afterward, so he resigns himself to doing it for at least two more scenes. More than two, if he gets camera crew time with anybody else today.

In the cabana, Nick ends up sitting between Tara and Darcy, which for some reason feels—awkward? He knows Tara and Darcy have become good friends the past few days, and for some reason, it just feels a little like Nick is randomly inserting himself into their friendship by attaching himself to Tara.

The thing is, Nick spends a lot of time talking to Tara, but he definitely doesn’t really feel like her boyfriend? He’s not, and he’s not claiming to be. She’s gorgeous, and of course he’s attracted to her, but he feels more like a friend who screws around with her sometimes, not like her primary bond or relationship or whatever the hell in the retreat. That feels increasingly like Darcy. Tara and Nick—it just feels to Nick like their friendship is totally divorced from their sexual activities.

And he’s in a tight spot because of it. The only thing he can possibly say to defend himself today when the group inevitably turns on him for costing them money is that they did it in the effort to form a deeper connection—but that’s not exactly true, is it? He does feel like his connection to Tara is meaningful, but not because of the physical things they’ve done. And he already feels guilty just imagining the look that’s going to be on Charlie’s face if Nick tries to say to him that he fooled around with Tara to connect with her romantically.

The atmosphere is a little tense and a lot awkward as they wait for Tori—or Tori’s voice actress, anyway—to begin. “You know, I think Tori is the wrong name for her. They should have called her Lana,” says Tao in a voice that’s just begging for someone to bite.

Isaac takes the bait. “Lana?”

“It’s ‘anal’ spelled backwards.”

Nick is mid-snort when Tori gets their attention. Doh doo DEE! “Good afternoon, guests.”

“Hi, Tori,” says Nick as everybody calls out various greetings. His knees are shaking.

“I selected each of you for my retreat,” drawls Tori in her usual unimpressed voice, “to encourage you to form more meaningful relationships. I encouraged you to do the same in today’s workshop. However, it appears that not all of you are heeding my advice.”

“Oh!” cries Ben as Imogen (who’s not sitting anywhere near him, for the record) titters with Sahar. When the catcalling dies down, there’s a long pause, and then Tori continues—

“There has been a breach of the rules.”

“Again?” complains Darcy, which is incredibly uncomfortable seeing as she’s sitting right next to Nick, who’s probably one of the worst offenders here. Sahar’s none too happy, either: “Guys, you realize that we all lose money when you break rules, don’t you? This doesn’t just affect you. It affects all of us.”

“Yeah, and it affects whoever’s doing it,” Isaac points out. “It affects whoever takes home the prize fund, and everyone, even if you break rules, has a shot at that. You’re only hurting yourselves by cutting into your own potential reward.”

“So who is it this time, huh?” demands Imogen. “Because I know it wasn’t me. I’ve been good. I’ve been the picture of restraint.”

Nick carefully trains his eyes on his own lap and away from her. It’s no good, of course: he’s going to have to come out with it eventually. The only questions are how long they’re going to sit here before he does and whether anybody else will fess up first (or afterward).

Based on how long they were in the cabana last time this happened, he’s pretty sure the final cut for the show is significantly edited down from how long these scenes actually take to film. Seriously, it took maybe twenty or thirty minutes of denials and dodges before the two offending couples fessed up? Nick kind of wants to just get it over with this time to spare himself that long of sitting around feeling stressed out, but he also wants to wait for the earth to swallow him whole before he has to come clean again.

It appears Nick is spared at first because, for the second time running, Elle confesses first. “Okay, look, Tao and I might have had a little slip in the bathroom yesterday,” she says.

Her and Tao’s “little slip” turns out to have been a kiss—during a naked shower. Needless to say, nobody is pleased.

“You got in the shower naked together?” complains Imogen. “Like, didn’t it maybe occur to either of you that, hey, maybe it’s not a good idea to do this because it’s going to lead somewhere? Nudity may not be a rule break on this show, but you didn’t exactly set yourselves up not to break other rules by doing it.”

“Chill, Imogen,” says Elle tiredly. “I thought Isaac was the sex police here, not you.”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong: I’ll back her up,” says Isaac impatiently. Nick can’t quite make out the next thing he says, though, because everybody’s talking over each other, all pretty much yelling at Elle and Tao for their indiscretion.

And that’s going to be Nick in a few minutes—and it’s going to be twice as bad because he’s going to have to say it in front of Charlie, too. Shit. Nick doesn’t think he’ll be able to live with himself if Charlie looks at him the way everyone’s looking at Tao and Elle right now.

Not for the first time, he wonders if it’s worth it to stay partnered with Tara. He likes her, and he’s attracted to her, but it just doesn’t feel like it’s going anywhere, not when Tara’s been clear that her main motivation in breaking rules is to get more screen time when the show airs. And anyway, since when does Nick even want a relationship? It’s nice to have someone to get hot and heavy with, but Nick never came into this show—not when he thought it was Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll and not now—looking for an actual commitment.

Isn’t it his whole thing that he gets bored and moves on quickly? Maybe this is him getting bored and moving on. Can’t Tara find somebody else to break rules with?

By the time the complaints die down, he’s starting to feel pretty sick, honestly. He just keeps looking across the cabana at Charlie, and every time their eyes connect, Nick wants to throw up. He doesn’t want to come clean—not in front of anyone, but especially not in front of Charlie. He doesn’t.

“There was another breach of the rules,” drops Tori. Seriously, sometimes, Nick just wants to reach over and strangle that little cone.

And then Ben says, “You know, you’re looking mad guilty over there, Tara.”

“Tuck your ass crack back into your trunks and don’t fucking talk to me, Benjamin,” she snaps back, but the damage is done: everybody’s looking at them.

“I hate to admit it, but he has a point,” says Sahar. “Out with it. What did you two do this time?”

“Nothing!” squeals Tara. But she even sounds like she’s lying through her teeth, and Nick’s sure that the look on his face isn’t helping matters, either.

He leans in and murmurs in her ear, “Shouldn’t we just… wouldn’t it be better to just…?”

“Nick,” says Isaac with narrowed eyes, “what are you whispering to her? What are you hiding?”

Nick’s eyes glue themselves to Charlie, and he can’t seem to make it stop. “Nothing. It’s nothing. I—”

“It has to be them,” says Imogen. “It must be. I know it wasn’t me, and there aren’t any other couples forming—unless Sahar or Darcy has something they want to say to the group?”

Sahar crosses her arms. “Don’t look at me.”

“Nor me,” adds Darcy. She shoots Nick a look that’s pissed as fuck; he feels like the intensity of her glare is scorching him from the sheer proximity of sitting next to her when he receives it. “So it was you.”

Unlike last time, Tara’s not giggling. In fact, when Nick looks back at her, she doesn’t look amused one bit. “Darcy—”

“A kiss, then?”

Why does Nick feel again like he’s walked into the middle of something bigger here? “Maybe… maybe more than a kiss,” he says hoarsely. When he chances a glance at Charlie, Charlie’s got his eyes in his own lap, a rosy blush coloring his cheeks.

“How much more than a kiss?” demands Isaac.

Nick looks at Tara and starts wringing his hands tightly. “There was some, uh, mutual masturbation?”

“Oh, shit,” calls Isaac loudly, but he’s far from the only one to be upset about this. Nick winces and braces himself for what’s coming.

Nick’s not sure what Tori’s price list is, but it turns out that jerking off costs four thousand dollars apiece—so he and Tara have just lost the group eight grand. On top of Elle and Tao’s six-thousand-dollar kiss, that means the group has just lost fourteen thousand dollars, slashing the prize fund down to one hundred and ninety K. Nick’s also not sure how much money that is in pounds, but he doesn’t need to do the maths to realize that he’s just spent a lot of quid—and the biggest price of all might be the look on Charlie’s face.

Shit.

Needless to say, Nick’s in a pretty foul mood by the time he makes it to his confessional—and Harry’s not helping. “Eight thousand dollars, my man! Tell me about what it was like to lose that.”

“I don’t know. Not great.”

“Oh, come on. You know how this works—you have to give me more, and you have to paraphrase. Let’s back up, all right? You haven’t done a confessional in a couple of days. What about your talk with Charlie the other day? How did that make you feel?”

And Nick just fucking loses it, all right? He’s not proud of it, but he can’t help himself. It’s been days now of holding it in and holding it in and getting hammered from all sides every time he and Tara slip up, and Charlie’s non-reactions are the worst part, and Nick’s not supposed to care what Charlie thinks, but he does. No, he takes it back. The worst part is that Harry is trying to manipulate the situation to make him and Charlie look… look gay on international television, and didn’t he learn when Charlie said on camera in the bedroom how horrified he was by that idea? Doesn’t Harry have any fucking respect for his own cast?

“Here’s how I feel,” hisses Nick. “I feel like Charlie went through something horrible with Ben. It was horrible. I could feel the pain radiating off his entire body. And you don’t even care, do you? You’re—what—trying to insert some storyline into your show because there’s been backlash about you not having enough representation of gay men? Is that it? You’re trying to out two people who aren’t even fucking gay, completely ignoring the fact that one of them has just been assaulted on your watch—”

“No one’s been assaulted,” Harry spits. “There’s no proof, and anyway, Charlie said himself when I pressed him that nothing inappropriate happened and he was just overreacting.”

“Yeah, you keep telling yourself that. You know, when this gets out—”

“There’s nothing to get out.” Harry’s eyes are dark and malicious. “And anyway, if you’re both so unhappy on this show, why not just leave? You may have signed a contract, but the contract has provisions for cast members to leave if they need to. If Charlie really went through what you’re claiming he went through, it would certainly be grounds for an early exit, wouldn’t you think? If you hate being here so much, why the fuck are you staying?”

“Because I have to stay and take care of him!” erupts Nick without thinking. “Because I’m not ready to fuck off to Leeds and never see him again. Because I—because—”

Harry raises an eyebrow. “You have to stay for Charlie? Not Tara? Sounds pretty fucking gay to me.”

Nick doesn’t answer.

“Now, if you don’t mind, I have footage I need to get from you. You can stay tight-lipped about Charlie if you want—I’ll make do—but I need to get your reactions to jerking off with Tara, the workshop, and the fourteen grand the group just lost, eight of them thanks to you.”

Control yourself, he tells himself. He needs to control his temper, or he’s going to get himself and Charlie into hot water. Remember when Nick was determined not to say anything that would incriminate them? Remember that?

The problem is, Nick suspects he and Charlie have said more than enough to make a mess for themselves. And what they haven’t said, Harry will twist to suit his own purposes.

Fuck.

I don’t care at all about how much money Nick and Tara just spent, Charlie tells us, glaring at the camera. I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. I don’t care. There’s nothing going on between us. Frankly, I’m insulted you’re even asking me to play up my reaction like this is something that personally affects me because it doesn’t. I don’t care, and I’m fine. Get the fuck out of my face.

Our narrator is not convinced. Yeah. Okay, Charlie. You keep telling yourself that.

Chapter Text

“I fucked up,” says Nick in a low, urgent voice.

It’s maybe a couple hours after they finished filming the cabana scene where Charlie discovered, to the surprise of no one, that Nick and Tara did stuff again. So did Elle and Tao, for the record, but Charlie doesn’t really give a rat’s ass about Elle and Tao, if he’s being honest with himself. Nick, on the other hand—Charlie’s starting to have to admit to himself that there is something between Charlie and Nick, even if Charlie’s the only one feeling it. For that matter, he doesn’t even know if he is the only one feeling it. Nick hasn’t exactly been giving off clear-cut platonic vibes this whole time.

Tao, who still doesn’t totally get it, has managed to convince Charlie to venture outside with the promise that he’ll be surrounded by trustworthy people who will make sure nothing bad happens to him. It means Charlie’s off camera, which is stressing him out a little, but he doesn’t think Ben dares try and pull something here with people all around. He was just hanging with Tao, Elle, and Isaac, but Nick’s just burst out of the cabana and sidled up to Charlie like there’s an emergency brewing, and from the sound of his voice, maybe there is one.

“What do you mean?” murmurs Charlie. “Fucked up what, exactly?”

“My confessional.” Elle and Isaac are staring, but Nick doesn’t seem to care. “I went off on Harry about—uh—the Ben situation and… the you and me situation. You know, with the producers trying to… yeah. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said any of it, but I was so pissed, and…”

“It’s okay. Uh, I lost my temper in mine, too. Harry… kept needling me about how it felt to find out that you and Tara…”

At this, Nick starts blushing furiously and rubbing the back of his neck. “Charlie, the thing with Tara…”

“Yeah?” There’s entirely more hope than is appropriate in Charlie’s voice.

Nick lowers his voice until Charlie can barely make it out. “We did it a few nights ago. It was before you and I… talked. That’s all.”

Okay, what the hell does Nick mean by that? Why is it so important for him to tell Charlie that he and Tara haven’t touched each other (or, apparently, themselves) like that since before Nick started getting close to Charlie again? It kind of pisses Charlie off, to be honest, for Nick to say shit like this because it’s not like Nick’s ending things with Tara, is he? He’s still hanging around her all the time, cuddling with her and sharing a bed with her and shit like that. Anyway, Nick doesn’t owe Charlie anything. Charlie and Nick aren’t anything. End of story.

“It’s fine,” breathes Charlie. “There’s nothing happening here. That’s why I blew up at Harry today—because he was suggesting that we’re a thing when we’re not a thing. You’re still with Tara. I get it. It’s fine.”

“But—”

“It’s fine, Nick.” Even whispering, Charlie can hear in his own voice that he’s starting to lose his patience. Apparently, Nick can, too, because he drops it.

Except—Tara doesn’t come round to stake out her property after that. In fact, Nick spends pretty much the whole rest of the day hanging round Charlie, Isaac, and Tao while Elle goes to Tara (and Darcy) elsewhere. It would have been fine except for the fact that Nick and Charlie himself both keep acting super weird and getting all flustered whenever either addresses the other.

Why are they like this? Why is Charlie like this? Why can’t he just be—be—be straight?

Here’s the other problem: this is still a TV show, and that comes with its own challenges. There’s Harry fabricating storylines that Charlie doesn’t want to see onscreen, for one thing, and it also makes it confusing as shit to figure out what’s real and what’s fake in Nick and Tara’s relationship—but there’s also the fact that Charlie signed on to do this for a reason, and that was screen time. And if he keeps refusing to film anything with the proper camera crew, his little gay storyline is gonna fizzle out, and he’s not gonna get any screen time for the rest of the show. Charlie really has no desire to film himself forming “deeper connections” with Nick or with any of the girls here, though, which means his options are limited.

So when Isaac asks him at dinner if Charlie wants to film with him afterward, Charlie takes him up on it. He’s not sure what Isaac has in mind, but that’s kind of the point, right? This show is staged, not scripted—but even when they stage scenes, they’ll come across more authentic if not everyone in the scene already knows what it’s about and what they’re going to be discussing. Charlie’s a drummer and not an actor for a reason, you know.

As usual, it takes a while for everybody, especially lighting, to get set up. It’s unpleasant being around Harry again—and that’s putting it mildly—but Charlie tries to just ignore him entirely and chat with Isaac while they wait. What he really wants is to talk to Ajayi and get confirmation once and for all of what the hell he meant when he warned Nick about “backlash” Harry is trying to rebound from on the show, but he doesn’t dare try, not with Harry paying such close attention, sure to snap at both of them if the cast and crew start to intermingle.

Finally, Singh gives the green light, and Farouk’s and Ajayi’s cameras start rolling. At first, Charlie hardly notices: something they like to do is not say when they’ve started filming so that they can get candid conversation on film that leads naturally into the staged part. Charlie isn’t great at steering the direction of conversations deliberately like that without it looking forced, but fortunately for him, Isaac is, asking, “Can you believe Nick and Tara this morning? We’re out, like, forty thousand dollars just because of them.”

“Forty-two,” amends Charlie uncomfortably.

“That’s more than two-thirds of it. Jesus,” Isaac swears.

Unsure where Isaac is going with this, Charlie ventures, “You’re doing great, though. It just seems like it’s so easy for you to resist temptation. It seemed for sure at first like you were going to be the biggest player here, and then…”

Isaac smiles sheepishly. “I’m far from the only person who hasn’t cost the group any money, though. It’s only, what, four people so far? And you haven’t spent money, either.”

“Yeah, but that’s—” Charlie shuts up and doesn’t finish this thought, though. No way is he saying anything that’s on his mind right now about why he’s refrained from jumping, for example, Darcy’s bones like people might have expected.

Fortunately, Isaac doesn’t push, which Charlie appreciates. Nobody on the cast but Charlie and Nick knows the storyline Harry’s pushing, but even if Isaac doesn’t realize he’s doing Charlie a favor, he is. In any case, he seems to have his own storyline to push here. “I guess it’s true that it’s probably been easier for me than it has for most,” Isaac admits now. “Like, it’s actually been really hard to resist having a wank, but… I maybe haven’t been as tempted by any of the girls as I kind of tried to convince myself I was in the beginning?”

Charlie raises his eyebrows. He can feel the color rising in his cheeks. “You’re not saying…”

“I’m not gay or anything,” says Isaac quickly. “I don’t know what I am. Is there a word for it when you don’t… want… anyone?”

Oh. Charlie’s blush starts going back down. “At all? Like, ever?”

“I just…” Isaac sounds genuinely frustrated now. “I still experience pleasure, right? Like, I actually spend a lot of my time chasing after that. It’s why I’m here, obviously. But I don’t… I’m starting to wonder if… the reason I’m never satisfied is because… nobody can satisfy me. I mean, you’d think I’d be feeling something for any of these women, but I’m just not—and not the men, either, because I have thought about that and asked myself that to try and figure it out. I thought being on a dating show with so many hot women would kickstart things, but… it just hasn’t. I don’t think there’s a deeper connection waiting for me here. I don’t think there’s one waiting for me anywhere. I don’t think I’m… like… interested.”

Unconvinced, Charlie purses his lips. “Not anyone? Not anywhere? I mean, there must be some kind of person you’re attracted to.”

“I don’t know. I feel like there’s not. I feel like there never has been. Maybe I’m just overthinking it, but…”

Charlie’s still frowning, still thinking. Not interested in anyone? Ever? Charlie’s not trying to be an ass, but he’s never heard of such a thing. Normally, he’d have tried to do some research and educate himself, but he’s got no access to the Internet or a phone in here: he has no way of trying to find out if what Isaac’s saying is a thing really might be a thing.

“I don’t know, Isaac,” says Charlie hesitantly. “I mean, maybe, but I don’t know if that’s… a thing. But I think it’s good you’re trying to figure it out. I mean, where better to sort it out than here, right? And—I don’t know. I can’t believe I’m suggesting this, but maybe it would be a good idea to break some rules? See if that helps you connect with anybody?”

“Yeah, but isn’t that kind of a dick move, using women to try and sort out my own issues?”

Charlie shrugs. “Just—I mean—be up front with anybody you kiss about why you’re kissing them, and I think you’re morally in the clear. Plenty of women here would probably be down with some kind of temporary friends with benefits situation.”

“Yeah,” says Isaac reluctantly. “Maybe. Thanks for listening, Charlie.”

Biting his lip, Charlie tries to smile, but it comes out all weird and wrong, just like a lot of things have been doing lately.

He doesn’t know if Isaac tries to take his advice or not, but he assumes not—or at least not yet—because Isaac gets right into bed with Charlie like usual when it’s time to film bedtime a few hours later. Interestingly, though, they’ve been in bed together for all of two minutes before Imogen busts into the bedroom, ignores Ben entirely, and makes a beeline for them.

“Hi,” she says breathlessly. “Can we be a bed of three tonight?”

“Kinky. I like it,” laughs Isaac. Well, that answers one question: he’s not ready for this entire villa full of people to know yet about anything he told Charlie tonight.

Charlie nods, too. “Yeah, sure. So you—uh—you and Ben are—?” It’s stupid how his voice cracks when he says Ben’s name.

“Not together anymore,” says Imogen shortly. “I really don’t want to talk about it—” she levels a glare in Ben’s direction, then looks back at Charlie and Isaac with a bright smile on her face in contrast “—but I’m happy to be in bed with you both! It’ll be just like a slumber party. It’ll be fun.”

“Well, get in, then,” invites Isaac, patting the mattress.

Imogen does so, bounding up onto the bed and snuggling right in between Isaac and Charlie. He feels like he should be saying something—anything—after their conversation at the workshop earlier, so he scoots right up to her and says low in her ear, “Um, I feel like I should be thanking you.”

“No, thank you,” she breathes back. “For warning me to be careful with him. I appreciate that you didn’t keep me in the dark any longer. You’re a good guy, Charlie.”

Charlie smiles halfheartedly. “Maybe.”

“Definitely,” Imogen insists. And she plants a fucking kiss on Charlie’s nose before snuggling up tightly between him and Isaac.

Our next scene starts on the beach, where Imogen is sitting alone in a highlighter-yellow bikini watching the waves crash on the shore—but she doesn’t stay alone for long. A camera zooms in on a shot of Ben approaching as we hear him say in a voiceover, Imogen’s been avoiding me ever since the workshop, so I really just want to find out what’s up. She’s barely given me any attention since we met Tori, and I want answers.

“Hey, sexy,” we hear him greet her as she looks up at him. He smiles, but she doesn’t return it. Her eyes are crinkled in some kind of mixture of anger and pain.

“Why do you always do that?” she demands.

Ben narrows his eyes. “Do what?”

“Call me pet names like you like me. You don’t even like me. Do you?”

We cut back to Ben’s confessional, which we can see with our eyes this time. He doesn’t say anything, just rolls his eyes dramatically while shaking his head.

“Of course I do,” he says back on the beach, but his tone has an edge of loathing underneath it. “Why are you attacking me out of nowhere?”

“Because you barely even fucking pay any attention to me. You know, in the workshop with Charlie today, it was so noticeable to me how much more attention he was paying to me than you ever have. It’s like, just because I want to follow the rules and not put out for you—”

Ben scowls. “I never expected you to ‘put out’ for me. I’ve been waiting patiently this whole time, following Tori’s rules, being a good boy because you wanted me to be—”

“That’s just it,” Imogen snaps. “That you were ‘waiting’ suggests that you were waiting for something you wanted at the end of this process, and you’ve been getting impatient, haven’t you? Just when I was starting to trust you, you just had to go and fuck it up, didn’t you?”

Our narrator interjects, Does anyone else think Imogen’s being maybe just a little hard on Ben here? Anyone?

She’s being way too hard on me, declares Ben back in the confessional room.

You don’t count, Ben. Try again, producers, says our narrator.

Unaware of this, Ben continues, When have I ever pressured Imogen for anything? All I’ve ever done has been to pay attention to her and jump through all her hoops, and when have I complained? What the fuck did I do to deserve the third degree here?

On the beach, Ben’s glare has intensified. “Well, fine, then. Go fuck Charlie all you want for all I care. This is over, Imogen. It’s done.”

“Fine.”

“Fine.”

Imogen lets out a little half roar, half scream. We jump to a confessional of her: You know, maybe I will sleep with Charlie after this—literally—because Ben had his chance, and he blew it.

Our narrator jumps in excitedly, Oh! I know this one! And then she starts to sing off-key: “Out of sight, out of mind! Shut your mouth, I just—” When her voice cracks horribly on the high note, she breaks off. Anyone? No one? She groans. Is no one in our target audience as old as me?

From here, we see a few picture-perfect shots of the beach and the exterior of the villa before cutting to a new scene, this one featuring Charlie and Isaac. They’re sitting on a bench outside, laughing at some shit Charlie’s just said, when Isaac goes, “Can you believe Nick and Tara this morning? We’re out, like, forty thousand dollars just because of them.”

“Forty-two,” corrects Charlie.

Yeah, because we definitely know you’re counting, quips our narrator.

Isaac adds, “That’s more than two-thirds of it. Jesus.”

“You’re doing great, though,” Charlie points out. “It just seems like it’s so easy for you to resist temptation. It seemed for sure at first like you were going to be the biggest player here, and then…”

Looking nervous, Isaac replies, “It’s actually been really hard to resist having a wank, but…” We cut to Charlie’s face as Isaac continues, “I maybe haven’t been tempted by any of the girls. I mean, you’d think I’d be feeling something for any of these women, but I’m just not. I don’t think there’s a deeper connection waiting for me here.”

Charlie looks skeptical. “I don’t know, Isaac. I can’t believe I’m suggesting this, but maybe it would be a good idea to break some rules? See if that helps you connect with anybody?”

Careful, Charlie, warns our narrator. Don’t let the resident sex cop hear you say th—oh. You already did. Wait, why isn’t Isaac flipping out?

Isaac doesn’t get all worked up about this, though. Instead, he just muses, “Yeah, but isn’t that kind of a dick move?—chasing after that if I’m not… like… interested.”

With a shrug, Charlie says, “Plenty of women here would probably be down with some kind of temporary friends with benefits situation.”

I’m with Isaac, our narrator says. Sounds like a dick move to me. You’re gonna shoot him down and package Pandora’s Box right back up, aren’t you, Isaac?

However, Isaac is frowning thoughtfully. “Maybe I’m just overthinking it. Maybe I just don’t know what I want.”

A note of playful desperation has entered our narrator’s voice. And this is how you’re gonna try and figure it out? By reverting right back to the player ways we all thought you left behind? Come on, Isaac! Stay strong!

But it does not appear Isaac is going to stay strong. No: the next thing we see is the bedroom that night, where Imogen comes right up to Isaac and Charlie’s bed and says, “Hi. Can we be a bed of three tonight?”

Isaac’s response is immediate. “Kinky. I like it.”

Oh, shit, says our narrator. I think we just found Isaac’s first target. And a big, flashing bullseye animation appears over Imogen and follows her as she climbs up into the bed, giggling and snuggling up in between both boys.

Chapter Text

And then, the next day… nothing happens? Well, some stuff happens, but it’s not centered on Nick. He films a scene with Tara in the morning, but it’s not a very eventful one: they just commiserate for the cameras about how much the whole house probably hates them and play a little will-they-won’t-they that doesn’t result in anything. After that, Nick’s vaguely aware that the camera crew follows Elle and Tao, who are enemy number two behind Nick and Tara, at least for the cameras; Isaac, who does separate scenes with Charlie, Imogen, and Darcy (Nick’s not totally sure what’s going on there); and Ben, who’s trying to play the spurned victim now that he’s the actual enemy of everybody else in the house, though Nick’s pretty sure that that hasn’t made it onscreen.

The good news is that Charlie seems to be recovering from the Ben thing okay now that a little time has passed. He’s relaxed a little about needing to be on camera all the time, even if he still (understandably) avoids being in a room off-camera alone with anybody ever, and he’s back to eating meals in the dining hall again, though Nick’s still concerned by how little Charlie actually eats when he’s in there. Still, progress is progress. Anyway, it’s probably for the best that Nick and Charlie not end up in a room alone together ever, as Nick’s a little afraid of what might come out of his mouth if they do.

The only problem with this is that Nick—kind of wants to spend time alone with Charlie? He just—he wants five fucking minutes to say how he feels and not have to say it in front of the cameras, not have to say it in front of other people. Of course, that’s exactly why he shouldn’t. Charlie doesn’t fancy him. Nick’s not even convinced he fancies Charlie—but he’s starting to believe it. God help him, he’s starting to believe it.

So it’s with mixed feelings that Nick finds himself alone at a table with Charlie in the dining hall for dinner. It’s not exactly private, but then again, he signed away his right to privacy when he decided to spend his summer on a reality TV show. There aren’t any cameras, though, and it becomes clear after a couple of minutes that nobody else is going to come and join them.

“So, uh, what’s the deal with Isaac?” Nick asks through a mouthful of cheeseburger. “He was barely filming anything because he didn’t have a love interest, and now, the crew have spent half their time following him around all day today.”

“Oh. Yeah,” says Charlie in a low voice. “I’m only telling you because he gave me permission, okay? Just to be very clear, I wouldn’t be saying any of this if I didn’t have permission.”

Nick raises his eyebrows. “Go on.”

“He’s… struggling with, like… his sexuality, kind of?” Charlie sounds unsure of any of what he’s saying. “He just feels like… he’s not attracted to anyone here because he doesn’t know if he… can be. I don’t know. I don’t want to misrepresent him, and I don’t want to not believe him, but… yeah. He feels like he’s been going after women so aggressively his whole life to try to… but he doesn’t think he can. Feel things. For them.”

Nick lowers his own voice, too. “Wait, you’re not saying he’s—gay?”

“No. That was my first thought, too, but he said he doesn’t feel anything for the men here, either. He’s been talking to me about it, and I suggested—well—I suggested he go find a fling, you know, and break some rules to see if it sparks something, so he’s been trying that, I guess. He talked to Imogen about it earlier today, you know, to kind of offer to be her rebound after Ben, but she wasn’t interested, so I think he and Darcy are gonna try things out as, like, a strictly friends-with-benefits thing.” Charlie smiles slightly. “Apparently, talking to Imogen was a big mistake. She wasn’t offended or anything—he made it very clear that he respects her as his friend and was just offering that they help each other out—but she got all pissed that even the sex police on this show doesn’t want to follow the rules. I have a feeling that Harry is gonna cast her in that role now that Isaac has kind of vacated it.”

“Sounds like Imogen.” Nick tries to smile, but it feels weird and wrong on his face. “So—there’s nothing happening between you and Imogen?”

Charlie’s eyebrows furrow. “Me and Imogen?”

“Yeah. Just… after yesterday…”

“What? No. No way. We’re just friends. Anyway, I think Sahar is still interested in her, and I don’t want to get in the middle of that. They’re gonna be filming together tomorrow. Plus, Imogen actually told me—” Charlie breaks off, blushing. “No, yeah, she’s not interested, and… and neither am I. I’m not really interested in any of the women here, to be honest.”

Nick suddenly feels like the temperature in here has risen about five degrees. “Not even Darcy?”

“Not… no. Yeah. No.”

“And you’re not planning on following your own advice and trying something out with one of them?”

“I… don’t think so. I don’t think that would do anything about…”

“About what?” Nick breathes.

Charlie is suddenly blushing just as furiously as Nick is. “Nothing. Never mind.”

Nick coughs and changes the subject before he says something stupid, like are you interested in me instead of any of the women because I want to kiss you until I can’t breathe. “So, uh, I love that you have all the gossip on everybody in here. I never would have pegged you for it.”

Smiling weakly, Charlie says, “Come on. I definitely don’t know everything that goes on round here.”

“Like what? Name one person or couple in here you don’t have the tea on.”

“Well, you and Tara, for one thing.”

Nick can tell from Charlie’s face that Charlie’s immediately regretting having said that—but the damage is done. And Nick has no idea how to react to it. Finally, he cobbles together a response: “There’s… not a lot to know, really. We’re friends who… do stuff sometimes.”

“I guess I just don’t… get it,” Charlie mumbles. “You’ve lost more money than anybody else here, but it’s not like you’re like Elle and Tao where you’re cuddling every chance you get and sneaking each other cutesy little pecks on the lips whenever you’re off camera and so—clearly so into each other. The last few days, I’ve barely seen you spend any time with her. And you wouldn’t… do stuff sometimes if you weren’t attracted to each other… would you?”

Nick is getting more confused by the second. “I mean… I’m attracted to her. Or I was attracted to her. I don’t know. To be honest, I don’t really know if she’s attracted to me or not. We talk about all our rule breaks in advance—it’s really important to her to get screen time because she’s trying to build her following—but I don’t… know how much of it was because she actually wanted… me.”

Charlie looks like he’s hanging onto Nick’s every word with bated fucking breath. “So you and Tara… aren’t an item?”

“I… don’t know.”

“Are you… exclusive?”

“I don’t know,” Nick repeats.

“And that doesn’t bother you, not knowing?”

Nick shrugs and laughs awkwardly. “It’s not like anybody else in here is trying to kiss me, right? Maybe it would change things if someone were, but for now…”

He doesn’t know what he’s hoping for here—for Charlie to say I want to be kissing you instead of her or something equally stupid—but Charlie doesn’t say it. Charlie just continues picking apart his burger with his hands and doesn’t say anything at all.

Nick’s rapidly approaching breaking point, though, and he doesn’t know how much longer he can hold it in and keep whatever the fuck feelings he has for Charlie entirely private from everybody else in the villa. The problem is, this is a television show. He can’t risk being honest, even off camera, because what if somebody else slips up and says something about it later in a room with a camera in it? What if, god forbid, somebody overhears and doesn’t realize (or, in Ben’s case, doesn’t care) that Nick’s trying to keep this completely secret? It’s just too risky to say anything to anyone anywhere.

But he feels like he’s going mad with this shit circulating rent-free around his brain twenty-four/seven. If nothing else, Charlie does have a point about Tara: maybe Nick should figure out what’s going on there, whether it’s all for the cameras or what. And if it is all for the cameras…

No. No way. Nick’s not saying he wants to have an onscreen relationship with Charlie. But it would… maybe kinda sorta potentially theoretically be kind of nice to know if even just telling Charlie he’s confused and seeing if Charlie’s confused, too, might be an option someday when they get out of the retreat and go back to regular life.

It could work, right? There are people in this villa from all over the world, but Nick and Charlie are both from England. It’s, what, four or five hours’ distance between Leeds and Kent? That’s workable. They could take the train every weekend or two, couldn’t they? If it really got serious, Nick could even look into moving to a rugby club closer to Charlie—but he’s getting way fucking ahead of himself by even thinking that at this point. They aren’t a couple. They’re not even dating. They haven’t even hugged before. Nick can barely even say to himself, let alone Charlie, that there’s a slim possibility he might not actually be a hundred percent heterosexual.

God, he needs the Internet. He needs to do some goddamn research.

But that’s not an option because he’s trapped in the Caribbean or wherever with no access to technology—except, you know, for the cameras that are filming him every second of every day because this entire experience is going to be televised. Shit. Nick doesn’t want to have a sexuality crisis on television screens worldwide. Nick wants some privacy. Fuck, Nick wants his mum.

One day at a time, he tells himself. Surely, he can get through one more day without cracking—and then another—and then another. Right?

Our next scene starts with a voiceover from Darcy as we pan over Isaac approaching her outside and greeting her. So I’m just chilling, right, minding my own beeswax, when Isaac comes up to me, and you can just tell that he means business. I already know about him and Imogen, of course. We cut to her in the confessional room. You think word doesn’t get around in this villa? Please. Charlie knows everything, and he blabs everything to anyone who wants to hear it, too.

Our narrator remarks, Wow. I guess that girl does not pull her punches. Can somebody get Charlie some ice?

Back outside, Isaac is now sitting at a right angle from Darcy. The camera narrows in for a second on his hands, which are folded tightly in his lap. “So, uh, I hope it’s okay that I wanted to talk to you today.”

I don’t know. I’m a little afraid he’s gonna turn out to be Darcy’s next victim, personally.

Darcy, though, just frowns at him. “Sure. What’s going on?”

“Well, I was talking to Charlie—” we zoom in on Darcy’s face as Isaac continues “—and, like… fuck, it’s so hard to say this.”

“You’re okay. Tell me,” soothes Darcy.

We get a closeup of Isaac’s nervous face. “So… I guess it’s obvious I haven’t actually made a connection yet with anybody here. I kind of latched on right away to trying to remind everybody to think about the money—”

You mean trying to be the sex cop, fills in our narrator.

“—But if I’m being honest… I didn’t really do it because of the money. I just did it… because it was easier.”

Darcy’s frowning hard at him. “Easier than what?”

“Than… admitting I wasn’t interested in anybody here.”

“Um, that’s definitely not what you just said to Imogen,” Darcy points out. “Weren’t you just trying to get her to break rules with you?”

“Yeah, but not… it wasn’t like that.” Isaac looks like he could burst with frustration that the right words aren’t coming to him. “I was up front with her what it meant, and it was Charlie’s idea, anyway—that I try and explore my options a little before giving up on making a connection here.”

She purses her lips. “And now it’s my turn? You’ve come to ask to get into my pants?”

Honey, you’re not wearing any pants, our narrator points out. I think he’s technically trying to get into your bikini, which will be a hell of a lot easier. I mean, just look at how thin that thing is.

We zoom in on Darcy’s crotch, and yeah, that thing is pretty thin. Before it gets creepy, we cut back to Isaac.

“I feel weird even asking because I know you—uh—you maybe—I mean—it’s why I went to Imogen first. She didn’t ever seem interested like that, so I thought it would be more equal.”

Uh, Isaac, I don’t think that’s how making deeper connections works. Pro tip: it only actually works if you actually like each other.

Darcy, however, doesn’t seem to understand this concept, either. “Don’t worry, Isaac. I kind of mentally wrote you off the first day when you didn’t seem all that into me. You’re a pretty boy, but I don’t have, like, a crush on you. We’re good.”

“Yeah?” Isaac sounds nervous and hopeful at the same time. “So you’ll… you’ll give this a shot?”

“Tonight?” Darcy suggests. “I can kick Sahar out of my bed. She won’t mind. She’d love to get into Charlie and Imogen’s bed.”

Our narrator points out, You know, there is another option. Anybody remember Ben? We see a screenshot of Ben, clearly in the confessional room, with his face looking really weird mid-speech. Our narrator acquiesces in a high-pitched voice, …Okay. Yeah. I see your point.

“Okay,” says Isaac. “Tonight, then.”

Can somebody get Tori in here? Our sexy singles are veering off track and need some help cleaning up their act—and fast.

We cut to a close-up of Tori sitting alone on a table in the cabana. The purple band just above her base is bright and activated. I couldn’t agree more. It seems my initial efforts to encourage meaningful connections have fallen on deaf ears. Couples are forming, but they seem to be distracted by the physical and not placing enough—if any—importance on the emotional. The time for drastic action is now. Tomorrow, phase one of my new regime begins as we stress test my guests’ developing relationships.

Phase one? repeats our narrator as the words PHASE ONE flash across the screen in neon pink and lime green. What do you mean, phase one?! And why are you waiting until tomorrow? Who knows what mischief these people could get up to before this plan takes effect?

Tori sounds unfazed. All in due time, my friend. All in due time.

Chapter Text

Charlie has never been less excited in his life at the prospect of having two fit girls in his bed together with him for an entire night. Until this retreat, he at least would have told himself that he’d love to have as many women as would have him—but now, he knows it’s a lie, and he can’t enjoy the lie when the person, the man, he really wants is two beds over, probably planning on having all manners of sex with his girl while Charlie is trying to sleep. Honestly, Charlie likes Imogen and Sahar just fine, but he’d much rather leave them alone in one bed and go sleep alone somewhere else—but there’s not another bed in the room. Where’s he supposed to go, anyway? With Elle and Tao? With Ben? With Nick and Tara? Compared to those options, and with Isaac planning on messing around with Darcy tonight, Charlie will stay right where he is, suck it up, and deal.

It’s extra awkward because Charlie and Imogen both know full well that Sahar is interested in Imogen, even if Imogen isn’t sure if she reciprocates. Charlie just doesn’t want to be in the middle of it, okay?—figuratively or literally. Seriously, he ends up spending the entire night on the edge of the bed while Sahar and Imogen take up most of it cuddling. It’s a miracle he doesn’t fall out.

The next morning, he feels like shit when Ajayi coaxes a microphone around his neck and attaches the transmitter to his pajama bottoms. “Rough night?” asks Ajayi knowingly.

“Not for the reasons you’d think,” Charlie mumbles.

Ajayi’s knowing smile vanishes. “I see. I’m sorry.”

“Listen—Ajayi—when you tried to warn Nick the other day—”

Casting a quick glance at Imogen and Sahar—who are both still asleep and undisturbed—Ajayi quickly leans into murmur urgently in Charlie’s ear, “I’m sorry to be cryptic. It’s just—listen. A lot of people are on the network’s backs about censoring LGBTQ+ storylines, okay? Harry’s new this season, and one of the reasons they brought him in was to manufacture something gay. Nothing too wild—if the whole cast turns out to be gays and lesbians halfway through, they’re definitely not going to air all those relationships—but they wanted to pick out two men with what they thought were homoerotic vibes—”

“Homoerotic vibes?” echoes Charlie, half horrified, but half too tired to be horrified at this hour of the morning.

“—And turn the subtext into text. I’m not here to make judgment calls about your and Nick’s sexualities, and I don’t know at this point if there’s anything you can do to walk the idea back—when Harry gets something into his head, he really latches on and makes it a reality—he’s already been talking with the story editors about selectively manipulating scenes and dialogue to invent a relationship between you two. But you at least deserve to know, whether it’s so you can quit or take control of the narrative or—or what.”

“Fuck,” Charlie whispers. “Fuck.”

It’s not anything he hadn’t already put together, but hearing confirmation like that—it’s got him wide awake and anxious like he hasn’t felt since the moment Ben trapped him against that wall. There’s no time to process it, though, because Harry snaps, “Ajayi, quit chitchatting and get Charlie’s transmitter turned on already. We’ve got a scene to film here.”

Clapping Charlie on the shoulder, Ajayi purses his lips sympathetically before bending down to switch on the transmitter. The next thing Charlie knows, Imogen is jostled awake beside him, turns to Charlie, and says, “Sleep okay?”

“Save—it—for—the—cameras,” Harry hisses.

Imogen rolls her eyes. Charlie attempts to fake a smile and closes his eyes.

They’ve no sooner started filming than Charlie hears Tori wake up, too, with her telltale doh doo DEE! Charlie’s not even faking it for the cameras when he groans: he’s got no desire at all to hear all about all the sex acts Nick and Tara got up to last night.

But Tori’s not there to fine anybody for sex acts. Instead, when they all get their swimsuits and makeup on and head to the cabana, Tori informs them—well.

“So far, you have failed at resisting your physical urges and forming meaningful relationships. To test whether your developing relationships can grow beyond the superficial, and to increase your chances of making new and deeper connections, I have invited to my retreat three—”

Not having ever watched Too Hot to Handle before, Charlie’s not entirely sure where she’s going with this—but it can only mean one thing, right?

“—New—”

People. She invited people. There are new people joining the cast. And sure enough—

“—Arrivals.”

Everybody around Charlie is freaking out and screaming, but really, he couldn’t be bothered about this new turn of events. What does it matter that new people are coming? Charlie’s not involved with any of the women here, and frankly, he’s not interested in getting involved with any new women who might arrive today. He already has a person whom his brain is quite stuck on, unfortunately. The fact that his person already has a person here doesn’t seem to matter.

Honestly, Charlie would love for some magical unicorn woman to show up that Charlie were actually attracted to—proof that he’s not fucking gay like he’s starting to suspect in the back of his mind—but he doesn’t think it’s going to happen. Anyway, didn’t Tori just say she wants to stress-test the existing relationships? Charlie’s not in a relationship, which means he’s probably not about to get paired off with one of the newbies.

“I have allowed each new guest to select one person from the retreat to take on a date,” says Tori to the surprise of no one. “If you are called for a date, please use your time wisely to truly consider the strength of your current and potential new connections.”

“As if,” says Sahar in a low voice to Charlie. “How much money do you want to bet we’re all going to have lost by this time tomorrow?”

Charlie snorts.

“The first new arrival is… Naomi.”

A few oohs go around the cabana. “Naomi sounds spicy,” says Darcy with a grin.

“Naomi has selected… Tao.”

Elle utters a tiny groan. Turning to her, Tao takes her cheeks into his hands and whispers something—Charlie can’t make out what. Whatever it is, it makes Elle nod bracingly, her eyes closed.

“The next new arrival is… Felix,” continues Tori. But she doesn’t immediately say whom Felix’s date is. Instead, she adds, “Felix is nonbinary and uses ‘they/them’ pronouns.”

At first, Charlie is surprised by this—but then he realizes he shouldn’t be. Didn’t Ajayi just confirm that Harry’s here this season to make the shower gayer? It was a good step to bring on someone trans (Elle), and it’s yet another good step to bring on someone nonbinary, too. Charlie just wishes they could stick to just showing LGBTQ+ storylines with the consent of people like Elle and Felix instead of dragging Charlie into it when Charlie’s not—Charlie’s not—

He was going to say he’s not gay, but that’s maybe not really true, is it? He’s definitely not out, though, and does not want to be outed on international television. Fuck.

“Felix has selected… Darcy.”

Darcy looks pleased about this, and Isaac—well—Isaac doesn’t look displeased. Maybe Charlie would have expected him to be a little sad to potentially be losing his person to figure things out with, but he doesn’t look sad at all. It kind of makes Charlie wonder if he actually gave Isaac the right advice, encouraging him to find a girl to mess around with.

Tori’s not done yet, though. “The final new arrival is… James,” she says dryly. “James has selected…”

Charlie finds himself vaguely wondering who James’s date is going to be. He’s guessing it won’t be Elle—Tori’s already blown up Elle’s relationship by sending Tao on a date with Naomi. If Charlie had to guess, he’d say Tara—so that there’s tension introduced into her relationship with Nick—but it could be Imogen or Sahar if Harry thinks either of them is getting boring and needs a new storyline. (Sahar may be interested in Imogen, but Charlie hasn’t forgotten what Ajayi just said about Harry probably cutting queer storylines if half the cast turns out to be queer.)

And then Tori absolutely shocks Charlie. James’s date isn’t Elle, and it’s not Sahar or Imogen, either.

“Nick.”

Oh, holy shit. Nick? The male newcomer is going on a date with Nick? But Charlie thought—but if Nick’s not straight (and Charlie has no reason to believe he’s not, mind you), then he’s certainly still performing straight for the cameras. Isn’t he?

At first, there’s just a really stunned silence—and then Tara breaks it, looking Harry dead in the eyes and crossing his only line: talking to the crew. “Nick’s not out, Harry,” she says firmly.

“Say it to the—”

“Like I give a shit. Nick’s not out as anything. You don’t fucking do that. I don’t care if he’s straight or if he’s actually closeted or what—you don’t take people who aren’t out and put them in situations where they’re implied to be queer.”

“He could have said something in a confessional that we don’t know about,” points out Imogen quietly. “Maybe—”

“Do you really believe that, Imogen? Do you?” Tara turns to Nick next. “Have you said anything on camera about being interested in men?”

“I don’t think it’s fair of you to ask that point-blank in front of everyone,” Imogen protests, frowning.

Tara glares at her. “We crossed way past ‘fair’ when Harry sent Nick on a date with James. Does Nick deserve his privacy here? Of course. But they’ve just robbed him of it. They shouldn’t have done that, but they did, so I’m asking Nick: how pissed do I need to be right now?”

For his part, Nick looks like he wants to drop dead and permanently melt into a puddle on the ground. “Do I have to go on the date?” he mumbles.

“I’ll let Tori answer that,” says Harry with a disgusting smirk.

Without so much as a second’s pause, Tori is back online. “Yes. However, if you do not find yourself connecting romantically with your date, you are not obliged to, as you humans say, play along.”

Okay, so whoever Tori’s voice actress is actually does presumably say this stuff in realtime. Charlie had been wondering this whole time whether she recorded her lines in advance or what.

Nick bites his lip. “I’m not going to. I… my person is here. I know who my person is, and they’re here. It’s not… this James guy.”

Elle, who’s sitting on Nick’s other side, pats his knee and flashes him a weak smile. “We know. You don’t have to convince us, okay? This is some fucked-up bullshit—” she turns to Harry and levels a death glare at him “—but we listen to you. If you say you’re just doing this because you have to and then going back to Tara, then we believe you.”

But Charlie’s mind is stuck on two things. First: Nick never actually answered Tara’s question to confirm that he’s never said anything about being queer or fancying men on camera, whether it be in a confessional or otherwise. And second: Nick didn’t say Tara’s name just now. He said he had “a person,” but he was incredibly vague about who that person was—and what that person’s gender was. He didn’t even say “she”—he said “they.”

Oh, fuck Charlie in a frying pan.

“James has selected… Nick.”

We immediately see several confessionals in short succession:

Called it, says Elle, snapping her fingers.

I knew it, agrees Tao before we cut back to the cabana, panning over several shocked faces. In a voiceover, Tao continues, I knew he wasn’t straight.

We all knew, Ben adds. It’s not like Nick’s queerness—or Charlie’s—isn’t something that every single person in the house knows by now. Charlie’s even talked about it on camera to Imogen at this point. Tori just had the guts to say out loud what everyone was thinking.

Our narrator says, Ben, are you sure that Tara knew about it? Because the look on her face right now screams that she wants to murder Nick and his firstborn child.

Sure enough, Tara sounds pissed as hell when she says, “Nick’s not queer.” We cut to her face as she looks at Nick and asks, “Have you said anything on camera about being interested in men?”

Meanwhile, Nick looks totally mortified for Tara to find out like this. “Do I have to go on the date?” he mumbles.

Nick, that wasn’t actually an answer, our narrator points out. Are you gonna come clean to Tara or not?

“Yes,” says Tori. “However, if you do not find yourself connecting romantically with your date, you are not obliged to, as you humans say, play along.”

Back in the cabana, he says, “I’m not going to. I… my person is here. I know who my person is, and they’re here. It’s not… this James guy.”

In a voiceover, we hear Nick say, This isn’t how I would have wanted her to find out. We cut to the confessional camera as he continues, We’re going to have a lot to talk about after this is over.

Oh, Nicky, sighs our narrator. You sure are.

Chapter Text

Nick is going on a date with a newcomer, and it’s a boy. It’s a boy.

His mind is buzzing—and not in a good way—as he kisses Tara on the cheek to say goodbye and then follows Tao and Darcy into the dressing room. Really, this shouldn’t come as a shock. He already basically knows from Ajayi that Harry is pushing LGBTQ+ storylines this season and has zeroed in on him and Charlie, and this is probably Harry’s way of trying to pull Nick away from his straight relationship with Tara.

But to send Nick on a date with a man? To make some kind of storyline about Nick’s sexuality so—so public like that? On television?

Somehow, he didn’t really believe Harry would cross that line. Won’t viewers crucify this show if and when they realize that its producers are actively trying to out people like Nick who aren’t out for the entire world to see? And yet that seems to be exactly what’s happening. Nick is going on a date with James, whoever that is, and he’s being expected to—what? Play along? Have a big heart-to-heart with a gay guy who fancies Nick onscreen about his sexuality?

Fortunately, it seems Darcy and Tao are on his side. “This is fucked up, man,” says Darcy in a low voice as she sits down at one of the metal stools and reaches for her makeup. “Harry never, ever should have sent you on a date with a guy without your knowledge and permission.”

“Yeah,” says Nick hoarsely. Apparently, his throat is no longer working correctly because his voice is coming out very weird and wrong.

Tao mutters, “You’re not actually queer, are you?”

“Tao!” scolds Darcy. “Leave him alone about it. Tara may be my best friend here, but Imogen had a point. We shouldn’t be asking, especially not on camera.”

Nick attempts to tell them it’s okay to ask and he really is straight, but he can’t seem to get his voice box to work, at least not the way he wants it to. Maybe it’s because his body knows it would be a lie. Maybe his body knows he’s a fraud. Maybe Nick is a fraud.

It doesn’t really take any of them long to get ready—they just got ready right before the cabana scene, after all—but they have to do this for the cameras, so Nick makes a to-do out of perusing his swimsuit collection and messing with his hair in the mirror. Truly, he has no desire to make himself look any fitter than he probably already does, not when he’s going on a date with a guy and doesn’t want to do it. But this is what he signed up for, right? He gave up his right to privacy when he agreed to do a reality TV show, didn’t he? He’s sure there was some fine print in that contract about how the story editors reserved the right to manipulate events captured onscreen any way they liked. He just never thought that would mean this—being outed on international television when Nick’s not even sure what his sexuality is anymore. He’d been so sure his whole life that he was straight, but now…

Since they’re going to be filming three dates and the people back at the villa simultaneously, Harry’s brought in several additional camera crews, which means it’s not Farouk and the others who go with Nick to the beach for Nick’s date with James. The whole thing really just makes Nick extra uncomfortable. It’s still weird as hell to have intimate moments from his life caught on camera, but it’s at least a little more comforting for the people filming him to be people he hangs around all day and feels like he knows a tiny bit.

That’s bullshit, of course, because the cast doesn’t talk to the crew and Nick doesn’t really know anyone doing the filming, but he feels like he does, anyway. He feels like he can trust Ajayi, at least. Ajayi tried to warn him.

Anyway, he doesn’t know any of these people, which means that little bit of comfort is gone. He sits down on the beach where he’s supposed to be waiting for James and resists the urge to drink the entire bottle of champagne that’s been provided to him. Drinking is a bad idea right now, isn’t it? If Nick gets drunk, his inhibitions are going to go down, and if that happens, he’s more likely to say shit he can’t take back on international television—like that there’s not just a girl, but a boy, back in the villa waiting for him.

Not that Charlie even reciprocates whatever the hell has been happening inside of Nick’s head lately. He doesn’t. He can’t. He’s straight. Right? But the way he looks at Nick sometimes—

He hasn’t been waiting long before James appears, looking incredibly built in nothing but a tight pair of swim trunks. His brown hair is a tiny bit wavy and parted down the middle, and he’s almost as muscular as Nick himself is—and remember, Nick plays semi-pro rugby. But what really gets Nick’s attention is James’s smile. The guy just seems so genuine and sweet—and pretty. Fuck, this man is so, so pretty.

Remember Tara? Remember Charlie? Nick doesn’t have the capacity to handle another pretty person in the villa right now. He needs to buckle down and survive this date, not get caught up in—whatever the hell is happening inside his head right now. He may not be straight, but… something. Like, okay, yes, he’s technically single, but he’s not… exactly single.

“Hi,” calls James. Shit, even his voice is pretty. “I’m James.”

“Nick. Hi.” Nick’s voice is wobbling.

He knows what he’s supposed to say. He promised himself he was gonna tell James first thing that he’s very sorry but he’s not gay and this whole thing has been a misunderstanding. And yet Nick just keeps sitting there staring like a dumb fish as James walks closer and closer, the wind tousling James’s pretty, pretty hair as his pretty, pretty smile gets wider.

Finally, the guy is three paces away, and it occurs to Nick that he should stand up and greet him. Right? That would be the polite thing to do. When he clambers to his feet, though, he makes an idiot out of himself knocking over the two glasses of champagne the producers have poured out for them, getting everything at their little picnic soaked in the process.

“Shit,” Nick mutters. “Sorry. I’m a little nervous.”

James smiles. “I make you nervous?” He doesn’t seem like he’s trying to tease Nick or flirt with him, though. He sounds genuinely surprised, albeit in a pleased sort of way.

“Well, yeah. I’ve never… been on a date with a… a man before.”

“You—you haven’t? Did you ask to go on one, or…?”

“No. The… producers completely blindsided me, actually.”

Nick’s not sure if he’s expecting James to put pressure on him and start flirting or what—say he’ll change Nick’s mind about him or something—but that’s not what James does. “Oh, damn. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. This, um, doesn’t have to be a date if you don’t want it to be a date, okay?”

Nick’s also not sure that he doesn’t want this to be a date, but no way in hell is he saying that on television, especially not when he’s hyperaware of the cameras revolving around them, filming every second of this. So he just purses his lips and says, “I appreciate that. Here, let’s… I mean, we can’t really sit here with champagne everywhere, but—”

“We can salvage it,” says James mildly. “We can move the food and drinks away from the champagne stains so that we’re not sitting in it. I know the blanket’s ruined, but I don’t need a blanket if you don’t. I don’t mind getting a little dirty.”

Oh, fuck. Nick can feel a spectacular blush coming on. “Okay,” he chokes out.

It doesn’t take long to relocate to a section of sand that isn’t drenched in champagne. It almost feels silly to move over—they’re at the beach, and they’re going to get wet anyway if the tide comes in close enough—but there’s a difference between sitting in saltwater and sitting in alcohol, isn’t there? Nick would rather get wet with water than end up feeling all sticky because there’s alcohol drying on the blanket he’s sitting on.

“So tell me about yourself,” says James warmly once they’ve gotten situated. “I don’t know anything about you except that you’re gorgeous and you wanted to spend your summer on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll.”

Holy shit. James thinks this is Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll? Harry didn’t tell him what show he’s really on?

Apparently, James notices Nick’s awkward silence. “Um, hopefully it’s okay for me to call you gorgeous. I didn’t mean it like—it’s just—you are, though. I just meant it like a fact.”

A fact? He thinks Nick being “gorgeous” is a fact? Nick stammers, “That’s—I—what—it’s okay. It’s more than okay.”

“It is? Like, it doesn’t freak you out that the bisexual guy is attracted to you?”

Nick doesn’t answer this. “So you’re bisexual?”

“Pretty much. I usually prefer men over women, but I’ve slept with both.” James pauses to pour out some fresh champagne for them both, then adds, “Um, you didn’t actually tell me anything about yourself. If that’s weird for you, too—”

“It’s not weird. I’m weird. I mean—fuck.” Nick slows down, takes a breath. “Well, I’m from Britain. I’m a semi-pro rugby player, and…”

James raises his eyebrows. “Yeah?”

“I don’t know what else to say,” Nick admits. “I guess I’m starting to realize my life is sort of… empty. I work, and I sleep around, and I don’t do much else. My hobby is my job, and I don’t really do close relationships.”

“You and me both,” admits James. “Well, I wish I had a hobby that I got to do as my job, but I get not having close relationships. Turns out that hot people tend to run away when they find out you’re autistic. Sure, they’ll get in bed with me before that point, but they don’t stick around.”

Nick raises his eyebrows. “You’re autistic?”

“Enough to get diagnosed,” shrugs James.

“Um, and… you realize this conversation is being filmed?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Yeah, but—you’re not worried I won’t run? Or anyone else in the villa? Or anyone who sees this and then meets you?”

“Well, for one thing, you just told me you aren’t interested in dating men.” James smiles that beautiful smile again. “It’s why I said yes when they asked me to join the cast, actually. I don’t think the producers realized from my social media that I was autistic—”

“It’s news to me,” Nick distinctly hears the producer behind them mutter.

“—But I thought it would be a good opportunity to bring some representation onscreen. Maybe I can change how some of the viewers think about us. Anyway, it would be nice not to feel like I have to hide it when I first meet people anymore.”

Nick nods slowly. “That’s… really good of you, actually. That’s a really good goal.”

“Thanks.” James takes a swig of champagne. “So can I ask what your usual type is?”

“I… don’t know if I have one, to be honest,” Nick admits. “Like, I want the people I’m with to be fun to talk to, but I don’t think it makes sense to rule people out just based on what they look like. There’s so much more to a person than their physical appearance. I pursue people because talking to them feels right, not because their looks fit into some box I made up.”

James smiles. Fuck, he has an absolutely stunning smile. “And in there?” He nods behind Nick, who turns around to glance at the villa. “Is there already someone you’re pursuing?”

“…Yes.”

“And what are they like?”

“Darker than me. Piercing eyes. Beautiful smile. Beautiful laugh. Beautiful everything. A little damaged, but I don’t see that as a problem. We’re all a little damaged, right? I swear I don’t have a savior complex or anything, but I just want… to help. I want to keep the smile on their face. I want to be someone they can trust.”

The problem is, Nick’s not sure if he’s talking about Tara or Charlie. Scratch that: the problem is, Nick’s definitely talking about Charlie. And if Nick hasn’t made that obvious with the pronouns he’s been using—

James doesn’t pry, though. “They sound very lucky to have someone like you in their corner,” he murmurs instead.

Nick screws his eyes shut. He doesn’t know anything about this James guy except that he’s fit and he doesn’t seem judgmental and he’s definitely attracted to Nick, and Nick just—

“Turn the cameras off,” he says abruptly.

There’s a short pause. Eventually, when James doesn’t answer and Nick doesn’t elaborate, somebody from the crew (the producer, Nick thinks) says, “What?”

“Turn the cameras off. I want to say something, and I don’t want it recorded.”

“But we… we can’t just turn the cameras off. Harry will have all our heads if—”

“Then I’ll turn my mic off. Go ahead and try and film me like that. See if you even can.”

“We’ll still get it,” says the mixer apologetically. “It’ll sound just like the overnight scenes in the bedroom do—clear enough audio to air.”

“Nick, it’s okay,” says James quickly in a mollifying sort of voice. “Whatever it is, we don’t have to talk about it now.”

Closing his eyes, Nick rubs his temples and thinks. He’s blowing this out of proportion. He knew going into this date that it was all going to be filmed, and he has no reason to tell specifically James that he—that he thinks he’s falling for Charlie. He needs to suck it up and save it for when he gets back to the villa and talks to—he doesn’t know. Someone. It’s awkward because Tara’s kind of his closest friend in there, but if it’s too weird to tell her, then he’ll find someone else to tell—off-camera in one of the rooms in the villa that’s safe.

“You’re right,” he mutters. “I overreacted. Sorry.”

“You didn’t overreact,” James murmurs. “I’d be feeling on edge, too, if they were doing to me what you say they’ve just done to you.”

Nick bites his lip. “Yeah,” he says eventually.

James hesitates, then adds, “Are you saying that—that you’re straight and getting cast in a queer role you didn’t ask for? Or were you—actually, I guess I shouldn’t ask on camera if this was an outing situation. You shouldn’t have to confirm that to the world.”

“It hardly matters if I admit anything on camera or not,” Nick mumbles. “I already know they’re twisting everything I say to fit… whatever narrative they’re trying to push.” He awkwardly avoids looking at any of the crew. (He knows he’s not supposed to be looking in the first place, but the fact that he’s complaining about them right in front of them onscreen makes it harder to resist temptation.)

“That’s so unfair,” James murmurs. “If they wanted queer relationships, they should have brought on more queer cast members. Is anyone but me even…?”

“There are a couple trans and nonbinary people, but I don’t know about queer ones. Everyone’s straight that I know of, anyway.”

James frowns. “They had their opportunity right here. It’s a brand-new show. They could have set whatever tone they wanted to set with who they picked for the cast.”

Oh, right: James doesn’t know what show they’re really on. Nick should probably do something about that.

“It’s not a brand-new show,” he admits.

James frowns. “What?”

“It’s not a new show,” repeats Nick. “They lied. I thought it was Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, too, but it’s not. They fooled us, James.”

Realization seems to be dawning on James’s face, but he looks like he’s not quite ready to admit that he believes it. “You’re saying… this isn’t… what?”

“How many Netflix dating shows do you know of that lie to their casts about what show it really is?” Nick mutters.

After a long pause, James’s voice drops to a whisper. “We’re on Too Hot to Handle?”

Nick bites his lip. Nods. “Yeah. We’re on Too Hot to Handle.”

“No. But…”

“Yes,” says Nick heavily. “No kissing—having sex—even masturbating.”

“What?” yelps James. “No way. There can’t be—this isn’t—I can’t have just signed on to go without sex for a whole month. Can I?”

“Well, you don’t have to,” Nick mumbles. “Just ask me. I’m one of the worst rule-breakers in the villa.”

James frowns. “Wait, with—but if you’re getting publicly shamed for all your rule breaks, then how—”

“I paired up with one of the women on the first day,” says Nick. “Everything else is… yeah. That’s all that’s going on. That’s all that’s supposed to be going on, anyway.”

He realizes too late that he just slipped up—that he just implied, directly and onscreen, that there’s more happening than the cameras have really been capturing. Great. As if Harry needed any more ammunition to fuel whatever edit he’s pushing.

“Well, I won’t say anything about anything if you, uh, keep the autistic thing to yourself for at least a few days,” offers James. “I don’t want to be a hypocrite—I’m gonna tell people—but I just want to give them the opportunity to get to know me for me a little bit first before I bring it up.”

“Deal,” agrees Nick. He turns to the producer. “And for the record, you should be ashamed of yourselves for airing lies about people just for the ratings.”

The producer doesn’t answer. Nick bites his tongue, as usual.

Nick’s looking nervous as fuck sitting on the beach as he waits for his date to start. Tori has laid out a little picnic for him and James, complete with a checkered sheet Nick’s sitting on and twin glasses of champagne—which Nick promptly knocks over the second he greets James and goes to stand up. Smooth, remarks our narrator as Nick apologizes, telling James, “I’m a little nervous.”

To be fair, I would be, too, our narrator comments as we pan back over James’s chiseled abs.

“I make you nervous?” James asks, surprised.

“Well, yeah. I’ve never… been on a date with a… a man before.”

“Oh, damn,” says James in a stunned voice.

Look at you stepping outside your comfort zone, Nick, cheers on our narrator. Just don’t forget you already have a man back in the villa, and his name is Charlie—and that’s on top of your woman named Tara. God, this guy is popular.

Clearly embarrassed, Nick blows right past this. “Here, let’s… I mean, we can’t really sit here with champagne everywhere, but—”

James assures him, “We can salvage it. We can move the food and drinks away from the champagne stains so that we’re not sitting in it. I know the blanket’s ruined, but I don’t need a blanket if you don’t. I don’t mind getting a little dirty.”

I wouldn’t mind getting a little dirty with you, says our narrator, and judging by that blush on his face, I don’t think Nick would, either.

We cut to a confessional of James, who’s smiling warmly at the camera. Nick is just looking so cute, he gushes to us. Do you see that blush? His face is literally as red as his swim trunks.

And I think we need to give James a grammar lesson on the correct meaning of the word “literally,” adds our narrator.

We cut back to the beach, where James and Nick have gotten reoriented a little ways away, minus the checkered sheet. James is saying kindly, “So tell me about yourself. I don’t know anything about you except that you’re gorgeous and you wanted to spend your summer on Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll.”

Oh, right, our narrator tells us. Did Tori and I forget to mention that the newbies don’t know what show they’re really on?

Taking a deep breath, Nick answers, “Well, I’m from Britain. I’m a semi-pro rugby player, and…”

“Yeah?” asks James, raising his eyebrows.

Nick confesses, “I don’t know what else to say. I guess I’m starting to realize my life is sort of… empty. I work, and I sleep around, and I don’t do much else. My hobby is my job, and I don’t really do close relationships.”

“And that’s why I’m here,” quotes our narrator. “I don’t really do close relationships, and that’s why Tori selected me for Too Hot to Handle, the show we’re all actually on.”

But Nick doesn’t take the bait. Instead, James replies, “You and me both. Well, I wish I had a hobby that I got to do as my job, but I get not having close relationships.”

“But I’m ready to take the plunge,” our narrator eggs Nick on. “This is Too Hot to Handle, and I’m here to start building one.”

Again, Nick dodges. “So you’re bisexual?”

“Pretty much. I usually prefer men over women, but I’ve slept with both.” There’s a short pause as they both drink. “So can I ask what your usual type is?”

“I… don’t know if I have one, to be honest. Like, I want the people I’m with to be fun to talk to, but I don’t think it makes sense to rule people out just based on what they look like. There’s so much more to a person than their physical appearance. I pursue people because talking to them feels right, not because their looks fit into some box I made up.”

Is it just me, remarks our narrator, or is Nick turning on the charm deliberately here?

Unfazed, James smiles and asks, “And in there?”

For a moment, Nick just screws his eyes shut. We cut to James’s face, then back to Nick’s, and then Nick says, “They lied. I thought it was Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, too, but it’s not. They fooled us, James.”

Finally, drawls our narrator.

“You’re saying… this isn’t… what?”

Nick mutters, “How many Netflix dating shows do you know of that lie to their casts about what show it really is?”

There’s a very strained silence, and then James whispers, “We’re on Too Hot to Handle?”

Nick bites his lip. Nods. “Yeah. We’re on Too Hot to Handle.”

“No. But…”

“Yes,” says Nick heavily. “No kissing—having sex—even masturbating.”

“What? No way. There can’t be—this isn’t—I can’t have just signed on to go without sex for a whole month. Can I?”

“Well, you don’t have to. Just ask me. I’m one of the worst rule-breakers in the villa.”

James, please don’t take dating advice from this guy, advises our narrator. He’s juggling three different people and has cost the group how much money again?

“Is there already someone you’re pursuing?”

“…Yes.”

“And what are they like?”

“Darker than me. Piercing eyes. Beautiful smile. Beautiful laugh. Beautiful everything. A little damaged, but I don’t see that as a problem. We’re all a little damaged, right? I swear I don’t have a savior complex or anything, but I just want… to help. I want to keep the smile on their face. I want to be someone they can trust.”

Our narrator adds, Uh, color me confused. Is he talking about Tara or about Charlie?

We cut back to James’s confessional. Nick seems like a great guy, but he’s also pretty clearly hung up on someone already, so I’m just gonna move on to the next. Hopefully, we can stay friends, though. I’d like that.

I bet you would, agrees our narrator. But you better be careful. That old saying about how men and women can’t be friends? I think it applies to bi men with bi men, too.

Chapter Text

For some reason, Charlie feels sick with nerves the entire time Nick is out on his date with James. Actually, scratch that: Charlie knows exactly why he’s nervous. Half of him is scared that he’s going to like this James person better than he likes Charlie, and the other half, a tiny little half in the back of Charlie’s head that he tries and fails to pretend isn’t there, is hopeful that dating James will—what? Make Nick realize he’s attracted to men? Nick’s not attracted to men. Charlie’s just being stupid.

This date changes nothing. Nick is with Tara. He’s already taken by the biggest rule-breaker in the house, and what happens on this date with James isn’t going to change that. Even if it does change that, all that’s going to happen is that Nick will jump beds from Tara to James. He’s still going to be emotionally unavailable to Charlie. They’re, like, barely even friends.

Except—it’s the way Nick looks at him sometimes. And twice now, he’s made these little comments that make it sound very much like his feelings for Charlie are more ambiguous than either of them would like to admit.

And Charlie feels like he has some authority on the subject because Nick seems to be doing exactly what Charlie is doing by holding his cards close to his chest. Charlie didn’t come to this show looking to have a sexuality crisis, either. Now that one has happened, of course he doesn’t want to talk about it onscreen—even if he’s torn, even if part of him wants to run to Nick and confess everything.

Maybe he doesn’t have a choice. Maybe it’s pointless to try to keep anything a secret when Harry is pushing this narrative whether Charlie likes it or not. But there’s a difference between the cast thinking Charlie and Nick are unwilling participants in this storyline and them knowing there’s any truth to how he and Nick are being portrayed—or at least how Charlie is being portrayed.

Charlie fancies Nick. Fuck. Charlie fancies Nick.

The crew is following around Tara, Isaac, and Elle to see how they react to the stress of their partners going on dates, and Charlie nopes all the way out of joining them and stays as far away from the cameras as he can get. Ultimately, this means parking himself in a room at the far end of the villa with Sahar and Imogen to protect himself from all of his words being filmed and used against him later. He kind of wishes they were down by the beach, but the beach is off-limits right now because it’s where three different dates are simultaneously being filmed, so indoors it is.

Since Charlie apparently has some big reputation for having all the dirt on everyone around here, Sahar is obviously dying to ask him why the producers sent Nick on a date with James. Imogen, however, is obviously going to kill her if she pries.

“Can I just ask—”

“No.”

“But is Nick really—”

“No.”

“I just want to know—”

“No, Sahar,” says Imogen firmly. “If there were people in that cabana—which there were—who were surprised to see Nick go on a date with a man, then what Harry just did to him counts as outing, and nobody who doesn’t have the full story already should be asking any questions of anybody else. If Nick chooses to reveal more, then that’s one thing, but Nick’s not here right now, which means it’s none of our business if Charlie knows more or not.”

“You think I don’t understand that?” says Sahar hotly. “I’m bisexual, remember? You wouldn’t—”

“I’m also bisexual,” Imogen snaps. “And I was outed to my conservative parents when I was in high school. So sue me for caring about protecting Nick from going through any more of what I went through than he already has. If he’s said something to some people or in a confessional or not—none of it matters. It’s none of our business until he makes it our business.”

There’s a very stunned silence as Charlie finds himself feeling very much like he’s not supposed to be here for this conversation. This feels private, like he’s an intruder, but how does he bow out now without looking like an asshole who doesn’t care about Imogen?

And he does care about Imogen. He may not know her very well, but she took his side over Ben’s—her partner’s—when he told her what Ben did to him, and that’s not nothing. That’s not nothing at all, and Charlie—Charlie feels a specific sense of loyalty to Imogen that he doesn’t quite feel to anyone else in this villa. He has other loyalties, yes—to Elle and to Tao and to Isaac and to Nick—but the one to Imogen feels different because she had every reason to defend Ben, but didn’t.

“Shit,” Sahar murmurs. Her voice sounds completely changed—soft and sensitive like Charlie’s never heard it. “Imogen, I am so sorry. I had no idea.”

Wordlessly, Charlie reaches out to rub Imogen’s shoulder. She shuts her eyes for a second, purses her lips, and then smiles weakly at them both.

“It’s okay,” she says quietly. “It’s fine. It was a long time ago.”

Sahar’s lip is wobbling. “And you weren’t ready for us to know? That’s fine, but—but then why did you kiss me back the first night? Why agree to film with me?”

Imogen takes a deep breath. “It’s not exactly a secret that I’m bi, but I just—it just takes me a little while to warm up to people still before I usually tell them. I don’t post it on social media or anything, and I’ve… I haven’t done anything with another girl since high school. I’ve been too scared of word leaking out like it did back then. I like you, Sahar, I do, and I kissed you back because I was a little drunk and could—could pass it off like you were coming onto me and I was just rolling with it. I wasn’t planning on coming out on this show, but I changed my mind. I was going to open up to you when we filmed today. I just… realized the last couple days that being with another woman is nothing to be ashamed of, not compared to Ben. He’s what I should have been ashamed of.”

“You had nothing to be ashamed of with him,” says Charlie quietly. “You didn’t know. You ended it as soon as you did know. He took advantage of you as much as he did me.”

Imogen shakes her head. “That’s not true. He didn’t… hurt me. I mean, he wasn’t very nice to me after we got together, but… it wasn’t like that. Don’t diminish what you’ve been through just to make me feel better.”

“Okay, but don’t diminish what you’ve been through to make me feel better,” says Sahar. “You weren’t ready to bring our… whatever we are to camera. I can understand that. It doesn’t make me feel bad about myself. I know I’m kind of… abrasive sometimes, but I do understand. I don’t want to see anyone outed, either, including you.”

“I haven’t been outed, though,” Imogen points out. “I’m okay. Nick is the one I’m worried about. Whether he’s in the closet or they’re just manipulating things to make it look like he is, we shouldn’t have found out like that. Tara was right about that much.”

And then a horrible thought strikes Charlie. Nick really hasn’t been involved with any of the men here—at least, not that Charlie knows of—and he has every reason to believe that the only information the producers are working off of is their suspicion that there are some kind of feelings between Nick and Charlie that they can pass off as a romantic relationship. If Charlie doesn’t say anything when Sahar is right here basically asking him if Nick is straight or not, is Charlie making it seem to Sahar and Imogen like Nick isn’t straight by not admitting what he knows? Is Charlie as bad as Harry for framing Nick’s sexuality as this big mystery? It’s not a mystery. Charlie has no reason to believe Nick’s not straight, and by keeping quiet, he’s suggesting otherwise—projecting queerness onto Nick that he has no business projecting there.

Then again… and it feels almost impossible to believe, but… what if Harry is right that there’s some kind of mutual feelings between Charlie and Nick under the surface? If Charlie says what he knows, are people going to go looking for something that is there that Nick isn’t ready to talk about yet? Or is Charlie just making excuses to avoid having to risk shedding any light on what he feels for Nick?

This whole situation is making his head hurt. It’s exhausting. It’s like, no matter what Charlie does, he feels like the bad guy—like he’s manipulative or evil or a horrible, horrible friend.

“Charlie,” asks Sahar quietly, “are you okay? You look a little…”

He shakes his head and smiles. “I’m fine. Sorry. Just… just thinking. I just feel really bad for Nick, that’s all.”

“Me, too,” sighs Imogen. “I’m gonna have to talk to him when he gets back from his date—away from the cameras. He’s one of my best friends in here. I don’t want to pressure him to reveal more than he wants to, but I want him to know I’m on his side.”

“Same,” agrees Sahar. “We can do it together, if you want?”

Charlie’s half afraid they’re going to invite him to get in on this, which would be all sorts of awkward, so he’s relieved when Imogen says, “No. We should do it separately. There might be a reason he’s more comfortable being open with one or both of us individually. We should give him that chance.”

But then Charlie has another horrible thought. He’s going to have to talk to Nick about this, isn’t he? They both know at this point what Harry’s doing and why, and it would be rude as shit for Charlie to let Nick navigate handling the reactions from the rest of the house without saying a word of support to him. But what the fuck is Charlie supposed to say?

He’s going to have to figure it out—and fast. He’s got, what, a couple of hours before Nick comes back from his date? The sheer thought of it makes Charlie feel so overwhelmed that he could cry.

It doesn’t feel like much time passes (but, in reality, it’s probably a couple of hours) before the door swings open to reveal Harry, sans camera crew, looking impatient. “There you three are. Let’s go. We need you out there.”

Charlie hugs his elbows protectively. “If this is about wanting to get my reaction to the date Nick’s on right now—”

“‘Right now?’ Charlie, the dates are pretty much over. We need to get everyone’s reactions to meeting the grenades.”

He raises his eyebrows. “Uh, ‘grenades?’”

“It’s what they call new arrivals on this show,” says Sahar in an undertone. “Are we at least having dinner first? I’m starving.”

Harry shakes his head. “Everybody can eat together after we’ve filmed introductions. Oh, and we’ll need to get confessionals from everyone before bed tonight. That goes for you, too, Charlie.”

“When have I ever not given you a confessional you asked for?” mutters Charlie as he drags himself to his feet and follows Imogen and Sahar out of the room.

Unfortunately, Harry overhears this. “Why don’t I make you an itemized fucking receipt of every time you didn’t comply with instructions? Would that refresh your memory?”

“Wow,” whispers Imogen to Charlie. “Someone’s touchy.”

The sun has long since gone down on our original horny hotties, and we group back up with them on the patio, where they’re sitting in two big gaggles divided up by gender. Our narrator informs us, Tao may have stayed strong when faced with Naomi’s wiles, but Darcy might be in hot water when she reveals to Isaac how frisky she and Felix got on the beach earlier tonight. Personally, though? What I’m dying to see is Nick coming clean to Tara about why exactly Tori pegged him as a good match for James. Is Tara finally going to find out about Nick and Charlie’s little secret? Or is Nick going to live to lie another day?

We zoom in on Tara, who’s sitting together with Elle on a wooden loveseat and looking stressed—like, really stressed. Elle’s got her arm around Tara and murmurs, “It’s okay. Maybe it’s just a misunderstanding.”

Um, Elle? Don’t give the poor girl false hope. It’s not like you believed it was a misunderstanding when you were saying—what was Elle’s reaction to James picking Nick again?

For a second, we get a greyed-out repeat clip of Elle’s confessional from right after it happened earlier today. Called it, she declares proudly.

You can practically hear our narrator wincing as she says, Not your best look, Elle.

“I still just can’t believe it,” mutters Tara. We pan away and see Imogen’s and Sahar’s sympathetic faces as Tara continues, “I can’t believe he would do this to me.”

“Maybe there’s a simple explanation,” suggests Elle, but even she doesn’t sound that optimistic.

I kind of doubt it, Elle, our narrator tells us. I mean, I guess that Nick coming back hand in hand with James saying, “Surprise! I’m gay!” is a simple explanation, but not the kind Tara is looking for here. Or Charlie, for that matter. I wonder how he’s doing with this whole date situation?

We cut to Charlie, who’s sitting uncomfortably with Ben and Isaac ten yards away. “Maybe—” Ben starts to say, and Isaac literally reaches over and swats him in the face to shut him up.

As we cut back to the girls, our narrator continues, Ouch. Looks like those two won’t be sharing a bed tonight, even if Darcy kicks Isaac out to snuggle with Felix all night instead. And by “snuggle,” I mean “have sex with.” Can one of our new couples bring a machete back with them real quick so that we can cut through some of this tension? Oh, there they are.

As if on cue, we see the girls suddenly all straighten up in their seats—and then we see why. It’s Nick and James, looking pretty friendly as they walk up the path toward the patio, Nick flashing the girls with a timid smile and a big wave. Our narrator assesses, Okay, so they’re not holding hands, but they’re still walking awfully close to each other. You’d think Nick would realize Tara’s and Charlie’s feelings are on the line here, but hey, the guy’s not known for his emotional sensitivity. Producers, back me up on this?

We roll tape on an old clip of Nick’s introductory confessional. It’s like, the second I tell them I’m a rugby player, their panties just drop right then and there, he drawls, and then time freezes on the smug look on his face as he realizes in a voiceover, Shit. My mum is going to be watching this.

Yeah, says our narrator, dripping with sarcasm. Real sensitive guy.

“Oh my god, Nick,” bursts Tara, wringing her hands. Okay, says our narrator, she sounds—relieved? Maybe she’s just happy to see Nick and James aren’t, like, holding hands. Or making out right in front of her. “And—James?”

“James,” Nick agrees, tilting his head toward the guy. “James, this is Tara, my—yeah. And this is Imogen and Sahar and Elle.”

While we watch James make his rounds hugging all the girls who stand to greet him, our narrator remarks, He definitely dodged that one. Close call, buddy, but I don’t know how much longer you can last before Tara drops the G word.

Suddenly, the word “G-string” appears on the screen, and our narrator snorts, Not that one. We cross out G-string, only to replace it with “G-spot.” Dear god, not that one, either. We cross it out again, and our next guess is “girlfriend.” There we go. This is Netflix, guys, not pay-per-view.

James is just settling in next to Elle on the sofa when Tara rubs her hands against her thighs and stands again. “Nick, we should probably talk. That’s how this works, right? We touch base after we date other people?”

Yeesh. Tara sounds more pissed than is strictly necessary about this. Tara, honey, Nick didn’t ask to go on a date with someone who wasn’t you. He just—kissed Charlie behind your back and then lied about it while breaking rules with you. Right. Okay, maybe Nick does deserve the brunt of Tara’s anger here.

Nick suddenly looks very, very nervous. “Um, yeah. Will you walk with me?”

Our narrator sighs, Finally. This definitely means we’re getting some real answers about Nick’s sexuality and what happened between him and Charlie. Right? As the cameras pan to James asking Sahar to introduce him to the other boys, we hear our narrator continue desperately, Right?! You’re not really going to make me sit through our horny singles meeting Felix or Naomi before I get some goddamn answers, are you?

Chapter Text

Nick wishes very, very desperately that he could talk to Tara away from Harry and Kieran and all these fucking cameras, but that’s not an option, and he knows it. It’s kind of futile anyway—what would he even say to her if he were able to get to her alone? It’s not like he can tell her about the Charlie thing. Maybe he could fill her in about Harry pushing the production crew to fabricate some kind of romance between Nick and Charlie—but that would just lead to questions about how much of it was fabricated and how much of it was inspired by reality, and Nick has no desire to answer any of those, either.

In any case, there’s no point speculating about what Nick would say if he were alone with Tara right now because he’s not: they have to film this conversation in front of Harry as well as the entire crew that filmed Nick’s date with James. Nick really wishes he could at least do this with Farouk, Ajayi, and the crew he knows instead of these strangers, but that’s not an option, either, not when the usual team is needed on the patio to keep filming James’s conversations with everyone else.

That includes Charlie, Nick realizes suddenly with a sick feeling in his stomach. James is over there meeting Charlie right now, and who knows what Charlie is thinking about all this? But Nick doesn’t dare try to talk to Charlie, not tonight. He doesn’t have the first clue what he would say to him, not when Charlie can’t find out that Nick maybe sort of fancies him (it’s at the point where Nick has to admit it to himself now). Plus, again, there’s the whole issue of really not wanting to have that conversation on camera—and the extra complication of Charlie being pretty uncomfortable talking to anybody off camera after whatever Ben did to him.

Fucking Ben fucking ruining everything. Nick hopes he gets booted off the show—and soon.

Tara still looks livid, presumably about Harry trying to out Nick as something he may or may not even be before Nick was anywhere close to coming out to anyone as anything but straight. Even so, she also looks relieved—to have Nick back, maybe? To have the opportunity to talk to him away from the others? God, Nick hopes she doesn’t ask him again whether he’s straight or not. He doesn’t even know himself, and he doesn’t want to have to lie to her about it just because the cameras are rolling. He doesn’t want to say anything about any of it to anyone at all.

“Here’s good,” says Harry.

Nick furrows his eyebrows. “What?”

“Here’s good to film. I want to get shots of you two sitting down on that loveseat—” Harry points “—and then you two can talk. Make it nice and long, but not too long. You both still need to meet Felix and Naomi tonight, and then I’ll need confessionals of you both. Kieran, can you pop back to the patio and direct over there? I want to stay with the couples tonight, at least until we start confessionals.”

Glowering at Harry, Tara snaps, “How late do you expect us to film tonight, anyway? It’s, what, eight o’clock at night already? If you still have to film us, Tao and Elle, and Darcy and Isaac, plus James, Felix, and Naomi meeting everybody, and then confessionals from everyone—with a bedroom scene at the end—and we haven’t even had dinner yet—”

Nick is just waiting for steam to start coming out of Harry’s ears as he rounds on Tara and snaps right back, “It’ll take as long as it’ll take, won’t it? You all signed up for this when you signed your contracts, little miss, and—”

“Oh, did we, now? Did Charlie sign up to get sexually harassed by another cast member? Did Nick sign up to get outed by the crew on international tele—”

Closing his eyes, Harry seems to be trying to collect himself or something. Finally, he interrupts, “I don’t know. Did he get outed? Is he queer? He’ll tell you everything, but only if you save it for the fucking cameras—”

“Fine,” hisses Tara. “You know what? Fine. Let’s film this fucking scene for your precious little show and its precious little ratings, but you’ll be lucky not to hear from our lawyers when we all get out of here and get back to civilization—”

“I look the fuck forward to it.” Harry smiles, which seems to just infuriate Tara further, but there’s no use: Harry’s in control, at least for now, and Nick and Tara both know it. “Kieran, get out of here. I want us rolling right the fuck now. Lighting? Sound? Are we a go?”

It takes just a couple of minutes for the cameras to start rolling again. Nick has to hand it to Tara: she’s an incredible actress. In that short amount of time, she manages to bury her anger below the surface and start channeling care and relief, twisting her face in sympathy and clinging to Nick’s arm as they take their seats on the loveseat. The second their asses hit the cushion, her head is on his shoulder.

“It’s so good to have you back,” Tara murmurs. “I missed you so much today.”

Did she really miss Nick, or is she just trying to play up her role as his doting love interest? He hates not knowing how much of anything caught on film is real. He knows Tara cares about him—that much is clear even in their offscreen interactions—but did she really miss him? How is Harry going to splice this against her fury during the cabana scene where Nick’s date with James was announced? How did Tara portray herself when she was filmed here at the house during the date, and how is Nick supposed to know what she wants him to play along with?

Or would Tara be upset if Nick even suggested that the way she’s acting right now isn’t authentic? He’s really starting to regret privately having agreed with Tara to falsify some of their on-camera storylines. It’s starting to get so confusing trying to figure out what’s real and what’s not.

There is one thing Nick knows, and it’s that he is a terrible actor. So fuck it, he decides. He’s going to try to be real and let Harry and the production crew edit this whichever way they want. That’s what they’re going to do anyway, isn’t it? It doesn’t matter what direction he or even Tara tries to push them: what they want to see doesn’t matter.

Nick never should have signed up for this show. Honestly, he has half a mind to quit tonight. Of course, if Nick quits tonight, he’s probably never going to see any of the cast ever again—probably never going to see Charlie ever again.

“You missed me?” His voice sounds high-pitched and weird. “I thought you were mad.”

Tara smiles gently. “Not at you. More at the situation. You haven’t done anything wrong, Nick.”

He blinks. “Oh. Right. Um, thanks.”

“Look, I know Imogen is going to have my head for asking you this, but are you queer? I mean—” she shoots a very ugly glare at Harry before she continues “—is that something you’ve brought on camera at any point? I just need to know before we take this any further. If this isn’t something you want talked about, then I don’t care how badly it fucks over the editors: I won’t talk about it. But if it’s something you have put out there on camera already, and you’re comfortable with us talking about it in scenes like this one—”

“Cut,” barks Harry. There’s a slight commotion as they stop rolling and the gaffer checks in with the camera operators about god knows what—Nick’s not paying attention. “Tara, I can’t use any of this.”

“Sure you can,” says Tara with a glare. “You always find a way to edit the hell out of any scene you get on camera, don’t you? Well, edit the hell out of this one.”

“But—”

“You better start rolling again before Nick answers my question,” she threatens.

Harry is clearly not taking Tara’s insubordination very well. “I can write you the fuck out of this show, you know—”

“And lose one-half of one of your two main couples?” Tara reminds him. “I don’t think so.”

She has a point, and Harry knows it. “Bitch,” he mutters—but before she or Nick can call him out on this, he adds, “Take two?”

“Rolling,” says one of the camerawomen. To her credit, even she looks annoyed about it.

Tara looks furious, and Nick doesn’t blame her: as far as he’s concerned, what Harry just called her constitutes sexual harassment. “You okay?” he murmurs. “We don’t have to do this now. We could reshoot tomorrow.”

“No, it’s fine. It’s fine. Just give me a second.” Tara rolls her eyes, takes a deep breath, and slides the mask back into place. Nick would be impressed if he weren’t so frustrated. “Where were we? Oh. Nick—has there been anything about your sexuality on camera already?”

How does he even answer that? He already knows Harry’s going to edit it like there has been when this goes into post-production—but that’s not because of anything Nick has actually said to anyone. As far as the entire cast knows, Nick is straight as an arrow. Does it count as lying to tell Tara that everybody else thinks so, too?

So he chooses his words carefully. “Not because of anything I’ve said. Tara, I’m straight. You have to believe me. I’m straight. I don’t fancy James any more than I fancy any other man here. I fancy you.”

Tara looks straight into Nick’s eyes—and nods. “I believe you. It’s okay.” She glares back at Harry and mutters, “You fuckers. You don’t fuck with people’s lives like that.”

“Tara, please let it go. Please? I just want this all to blow over, honestly. And… I guess our date wasn’t that bad. James didn’t, like, make a move or anything.”

Tara smiles sadly. “Well, at least there’s that. I probably would have rioted if he’d tried to force anything on you.” (Nick chuckles.) “You deserve better than all of this, Nick.”

“So do you,” points out Nick. “Honestly, it’s shit that either of us had to come on this show in the first place.”

Harry is glaring bullets at them both, but Nick doesn’t particularly care. Harry only gets to have an opinion again about what they say when they’re filming when he takes back the date he sent Nick on today, and seeing as that’s not happening, Nick’s just… done. He’s done. If Harry’s going to play this game his way, then Nick’s going to play it his way, too. Let Harry sort out what to do with it. That’s Harry’s problem, not Nick’s.

“James seems like a nice guy,” remarks Tara. “I hope he knew what he was getting himself into when he joined this show.”

Pursing his lips, Nick shakes his head.

“Oh, shit. He doesn’t still think it’s Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, does he?”

“No. Not anymore. I, uh, broke the news to him pretty early on. He wasn’t happy, but—well—I think he’ll be okay. Sex isn’t the only reason he came to the house.”

“That’s good. If he had, he would have been in for a pretty rude awakening.” Tara relaxes a little. “Well, I hope he still can accomplish his goals for going on reality television, whatever they are. Wouldn’t it be great if he could just replace Ben entirely so we wouldn’t have to look at his stupid face anymore?”

Nick grins. “I wish.”

“I feel bad for whichever newbie ends up sharing a bed with Ben tonight—”

“Cut,” says Harry again. Half the crew starts grumbling under their breaths again, except the mixer, who’s probably still capturing all the audio. “Can we stay on topic, please?”

“Can you eliminate cast members who make this place an unsafe working environment, please?” Tara claps back. It would be funny if the entire situation weren’t so fucked up.

Harry rolls his eyes. “Start rolling again on these two so we can salvage some footage before they completely fuck up what’s left of this scene, can we?”

Nick sighs as the cameras resume take three. “Forget it, okay?” he tells Tara. “Charlie will be okay. We’ll make sure of that.”

Grimacing, Tara nods. “Yeah. Sure. Is there anything else we need to talk about, or…?”

For a second, he just reflects on everything he’s not telling Tara: how flustered James gets him, how flustered Charlie gets him, how Harry’s inventing this whole relationship between Nick and Charlie and the kicker is that he didn’t even really have to invent much of it. And then he shakes his head. “No. I’m good. We’re good. Come here.”

And he gives Tara a tight hug and tries to pretend like none of this is happening—but it is. It is, and it’s going to catch up to him sometime. It’s just a matter of when.

It’s an excruciating couple of minutes watching James meet Charlie, Ben, and Isaac—and then watching Tao introduce Naomi to Sahar, Imogen, and an anxious-looking Elle—before we finally, finally, cut back to Nick and Tara as they’re getting settled on a loveseat. Our narrator seems to be in the same boat, declaring, Finally. Can someone get me some tea, please? I take it unsweetened and piping hot.

Tara seems to have settled down a little since we last saw her stressing to Elle about whether Nick and James were getting up to anything on their date. Seriously, she looks all doe-eyed as she murmurs to Nick, “It’s so good to have you back. I missed you so much today.”

Our narrator doesn’t miss the irony. Did somebody get Tara a personality transplant since this afternoon? Or is her strategy to lull this gay boy into a false sense of security before she really goes on the attack?

Nick seems a little suspicious, too, at least judging by how skeptical and high-pitched his voice sounds when he asks, “You missed me? I thought you were mad.”

Tara, however, is smiling. “Not at you. More at the situation.”

Oh, you mean the situation where your fuck buddy is going around kissing and dating other guys? Are you sure you’re not mad at him for that?

We’re not the only ones who seem a little thrown off by this. Blinking, Nick says, “Oh. Right. Um, thanks.”

Now, we can hear a voiceover of Tara in a confessional. I just need to know the fucking truth, she demands in a voice that’s way angrier than the show she’s been putting on for Nick up until now. When we cut to the visual of that confessional, she looks just as livid as she sounds. If he says he’s not queer, then what the fuck is going on here?

Back on the loveseat, Tara starts, “Look—”

Here it comes… prompts our narrator.

“Are you queer? I mean—” We get a glimpse of Tara glaring daggers off into the distance before we cut back to Nick’s panicked face. “I just need to know before we take this any further. If this isn’t something you want… don’t fuck with people’s lives like that,” she finishes furiously.

For a second, we listen to low, tense music as we cut back and forth a few times between Nick’s stressed face and Tara’s, which is bubbling with fury right under the surface. Finally, Nick stammers, “Tara, I don’t fancy James any more than I fancy any other man here.”

Our narrator scoffs, Uh, Nick? Given your track record, that’s not exactly helping your case. Maybe try giving her some actual validation?

Nick complies. “I fancy you.”

Okay, still kind of a non-answer, but not as bad. We’re making progress. We’re growing. We’re… sitting here staring at each other in silence? Awkward.

Tara doesn’t seem to know what to make of this, and we don’t blame her. She continues to sit there watching Nick for a few seconds until he adds, “You okay?”

“No, it’s fine. It’s fine. Just give me a second,” says Tara. She rolls her eyes and takes a deep breath before we cut to a confessional of Nick saying, I need her to believe me, okay? I’m not fucking lying. I wouldn’t do that, not about this.

Our narrator is not convinced. Sure you wouldn’t, Nick. And I’m your host, Jack Henry Maddox.

Nick pleads further, “You have to believe me. Please? James didn’t, like, make a move or anything.”

Okay, but did you make a move on Charlie, Nick? You know she’s going to find out sooner or later, right?

For her part, though, Tara doesn’t seem to want to push—for now. “That’s good,” she tells Nick. We watch Nick’s whole face slacken as she adds, “If he had, I probably would have rioted.”

Nick chuckles, and then we cut back to Tara while he replies, “I just want this all to blow over, honestly. Forget it, okay?”

Tara assures him. “I believe you. It’s okay.”

Do you, though? Is it really?

Nick, at least, seems convinced. “We’re good,” he agrees. Then he adds, “Come here,” and now they’re hugging, Tara burying her face in Nick’s neck and squeezing tight around his shoulders.

You know, I’m still not convinced Nick’s getting away with any of this, starting with lying to Tara’s face about being straight and ending with that kiss he planted on Charlie before Tori’s rules kicked in, complains our narrator. But I guess Nick’s still going to live to fight another day. Somebody take us back to Elle and Tao? And get me a drink. Something strong. I’ll have whatever Charlie was having on night one of the retreat, she adds as we check out a flashback of Charlie drunkenly tossing back shots during the group toast. That stuff looked good.

Chapter Text

James turns out to be pretty a pretty likable person, as far as Charlie can tell. In fact, James is so likable that Charlie kind of can’t stand it. He wanted to hate James, and Charlie’s being honest enough with himself now that he can admit it’s because James fancied Nick enough to want to go on a date with him. But when Charlie asks casually-on-purpose if the date was good, James just smiles and shrugs and says, “It was fine. Nick’s gorgeous, obviously, and he seems sweet, but it’s obvious his attention is fixed on somebody else already. Onto the next, you know?” And James turns straight to Isaac—looking not into his eyes, Charlie thinks, but at his lips—and bites his lip and grins.

Okay. The good news is that Nick probably hasn’t completely fallen for this guy. The bad news, of course, is that he’s still seeing Tara—and Charlie still doesn’t have any proof whatsoever that Nick could possibly be interested in men.

He feels kind of like a hypocrite for even caring, if that makes sense? It’s not like Charlie… okay, well, Charlie’s pretty much been forced to accept today that he is interested in men and does want to fuck Nick’s brains out. It’s the only reason he could have possibly felt how he felt about Nick and James’s date: jealous. Jealous beyond belief, actually. And it explains so many other things: Charlie’s immediate fascination with Nick and why it completely blows out of the water any interest Charlie’s ever had for Darcy or, for that matter, any woman he’s ever met in his life.

He’s… probably gay, okay? Charlie’s probably gay, and he has the hots for Nick, and that’s why he cares so much. That’s why Nick makes him completely and utterly lose his mind and his shit every time they talk and even when they don’t.

But even if Charlie cares, it’s not like Charlie has shown Nick any romantic interest. He’s been repressing the hell out of it, and even now, he’s sure as fuck not ready to display whatever the hell is happening inside his head on international television. He wants to have his sexuality crisis alone, in peace, thank you very much, and that means not telling Nick how Charlie feels about him. And if Charlie is so determined to bury these feelings until he gets off camera and back into the real world where it’s safe to work through things privately again, then why is he so upset with Nick for not being gay on camera, either? Even if, by some random and improbable twist of fate, Nick did return Charlie’s feelings, why should he have to show them to Charlie when Charlie won’t show his feelings to Nick?

There it is, though. Charlie fancies Nick, another man, and he wants Nick to fancy him back—but he doesn’t want any of it filmed. God help him.

James is so busy flirting with Isaac that neither of them seems to notice that Charlie is stuck in his thoughts, obsessing about the Nick situation. At first, Charlie tries to stay engaged in the conversation just to avoid getting singled out by Ben. But then Tao shows up with his date, Naomi, and Ben immediately—like, immediately—starts hitting on her, leaving Charlie’s mind to wander freely without fear of Ben pulling any shit on him.

Naomi turns out to be quite friendly, too, and Felix seems chill when they and Darcy appear. It catches Charlie off guard for a second to discover that Naomi is trans and Felix uses a wheelchair (and he promptly feels guilty for his initial reaction in the next second), but as long as Harry doesn’t pull any transphobic bullshit on Naomi or try to turn Felix into an object of disability porn, then Charlie’s happy. Felix and Darcy certainly seem happy—their hands are pretty much plastered all over each other to the extent Tori will allow it—and that’s all that really matters.

For some reason, when the genders all mix and Charlie comes back in contact with Tara for the first time all day, she seems like she’s kind of in a bad mood. Charlie’s pretty sure she’s still pissed about Nick getting outed on camera (does it count as outing when Nick’s probably straight to begin with?), but he still thinks it’s totally unnecessary of her to practically rip Darcy’s head off just for asking Tara if she’s happy to hear that Nick stayed faithful to her on his date with James.

“Of course he stayed faithful,” Tara barks, crossing her arms. “Nick wouldn’t do that to me. Nick likes who he says he likes. Nick—”

“Okay, okay. Jeez, lady,” says Darcy as she rolls her eyes. “Who bit your tits off this morning?”

In the bedroom, Charlie discovers, the producers have added not one, but two, new beds to accommodate the three new arrivals. Darcy and Isaac seem to have amicably parted: Darcy hops right into Felix’s bed when she enters the room, leaving a space in Isaac’s bed that James shyly asks to claim a few minutes later. With Imogen and Sahar having pretty much both admitted in front of Charlie earlier today that they like each other, and with Ben having flirted so hard with Naomi earlier, Charlie assumes that means he himself will be in the solo bed tonight—so it surprises him when Naomi ignores Ben’s bed altogether and comes round to Charlie’s instead.

“I hope it’s okay if we share tonight,” she says under her breath. “I don’t know any details, but Imogen mentioned in the women’s dressing room that Ben’s done some creepy stuff before. I don’t know any details, but I definitely don’t want to find out from personal experience.”

“Sure,” whispers Charlie. When he glances over at Ben’s bed, Ben is positively fuming—but he doesn’t say anything.

Naomi was the last person left to come in the bedroom, which means it’s time to film bedtime and then actually have bedtime. “I want a nice, clean night tonight, okay?” Imogen tells the group in a very tired voice. “Do you hear me, Tara and Nick?”

Charlie pointedly doesn’t look at Nick and Tara’s bed, where Nick is sort of sheepishly going, “We hear you.”

“And you, Elle and Tao?”

“Got it,” says Tao, holding out a thumbs-up sign. “No reunion sex. Check.”

“Darcy, Isaac, you won’t be corrupting your new bedmates?”

Isaac rolls his eyes and smiles—but Darcy just smirks and says, “I make no promises.” Next to her, Felix giggles.

“Shut up and do what Imogen says,” snarls Tara.

Charlie raises his eyebrows, but says nothing. Sahar, though, remarks not-so-quietly from where she’s sort of curled up in bed with her head on Imogen’s shoulder, “Well, at least we can probably assume Tara and Nick are telling the truth.”

Naomi snorts.

Tara and Nick may not be planning on fooling around tonight—maybe—but that definitely doesn’t mean nobody else is, no matter what everyone just assured Imogen. Charlie would bet money that Darcy and Felix will be hooking up tonight—and he’s also pretty sure that Darcy and Isaac did the same thing last night, even if Tori hasn’t fined them for it yet. Oh, and he would bet his life that Tao and Elle will at minimum be snogging after bedtime—probably more. Possibly a lot more, as annoying as that is.

With how distracted Charlie is by his inconvenient feelings for Nick, he forgets sometimes that he’s probably had the least amount of onscreen sexual or romantic interaction with the rest of the cast out of anybody in this villa. Like, he had those kisses with Darcy and with Imogen on night one, but absolutely nothing has happened to him since. He told the cameras he was interested in Darcy, sure, but that fizzled out fast—he doesn’t think they ever filmed together even once. Normally, he’d be pretty sure it would be a reason for Harry to write him out of the show whenever eliminations start to happen. He’s boring, you know? He’s not giving production any material to work with. But Charlie hasn’t forgotten Ajayi’s warning, and somehow, he thinks production is creating plenty of material about him all on their own without his knowledge, let alone his consent or participation.

It’s pretty weird sharing a bed with Naomi, whom Charlie has exchanged maybe three sentences and a greeting hug with since he first met her. It’s not bad or anything—he likes her perfectly well—but it’s just a little strange compared to sharing with Isaac or Imogen or Sahar, whom Charlie had at least talked to a decent amount before they hopped into bed together. Even that was strange, to be honest, since none of it was sexual. God, this show is weird. Charlie’s not used to sharing a bed with anybody he hasn’t slept with, preferably the night of.

The next morning, Tori wakes everybody up talking ominously about how she hopes everybody behaved themselves with the new arrivals last night and encouraging Naomi, James, and Felix to get settled in and enjoy the day while they still can. “Wait, so we’re not going to the cabana?” asks Imogen, sounding so hopeful it hurts. “People didn’t break rules last night?”

“Oh, rules were broken,” quips Felix, and then they and Darcy dissolve into giggles again.

Isaac informs Imogen, “They probably just want to wait until more time has passed before filming the next few fines. They have to condense this whole month into, what, ten episodes? Twelve at most? There’s just not enough screen time to have Tori yell at us as often as we actually break the rules.”

“Once an accountant, always an accountant,” Tao stage-whispers to Elle, grinning. “Come on, Isaac. Stop doing maths and come to breakfast with us.”

“You, too, Charlie,” adds Elle.

Feeling like it would be rude not to, Charlie turns to Naomi, who’s still sitting up next to him in bed. “You want to join us? I mean, is that weird for you after your date with Tao?”

“No, that sounds nice.” Naomi smiles. “Thanks, Charlie.”

At breakfast, Charlie gets fully up to speed on the whole Elle-Tao-Naomi situation—which is to say that there isn’t much of a situation to get up to speed on. Apparently, Naomi was super attracted to Tao on paper, but they had no sexual chemistry at all on their date, partly because they felt like they had Best Friend Energy and partly because Tao couldn’t stop thinking about Elle the entire time. In fact, the whole thing seems to have worked in Elle’s favor: Tao wasn’t expecting to find anyone here he’d actually want to commit to, and then he did. All the date really did was help him realize that.

Of course, then, they (sans Naomi, who disappears with Felix and Darcy somewhere) have to film that entire conversation over again later that day because major developments aren’t supposed to happen off-camera. Charlie still kind of hates being filmed, but this scene isn’t so bad: it’s not about him, and that helps. Even when conversation turns to Isaac, Charlie’s holding out hope that they can call cut and wrap this up before anybody asks Charlie anything to do with anything about what’s going on inside his head.

“What’s the deal between you and James, Isaac?” asks Elle animatedly. The four of them are kind of chilling together in the pool for this scene, and she splashes a little water Isaac’s way and grins at him. “I wasn’t expecting you two to hit it off.”

Tao adds, “Yeah. Is this, like, a Darcy rebound or what?”

Suddenly, Isaac looks embarrassed. “No. And for the record, Darcy wasn’t ever really…”

Charlie obviously knows what Isaac’s thinking here: he only even messed around with Darcy for the, like, twenty-four hours (if that) that they were “together” on Charlie’s advice, trying to help Isaac get some answers about what his sexuality might be. He’s not sure if Elle and Tao know about that, though, and it turns out they must not when Elle frowns and says, “Darcy wasn’t ever really what? I mean, I’m glad if you’re not feeling all heartbroken about her, but…”

Isaac shakes his head. “I’m not heartbroken. I promise. I was telling Charlie, I think I’m just… not… able to feel things like that for anyone? I mean, I’m still figuring it out. It took coming on a reality TV show full of the fittest women and men that you could imagine for me to realize it. I think I just keep… chasing after something that’s never going to exist for me. I keep thinking the solution to not caring about sex or relationships is to have more sex and relationships until I click with somebody, but… I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m ever going to.”

Elle shrugs. “Makes sense to me. You could be asexual. Or aromantic. Or both.”

Frowning, Isaac asks, “What… does that even mean?”

“Oh, you poor, heteronormatized thing. I meant you might just not be someone who can experience sexual or romantic attraction. It’s a thing. Straight people just like to pretend it isn’t. Hell, even some queer and trans people like to pretend it isn’t. But it is.”

“Clearly, you should have asked Elle about this instead of me to begin with,” mumbles Charlie, feeling pretty embarrassed. “I’ve never heard of any of this before. I probably gave you terrible advice, telling you to do more of what you were doing back before you came to the villa.”

“It’s okay. It wasn’t terrible advice—no, really. Darcy and I had a really good talk after we… uh…”

Tao purses his lips. “Okay, now, Isaac, which rules did you break?”

“Nothing major,” says Isaac quickly. “We kissed, and I—sorry—got her off with my hand. But it didn’t do anything for me, so we talked for a long time about that. She wasn’t offended or anything. She thought I might be gay—I hadn’t ever tried anything with another man before—so it worked out well that James was interested. But I—sorry—did some stuff with him last night, and… I really don’t think I’m gay, either. I mean, it was no worse than doing anything with any of the—sorry, Tao—dozens of women I’ve been with before this—”

“Okay, why are you apologizing to me?” erupts Tao, all mock offended. “Is that supposed to imply that I can’t get girls back home as easily as you? Or—no—is it supposed to imply that I’m not fit enough to get girls back home like you do?”

“It’s okay, Tao. We all know you’re a nerdy little freak deep down,” says Elle, smirking. Tao looks like he’s about to blow his top until she adds, “Then again, so is Isaac, and he’s not even attracted to men. I am, and I fancy you, so I think we can trust my judgment over his.”

“Aww,” Charlie coos at them as Tao rolls his eyes and then, forgetting this entirely, nuzzles his nose against hers. “True love.”

Elle rolls her eyes and smiles. “Yeah, yeah. Isaac, you okay?”

That’s when Charlie notices that Isaac is smiling at them—but it’s an awfully sad smile. “Yeah. Yeah, it’s fine,” he murmurs, but it doesn’t sound convincing. “It just… I get down about it. Thinking I’m never going to have what you two have with anybody. I can believe that I’m just not wired that way and there’s nothing wrong with me for it, but just because you’re, like, a-whatever doesn’t mean you don’t still want things.”

“That makes sense,” says Elle softly. “You have to grieve it to be okay with it. It sounds like a lot to have to accept.”

“That’s amazing if you can figure that out here, though, you know?” Charlie suggests. “Relationships don’t have to be romantic to be meaningful. You don’t have to feel like something’s missing just because you don’t have that, like, piece in your life. You’ve got us, for one thing.”

“Talk about making meaningful relationships without sex,” adds Tao. “Tori would be proud.”

“Yeah, speaking of which,” continues Elle, “how much money are we going to be losing because of you, Isaac?”

He winces. “I don’t even want to think about it. Please don’t make me do the maths.”

“Tori’s going to tell us anyway whenever we film in the cabana next,” Charlie points out.

Tao adds, “Yeah, and I’m sure it’s no more than whatever Elle and I will have spent by then. How much are we up to from the last couple of days since we were fined last?”

“You better not be telling me you’ve forgotten already about me giving you head last night,” says Elle, laughing. “I swear, my jaw still hurt from that when I woke up this morning. Guys, let me tell you—dude is big.”

“Okay, I did not need to know that,” chuckles Isaac.

“Yeah, but I bet it makes you feel better about all the money you’ve spent in the last two days, doesn’t it?”

Isaac smiles weakly, then claps Charlie on the shoulder. “You’re the last one standing,” he informs him. “You’re our only hope for the future—well, you and Imogen. And the newbies. And Sahar, but I don’t think that one was by choice.”

“And you think I’ve stayed strong by choice?” says Charlie without thinking.

Isaac brightens up properly at this. “Oh, this must be good. Who have you got your eye on, then? Imogen or Sahar? It’s got to be one of the two, right?”

“Could be Naomi,” muses Tao. “She wasn’t my type, but you can’t deny she’s gorgeous.”

“Hey, he said it wasn’t by choice, didn’t he?” Elle points out. “My guess is it’s someone in a relationship—so Tara or Darcy. Or me, I guess. I hope it’s not me. Charlie, man, I love you, but—”

“It’s not you,” Charlie says quickly. “We’re all good, Elle.”

Elle has no sooner said “Good” than Tao is saying, “But then, you’re saying it is someone.”

“No. It’s not anyone. I just hate being single and celibate, that’s all,” Charlie mutters. “I’m used to having a different girl in my bed every night back home. I miss that. That’s all it is.”

Tao narrows his eyes. “Right. Sounds convincing, doesn’t it?”

“Oh, definitely convincing,” agrees Elle, her eyes sparkling wickedly.

“Shut up,” Charlie mumbles.

Three more weeks. That’s all he has to survive. Three more weeks of being straight on camera, and then he can go home and figure this all out.

Nick may be in rocky water with Tara, and Darcy and Felix may be threatening to cost our sexy singles some serious cash, but at least Tao and Elle seem to be in good standing even after Tao’s date with Naomi last night. We catch up with our lovebirds in the pool, where they’re hanging with Charlie and Isaac as Tao describes his date to them. “I mean, we clicked, like, immediately, but not in a sexual way. The energy was totally platonic. I could totally be that girl’s best friend, but I don’t think I have any desire to go out with her, and I think she felt the same way once she’d actually met me in person.”

“You better hope she felt the same way and you weren’t crushing all her dreams by rejecting her,” Isaac teases, grinning.

“No, seriously! We talked about it on the date, and the spark just wasn’t there. Plus, I couldn’t stop thinking about Elle the entire time.”

Aww, remarks our narrator in unison with Charlie and Isaac. Meanwhile, Elle drapes her arms around Tao from behind and smiles as she pecks him on the cheek. “Honestly, I feel like Tao and I are closer than ever because of this. We made it. I’m proud of us.”

We cut to a confessional of Isaac, who isn’t smiling quite as broadly as Elle or Tao, but still looks pleased. I’m happy for them, you know? If I’m being honest, I’m jealous that they have what they have.

Our narrator sounds skeptical. Really, Isaac?—because you’re not even bothering to go through the motions and make it look like you’re trying to form a genuine connection.

As if on cue, Elle continues, “Hey, what’s the deal between you and James, Isaac? I wasn’t expecting you two to hit it off.”

She splashes some water in Isaac’s direction, and he makes a disgruntled face and starts shaking water out of his eyes as Tao adds, “Yeah. Is this, like, a Darcy rebound or what?”

I’m not sure I would call it a “rebound,” says our narrator. He was with her for all of one night? And it was purely a sex thing, remember? I think it’s more likely Isaac just wants to keep his dick wet. Um, wetter than it already is. The camera zooms in on Isaac’s naked waist right on the surface of the pool water.

Before we pan away, we start to hear Isaac say, “No. And for the record, I’m not heartbroken. I’m on a reality TV show full of the fittest women and men that you could imagine. It worked out well that James was interested.”

Oh, boy, sighs our narrator.

Isaac’s friends don’t look convinced, either. Frowning, Elle says, “I mean, I’m glad if you’re not feeling all heartbroken about her, but…”

Charlie seems to agree. “I probably gave you terrible advice, telling you to do more of what you were doing back before you came to the villa.”

“It’s okay. It wasn’t terrible advice—no, really. The solution is to have more sex,” Isaac tries to convince them.

Right, says our narrator. How gullible do you think we are, Isaac? 

But Isaac isn’t finished. “I’m never going to have what you two have with anybody. I’m just not wired that way. There’s nothing wrong with me for it.”

We cut back to the confessional room, this time with Charlie. I feel bad for him, you know? If nothing changes for him, then he’s right: he isn’t ever going to get to have a relationship like Tao and Elle’s. And that sucks. Charlie’s voiceover continues as we pan back over our unconvinced cast in the pool. Relationships have to be meaningful if you want to have that, like, piece in your life, or you’ll feel like something’s missing.

The camera narrows in on Tao, who asks, “Okay, now, Isaac, which rules did you break?”

Elle joins in, “Yeah, how much money are we going to be losing because of you, Isaac?”

Wincing, Isaac says, “I don’t even want to think about it. Please don’t make me do the maths.”

Bracingly, Tao assures him, “I’m sure it’s no more than whatever Elle and I will have spent by then.”

I think these sexed-up singles need another cone-shaped intervention. Tori? Can you come over here, please?

Clapping Charlie on the shoulder, Isaac tells him, “You’re the last one standing. Our only hope for the future—well, you and Imogen. And the newbies. And Sahar, but I don’t think that one was by choice.”

“And you think I’ve stayed strong by choice?” says Charlie without missing a beat.

The friends all talk over each other for a few moments as Charlie stands there blushing. Wow, comments our narrator over the commotion. It really looks like he’s getting ready to cook an egg on that face, doesn’t it?

Finally, Elle’s voice breaks through above the others’. “My guess is it’s someone in a relationship—so Tara or Darcy.”

“No. It’s not anyone. I just hate being single and celibate, that’s all. I’m used to having a different girl in my bed every night back home. I miss that. That’s all it is.”

“Right. Sounds convincing, doesn’t it?” Tao says to Elle, who agrees, “Oh, definitely convincing.”

And our narrator tells us, Are you sure you want a girl in your bed tonight, Charlie? Or is there a guy at this retreat that you’ve still got your eyes set on?

Charlie, however, isn’t talking. “Shut up.”

Well, you win some, you lose some, I guess. You’d better be careful, Charlie, because at this retreat, Tori is always watching. And, you know, so is Tara. The one Nick actually chose. Does anybody remember her? Anyone?

Chapter Text

And then not much happens for a couple of days. Nick keeps thinking Tori’s going to call them all to the cabana and fine their asses for the multiple rule breaks everyone knows have been happening, but she doesn’t, not yet, probably because the producers need to space out their material so as not to fill up the whole season in, like, two weeks. At first, Nick sticks close by Tara like always—whatever else may be going on between them, she’s Nick’s best friend in here, and they both know it—but after about a day of that, it’s just too much to be around her all the time when she’s so angry.

And for what? On Nick’s behalf? If it were really all about defending Nick’s honor, why would she be lashing out so much whenever Darcy cracks a joke or getting all irritated with Nick himself anytime he tries to ask how she’s doing?

So eventually, when Tara goes off to film with Darcy about an hour after dinner, Nick just… tells her he’ll see her at bedtime and wanders off himself in search of—he doesn’t know. Imogen and Sahar, probably. But he doesn’t find them.

Instead, he finds Charlie.

Well, technically, he rounds a corner right as Charlie is doing the same, and they nearly knock each other over. Nick just stumbles back a couple of paces, but Charlie gets hit harder and comes pretty close to toppling to the ground. “Shit,” swears Nick, hurrying forward and holding out a hand. “Let me help you up.”

“It’s okay. Thanks.” At first, Nick thinks Charlie’s going to refuse the help, but then Charlie does take Nick’s hand and allow him to help pull Charlie back to his feet.

Nick kind of sticks one finger in the air very stupidly. “Um, there’s no cameras in this corridor, I think. Is that, like, okay?”

Hesitantly, Charlie nods. “Yeah. I know you’re not Ben.”

Yeah, and he probably thinks Nick isn’t interested in him like Ben was. Shit.

Attempting to steamroll right past this, he asks now, “Where are Isaac and Tao and Elle? You’re usually all glued pretty close together.”

Charlie shrugs. “Tao and Elle were filming earlier. They’re probably still off trying to find somewhere to snog without the producers finding out. I think Isaac is with James.”

“I’m glad James found someone. I felt a little bad that I couldn’t… you know. Be present. On my date with him.”

At this, Charlie winces a little. “They’re not, like, together. I mean, they messed around for one night, but they’re just friends now. Isaac’s been going through this whole… thing.”

“Thing?”

“Sexuality thing. He thinks he’s… what did Elle call it? Like, he just doesn’t feel attraction to people like that.”

“That’s really a thing, then?” asks Nick, surprised.

“According to Elle, it is. Anyway, I believe it. I think it was really hard to admit it to himself—and to us. The least we can do is be supportive.”

“Well, good for him,” Nick says. “Sometimes, I wonder if I’d be better off if I didn’t…”

There’s an awkward pause. “Sleep with so many women?” Charlie finally asks.

Oh, shit. Now, Charlie’s going to think Nick is like Isaac, and Nick definitely doesn’t want Charlie to think that. He may not want Charlie to know Nick sort of maybe fancies him, but he doesn’t want Charlie to think he couldn’t fancy him, either. “I still like sex,” Nick corrects himself. “Sex is great. I’m not saying I don’t want to have any.”

“I get it,” says Charlie quietly. “It’s, like, how we’re having it. Lately, I think I’m doing it all wrong, too.”

Charlie’s not having any sex, though. Charlie’s not with anyone here, and Nick is, but Nick sort of wants to ditch Tara to be with Charlie instead. And it’s the same exact thing he always does back home, but it’s nothing like it, because Charlie is a man and Nick doesn’t sleep with men, and besides, Charlie is straight and wouldn’t want Nick anyway if he knew, which he doesn’t because the most important thing in the entire world is that Nick not let him find out, not when they’re surrounded by cameras and any kind of dalliance they might have is going to be aired to millions of viewers. Hell, they haven’t even had a dalliance, and people are still going to see whatever torrid love affair Harry puts together for the cameras.

“You’re doing better than I am here,” says Nick very, very carefully. “You knew better than to drop your pants for the first girl who showed interest.”

Charlie snorts. “Nick, no girl has showed interest. Haven’t you noticed? And—and Tara’s not just some girl to you. You’re friends. And you said yourself this isn’t just you manipulating her into having sex with you. She’s the one who wants to discuss all your rule breaks in advance as, like, a way of getting screen time, right?”

“I… yeah, that’s true. Sorry. I forgot I told you that.”

Charlie purses his lips. “Why are you apologizing to me? You can break rules with Tara if you want to break rules with Tara. It’s okay. Everybody knows I have no chance of winning this prize money anyway. I’d have to have an actual storyline for that, and I don’t. I’m just the sidekick everyone tells all the gossip to.”

“You have a storyline,” Nick says without thinking. “There’s the storyline we know Harry is pushing about you and me.”

That seems to catch Charlie off guard, and Nick spends an uncomfortable few seconds beating himself up for saying that out loud before Charlie replies, “Nick, do you really believe that’s even going to make it onscreen? We’re not exactly giving Harry much to work with. We’re never even filmed a scene together. If they want queer representation, they can just edit your date with James. Or air any of the stuff they’ve been filming of Imogen and Sahar. Those two shot together again today. I think Sahar’s, like, properly interested in—”

“Do you want to film together?”

And honestly, Nick doesn’t know what possessed him to say that. He really, really doesn’t. It’s bad enough that he got sent on a date with James: he doesn’t need to add any more fuel to some kind of sexuality storyline about himself.

What would he and Charlie even say to each other on camera, anyway? What would they do? Kiss? Nick may fantasize about that privately, but it’s not like Nick wants to do it on Too Hot to Handle.

Charlie seems similarly taken aback. “Why would we?”

“You’re right. That was dumb. There’s no reason we should make it any easier for Harry to—”

“No, I just mean… what would be the point? Why risk it? What would we, like, gain from it?”

Nick hesitates. Thinks—really thinks. “I guess I… don’t want you thinking I’m ashamed to be your friend in public,” he finally mumbles. “We can’t stop Harry, but… I don’t know. I don’t know if I feel good about pretending not to be your friend on camera just because we’re scared of him. Fuck him. I want us to do this show on our own terms.”

It takes Charlie a second to react to that, which is fair enough. It’s not like Nick knows what the hell he’s talking about here. He’s probably as surprised as Charlie is to hear himself say it, really, and Charlie’s completely right in saying next, “I appreciate that, but… I don’t think we can do this show on our own terms. They’re going to edit it how they want to edit it. We can’t control that. We literally signed a contract saying we can’t.”

Nick frowns. “Then why stay on the show? Why not make up an excuse and leave the show? You said yourself you don’t think you have any chance of winning. You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”

And then Charlie suddenly looks mortified. Nick may not understand it, but he can relate to it. If you asked Nick right now why he’s staying on the show, he’d have to tell you that it’s because he’s not ready to leave Charlie behind yet, and that’s more mortifying than anything Charlie could possibly be thinking right now.

“I don’t know,” Charlie finally stammers. “Maybe I… feel like I have more to do here before I’ll be ready to go. It’s not because of anything Harry and his people have set up, but… yeah.”

“Yeah,” whispers Nick. He clears his throat and tries again. “Yeah, me, too.”

Collecting himself, Charlie adds, “I’m trying to stay under the radar as much as I can, I guess. Not give them too much to work with that they could use to ruin my life.”

“Yeah. Me, too, honestly.”

Charlie raises his eyebrows. “You’re flying under the radar? You’re probably racking up tons of screen time with all the scenes with Tara you’ve been filming.”

Oh. Right. Nick backtracks, “I mean, yeah, but… that’s the stuff I’m okay with airing. Tara and I negotiate it all ahead of time, anyway, like you remembered.”

“Then what was that just now about wanting to film with me? Nothing Harry would air of us together would be anything we agreed to.”

He’s backed Nick into a corner here, though, and Nick knows it and has no idea how to get out of it. “I… don’t know. I lost my mind for a second.”

Charlie smiles faintly. “Look, I don’t know about filming together, but… maybe we can still do a better job of being friends off camera? Just because we don’t want to give Harry any more ammunition than he already has doesn’t mean he gets to control what we do when the cameras aren’t rolling.”

Oh, shit. Charlie’s given Nick an out, and it’s the perfect out, really, because it means he’s not going to look at Nick all funny just for wanting to talk to him. Maybe they’ll have to be friends in the shadows, but they can still be friends.

Isn’t that what Nick wants? To be Charlie’s friend? Maybe he does want more than that, but it’s the most he can get, anyway, and isn’t that more than enough?

“Yes,” he stammers. “Yes, I would like that very much.”

Charlie smiles again. “Okay. So, uh—”

And then they both jump about fifty meters into the air when a door slams somewhere behind them and footsteps start approaching from down the corridor. “Oh, there you two are,” calls Felix, grinning. “Harry wants everybody in the cabana when Tara and Darcy are done filming. Or, like, I guess I’m supposed to say Tori wants everybody in the cabana. Tori’s not actually a robot, right? She has lines scripted by the writers and everything?”

“Yeah,” says Charlie shakily. “Yeah, we are not, in fact, living on a television show where decisions are made by a talking robot. Everything Tori does is decided by Harry and the other producers.”

Nick laughs uncontrollably for a second before he gets himself back under control. Clearing his throat, he shuts up.

Giving them both a very weird look, Felix adds, “Are you two sure you’re okay? You’re acting very… jumpy. Literally.”

“Everything’s fine,” says Nick in an everything is not fine kind of voice. “We’ll be there in a minute.”

Charlie smiles. Nick smiles back.

Our sexy singles are looking guilty as hell when they convene on the cabana, and they should. We’re sure there have been rule breaks—more than one of them—but we don’t know what rules were broken, exactly, and we also don’t know who all the offenders are. Unfortunately for us, when our cast opens up to us in a short sequence of confessionals, they mostly stay cryptic about the specifics when they give us a couple of hints.

Darcy, snickering: We’re gonna be in such hot water, aren’t we?

Felix: The whole group is gonna hate me when they find out what I’ve managed to get up to since I got here.

Tao: I know what I’ve done with Elle, but why are the rest of these people looking this shifty?

It takes a few seconds for everyone to get settled in the several sofas and loveseats positioned around the coffee table where Tori is sitting, grey for now—but not for long. We only have to endure a couple of seconds of tense music before she lights up purple. Doh doo DEE! “Hello, guests.”

“Hi, Tori,” everybody choruses together. We zoom in on Isaac’s face; he looks like he’s sweating bullets.

“I brought three new arrivals to the villa to test your relationships and break you out of some dangerous habits that have been forming,” Tori continues. “Regrettably, since that time, there have been multiple breaches of the rules.”

Above the ensuing uproar, Imogen repeats furiously, “Multiple!?” And she’s not the only one: Ben looks pissed as hell, and Tara is booing almost as loudly as Imogen is shouting.

We cut to a confessional of Tara. Okay, I know I haven’t done anything this time. If Nick and I could contain ourselves, and we’ve been together since the very beginning, then what are these assholes doing breaking the rules multiple times?

Charlie adds in a voiceover as we pan over the group, Can we just get this over with, please? I’m getting really bored of this same old shit happening again and again.

It appears Charlie is getting his wish: Tori continues promptly, “In total, rules have been broken by six of my guests.”

After the next uproar settles down, in a confessional, we hear Naomi doing the math. Six guests means three couples, right? The couples I’ve seen since I’ve gotten here are Felix and Darcy, Nick and Tara, Elle and Tao—

Back at the cabana, our singles seem to be coming to the same conclusions. “Obviously, two of the rule-breakers are Nick and Tara,” decides Ben. “They haven’t been able to keep their hands off each other this whole time.”

He’s still mid-sentence when Nick interrupts, “We haven’t, though. We haven’t.”

“Oh, come on, Nick. You really expect us to believe—”

“We haven’t!” Nick’s voice takes on a nasty edge as he says so. “Hand to god, really, we haven’t.”

“We really haven’t,” Tara defends. “Why is everyone looking at us, anyway? Darcy and Felix are the ones who as good as admitted to everyone that they’ve been fooling around ever since Felix got here—”

“Oh, thanks, Tara, way to throw me under the bus,” says Darcy. She doesn’t sound too concerned, though. In fact, she giggles a little as she says it and exchanges a knowing look with Felix, who grins.

Back in a confessional, Felix tells us, Great. I’ve been here for all of seven minutes, and Tara already hates me.

Our narrator adds, Not exactly the seven minutes in heaven you were imagining, huh, Felix?

We jump back to the cabana, where Tara and Darcy aren’t done fighting. Tara tells Darcy, “You know, it’s really rich of you to break the rules with Felix. You barely know them—”

Darcy is starting to lose her cool. “Oh, like you knew Nick so well when you broke rules with him, what, one day into the retreat? Two at most? You can’t hold me to some fucking double standard when you two have been messing about every chance you—”

“We haven’t, though! We haven’t. It’s been days since Nick and I—”

“Oh, right, ‘days.’ The woman hasn’t had sex in forty-eight hours. It’s a miracle! Call the fucking—”

Imogen breaks in, “Actually, Darcy, she has a point. You did tell us you’ve been breaking rules, so just—out with it. How much money have you lost us?”

Darcy looks at Felix again… and snickers, “Lots, probably.”

“I fucking knew it,” yells Tara.

Beside her, Nick drapes his arms around her and kisses the top of her hair. “Tara, it’s okay—”

“You’re not pissed about this?”

“Well, yes, but we can’t change it now. Just—Darcy—what did you do?”

We cut for just a second to a confessional of Darcy, who smirks at the camera and then looks down into her lap. Back at the cabana, she grins slyly and says, “Well, there was that kiss between me and Felix—”

“—And you got me off with your hand after that, remember?” Felix adds, looking awfully pleased with themself, given that everybody’s shouting at them.

“Of course. And don’t forget about me and Isaac from before I met you, honey.”

“‘Honey?’” echoes Tara. Seriously, that girl looks like she’s about to shit herself. “Are you kidding me?”

“Wait, what did you and Isaac do?” asks Naomi, frowning.

We get a look at Isaac’s face, where he’s looking so uncomfortable that Charlie actually reaches over to squeeze his hand like they’re boyfriends or something. They’re not, of course. We all know Charlie loves Nick, not Isaac.

“We just kissed once,” Isaac mumbles.

Darcy adds mildly, “And don’t forget, you gave me a handy, remember?”

“Jesus, Darcy, you move fast, don’t you?” spits Ben.

Darcy shrugs. “Don’t look at me. Isaac moved right on to James when we were done, didn’t he, James?”

In a confessional, Imogen looks like she’s about to boil over. Am I the only person here who cares about the money? Or the process? Or any of what we’re supposed to be doing here?

Sahar groans. “At least tell us you didn’t do more than kiss. Preferably just once.”

There’s a short, strained pause, and then James seems to take pity on Isaac and helps him out. “Well, my lips aren’t where he put his mouth, if you get what I’m saying.”

Everybody groans. “I can’t believe you people! You crafty little foxes!” declares Naomi. “How much money is that?”

Helpfully, Tori answers, “Felix and Darcy’s kiss, and Isaac and Darcy’s kiss, have each cost the group… six thousand dollars.” Over the continued boos, Tori adds, “Felix and Darcy’s act of manual gratification, and Isaac and Darcy’s, have each cost the group… eight thousand dollars. Isaac and James’s act of oral sex has cost the group… twelve thousand dollars.”

What the FUCK!? demands Naomi in a confessional. You’re telling me we’re out—hold on—

Our narrator tells her, It’s okay, honey. Take all the time you need to do the math. It’s not like you’ll be busy spending much prize money with how little you guys have left.

At the cabana, similar calculations seem to be happening. “Twelve for two kisses—sixteen for two handjobs—” tallies Tara.

“Don’t forget the oral,” adds Imogen with a dirty look at Isaac. “Twelve thousand for oral.”

“That’s thirty—no—forty. Forty thousand dollars. That’s almost twenty percent of the money we started with—”

“And we’re not done yet,” Charlie reminds everyone suddenly. “Tori said six of us broke rules. Isaac, James, Felix, and Darcy—that’s only four people.”

The music takes a suspenseful turn as dramatic cellos play in the background. “Who the fuck else cost us even more money the last couple of days?” exclaims James.

Our narrator is not impressed. Um, pot? Kettle much?

Sahar recites, “It’s either Nick and Tara—”

“For the millionth time, it’s not us,” seethes Tara.

“Well, then, it’s got to be Tao and Elle,” decides Darcy. “I mean, look how much money they’ve cost us already.”

We zoom in on Elle and Tao, who are cuddled up together on a loveseat and both looking rather guilty. In a confessional, Elle says, I mean, it’s not like I thought Tori’s WiFi cut out all those times Tao and I got down and dirty, but—

Wait, interrupts our narrator. “All those times?” How many times are we talking here?

“What did you do?” says Nick, frowning. “And how many times?”

“Well… there was the kissing,” Elle admits.

Over the screaming this elicits, we hear Sahar say in a confessional, Somehow, I think that a bit of kissing is the least Tao and Elle got up to together.

“How many kisses?” asks Imogen hotly.

Tori responds, “Two kisses between Elle and Tao have cost the group… twelve thousand dollars.” There’s a cacophony of shouting going on—and then Tori adds, “But that’s not all Tao and Elle did.”

Imogen looks like she’s about to beat them both into the ground. “What else!?”

Elle’s voice wobbles around an awkward giggle. “I mean, I did give him that blowjob…”

We hear a drumbeat, and the music goes silent for a second as everybody shouts at them, especially Imogen and Tara, who seems really worked up about all the rule breaks today, for some reason. It takes a while for things to settle down enough for Tori to continue, “Elle and Tao’s oral sex has cost the group… twelve thousand dollars. These combined rule breaks have cost the group… sixty-four thousand dollars.”

“SIXTY-FOUR—”

“The prize fund now stands at… one hundred and twenty-six thousand dollars.”

That’s it. I’m shitting bricks, Imogen tells us. That’s almost half the money gone right there. Half of two-fifty is one twenty-five, and we’re at one twenty-six.

Our narrator pipes up, When I used to complain as a teenager that the only math I’d ever need in my adult life was basic arithmetic, I may have been right, but I still had no idea that this was the kind of subtraction I’d be doing someday. I hope my first grade teacher isn’t watching this.

Our singles may think this is punishment enough—but it appears Tori’s still not done. “I must remind you,” she says in her bored voice, “that I brought you to this retreat to teach you how to form genuine connections over meaningless flings. In light of these egregious rule breaks, I’ve decided it’s time—to streamline. The. Group.”

Her words are followed by a collective gasp—and then a ringing silence. But it doesn’t last long.

We know what this means, of course. “Streamline the group”—that means somebody’s going home. The question is, who is it?

Chapter Text

It takes Charlie a second to figure out what the fuck Tori is talking about when she says she wants to “streamline the group.” Does that mean she’s got some new initiative to try to whip everybody into shape? And then he realizes—eliminating part of the group is how she’s going to whip it into shape. “Streamline” means somebody is going home. At least, that’s what Charlie gathers when he catches sight of Tao wrapping his arms around Elle and going, “They can’t take you away from me. This is real, okay? Even if we go home tonight, this is real.”

“You better be prepared to buy so many plane tickets to Paris,” Elle murmurs back in a choked sort of voice.

“I will,” Tao breathes, planting a kiss on her cheek. Charlie accidentally locks eyes with him, smiles encouragingly, and looks away.

Okay. So someone is going home tonight—maybe multiple someones. But who?

The thing is, Charlie knows by now at least a little of how Harry and his people operate. This show claims to teach its contestants to form real romantic bonds and not rely on sex to connect with each other, right? From that perspective—as much as Charlie has seen their bond off camera and believes it’s real—Tao and Elle are the logical choices for whom to send home. Tori may have just fined them for two kisses and a blowjob, but Charlie knows for a fact that Elle and Tao have gotten up to way, way more physical affection than just that since the last cabana scene they filmed. It’s just that Tori actually fining them for all of their indiscretions would completely consume what’s left of the prize fund, and that would make for bad television—so Harry’s limiting what they air onscreen, apparently.

It makes sense. And Charlie’s sure Harry would love to punish Tao and Elle for their total disregard for his rules about physical intimacy. But at the same time, Tao and Elle are one of the two longest-standing couples on this show so far—and all their rule breaks do, Charlie’s convinced, make for juicy TV.

The other biggest spenders, at least up until today, were Nick and Tara—but as paralyzing as Charlie’s fear is that he might lose Nick tonight, he’s pretty sure they’re both safe. They haven’t had any rule breaks at all in the last couple of days: how could Tori possibly convince the audience that they deserve to go home when they seem to be getting their act together? In fact, Charlie’s fairly certain that everyone who wasn’t fined tonight is safe—so that also means himself, Naomi, and (unfortunately) Ben. Imogen and Sahar, too: even though they’re maybe a thing now (Charlie’s not fully up to speed on that just yet), Imogen trusts the process and wants the money badly enough that she won’t let Sahar make a single move on her.

And that leaves Isaac, Darcy, Felix, and James. Felix and James are probably safe, too, since they’ve only been here for a couple of days, which means Darcy and Isaac are probably both on the chopping block. Charlie tends to think Darcy’s more likely to go home than Isaac is—hasn’t Isaac been building this whole beautiful storyline about discovering his asexuality? Even when he got fined tonight for his actions with Darcy and with James, he used it as an opportunity to come out to the whole cast, and everyone agreed the rule breaks were justified in helping him discover who he is. If Too Hot to Handle is all about forming genuine emotional connections, what’s more genuine than Isaac coming to terms with being (as Elle calls it) aroace and learning to value the importance of his platonic friendships? If the whole point is that not everything is about sex, well, Isaac is pretty much the epitome of that.

So that means it’s probably Darcy, Elle, or Tao going home. Charlie feels bad even for thinking it, but he kind of hopes it’s Darcy. Tao, Elle, and Isaac are his best friends in here, and they’re the last people he wants to lose. Well, them and Nick. Especially Nick, if he’s being honest.

So he starts getting nervous when Tori lights up again and drawls Elle and Tao’s names. They stiffen up, Tao’s arms still wound around Elle’s shoulders in an iron grip, as Tori continues in a long-suffering voice, “Thirty percent of the money the group has lost has been because of your rule breaks. Instead of forming meaningful connections, you have both continued to rely on sexual acts in your interactions.”

Charlie feels like his heart is in his throat. They can’t both be going home, can they? He wishes now more than ever that he’d seen any of the previous seasons of this show before coming on it. How many people usually leave during eliminations?

And then Tori drawls, “However…”

Please don’t let it be them. Please don’t let it be them. “However” is a good sign, right? Tori’s about to change directions and keep them here? If Charlie loses them, he doesn’t know what he’s going to do.

“I have detected that you have the potential to form a genuine connection despite your physical infatuation,” Tori concludes. “Your actions thus far have been risky, but you are not the guests I will be sending home tonight. Consider yourselves warned.”

Elle sighs with such loud relief that she makes a squeaky sort of noise as Tao scrunches his eyes shut and leaves a long kiss on her cheek. Okay. This is good. Elle and Tao are staying, and that means Charlie has nothing to worry about. Right?

It appears he’ll find out in just a few moments because Tori says now, “The first guest going home is…”

Oh, shit. The “first” guest? That sounds like more than one. Charlie’s guessing Darcy is one of them, but if there’s definitely more than one—

“Sahar.”

Charlie is so shocked that his heart just about falls into his ass. Sahar? What the hell did Sahar do to warrant getting booted off the show? She’s literally never broken a rule, for god’s sake. Why does she deserve it, and how is Tori going to justify it?

And he’s not the only one asking that question, either. “What the fuck are you doing, Tori?” barks Darcy, looking furious, over the collective gasp and chorus of nos that goes around the cabana. Charlie kind of would have expected Imogen to protest the loudest, but it seems Imogen is at a total loss for words: she just buries her face in Sahar’s shoulder, shaking, as Sahar cards a hand through her hair and whispers in her ear. He sort of suspects that Imogen may be crying.

But they all know it’s not Tori who made this decision, and Nick seems to have lost any regard at all for pretending it is for the cameras. No: he looks directly at Harry and goes, “Harry, what are you playing at? Sending home Sahar? All she ever did was start going out with Imogen, and you know they’ve been following your stupid fucking rules—”

It doesn’t seem Harry is going to indulge Nick, not today. Actually, that’s a stupid thing to say: Charlie knows full well that Harry’s never going to indulge anyone from the cast in any freedom they try to reclaim for themselves. In any case, Harry just narrows his eyes and smiles cruelly as Tori continues from her perch on the coffee table, “Sahar, since you arrived, you have continued to place value on physical looks and have not made any effort to form genuine connections—”

“Bullshit!” shouts Tara. “She formed one with Imogen!”

“She formed one with all of us,” adds Darcy, crossing her arms and glaring right at Harry.

Ben snickers, “She didn’t form one with me.”

Nick rolls his eyes. “Fuck you, Ben.”

Undeterred, Tori continues, “I have calculated that you are one of the guests with the lowest probability of forming meaningful romantic relationships. You are being sacrificed for the sake of the group. Please say your goodbyes and exit my retreat.”

Imogen is still glued to Sahar’s shoulder, but it seems she’s recovered enough to mumble—still softly, but enough so that Charlie can make out the words—“‘Meaningful romantic relationships?’ But—but we have that. What about everything we’ve been filming?”

There’s a long pause—and then Harry breaks his own rule and says snidely, “Just because you’ve filmed it doesn’t mean we’ll air it.”

“Why?” Sahar snaps. “Because it’s queer? Do you know how strong Imogen was to come out as bisexual on camera after everything she’s been through? Do you know how proud of her I was? And you’re just going to—to throw that all away?”

Even when she detaches herself from Sahar’s shoulder, Imogen stays close to Sahar, her arms around Sahar’s neck and her ear pressed to Sahar’s chest. She croaks, “Are you even going to air our kiss from the first night?”

But it seems Harry is done responding. Tori repeats, “Sahar, please say your goodbyes.”

With a very dirty look at Harry, Sahar murmurs, “Imogen, it’s okay. It’s okay. The second—no. It’s okay. Immy, listen to me. The second you get out of this place, you’re going to ring me, okay? I’ll look you up on Insta and DM you my number. Just—I get it if you find someone else before the show is over, but if you don’t—”

“I won’t,” whispers Imogen. “I waited my whole life to find you. I can wait a little longer to have you.” Giggling nervously, she adds, “It’s not like I’ll be breaking any rules. I didn’t break rules with Ben. I didn’t even break rules with you.”

It takes a few seconds for Imogen to stop crying long enough that she can release Sahar, who shakily gets up from her sofa and starts making the rounds hugging everybody. When it’s Charlie’s turn, he feels a little uncomfortable: Sahar’s his friend, sure, but he doesn’t actually know her all that well, and he feels sort of like he’s intruding on her and Imogen’s grief.

“This is bullshit,” he tells her awkwardly as they embrace.

Sahar laughs. “You’re telling me. They’re just cutting me because they don’t think they can get any storylines out of me—not ones they’ll air, anyway.”

“It’s not right,” Charlie answers hesitantly.

Smiling, she tells him, “I’ll miss you, Charlie. Do me a favor when you get out of here and ring me with all the gossip. I don’t know what I’m going to do when I can’t get my fix from you.”

Charlie grins. “Can do.”

Then she embraces Felix and Naomi, and after that, it’s time to go. “Head to the confessional room,” Harry instructs her. “I’ll meet you there in a few minutes to get your thoughts, and then we’ll escort you out. Your things will be collected for you.”

“Okay, but if any of my things go mysteriously missing, I’m violating my NDA,” says Sahar lightly.

She and Imogen are right: this is complete bullshit. It’s not like at this point Charlie believes that getting to stay on the show is such a huge reward in and of itself, not with the way Harry’s manipulating them all like puppets on strings. But if elimination is supposed to be punishment for not following Tori’s process or whatever, then Sahar certainly hasn’t earned that. It feels unnecessarily cruel to separate Sahar from Imogen just as they’re starting to work through their feelings and embark on a relationship. He meant what he said: it isn’t right.

“Sahar,” bursts Imogen just as Sahar is starting to walk off set. By the time Sahar spins around to look at her, Imogen’s gotten back up and raced over there to plant a big kiss on Sahar’s lips. It makes Charlie smile, makes the whole cast clap, even makes Nick and Darcy cheer.

Harry looks thoroughly annoyed by this. “You do realize this is Too Hot to Handle, right?”

“Oh, fuck off,” says Imogen breathlessly. “If you were going to fine us for kissing, you would have aired our love story and kept me on the show.”

“Yeah,” Sahar agrees. “If I’d known you were going to do me this dirty, I wouldn’t have bothered keeping my mouth off her the last couple of days.”

Sahar and Imogen kiss briefly again, and then Sahar gives a little wave and disappears off the set. Charlie grins. Yeah, he’s really going to miss Sahar.

He’s almost forgotten that he still has more to be anxious about—but Tori reminds him a moment later when she says slyly, “Sahar is not the only guest leaving my retreat tonight.”

Oh, shit. He was right: somebody else is leaving, too.

Charlie just doesn’t want to lose any of these people, you know? He’d thought he’d known who was safe, but now, he thinks no one is safe, not if the producers are shaving off people they think they can’t get storylines out of. Surely not everyone they eliminate will be characters who haven’t broken rules, right? But then, does Charlie even want that? He doesn’t even know what he wants anymore—just knows he doesn’t want it to be anyone, really. Well, anyone but Ben. Or maybe Felix, since Charlie barely knows them. He’s at least hung around James and Naomi a bit in the last couple of days by virtue of James’s thing with Isaac and Naomi’s friendship with Tao, but Felix has been off cuddling with Darcy pretty much nonstop.

Maybe it’ll be Charlie. Maybe Harry will change his mind about forcing some kind of queer plot between Charlie and Nick, and he’ll boot Charlie off this show, and Charlie will be able to stop spending his days worrying about what his sadistic executive producer will dream up next to torment him and these people he considers his friends on international television. Then again, even if Charlie does leave, he won’t exactly feel good about not knowing what any of the rest of the cast are going through for the whole rest of filming.

Shit, that’s right: none of the cast in here has access to their phone. If Charlie stays, he won’t have a clue what Sahar or whoever else gets eliminated is up to out there. And if Charlie goes, he’ll have no idea what’s going on inside the villa until everybody else leaves it, too. If Charlie stays and Nick goes, or Nick stays and Charlie goes—

“The second guest going home is…”

Charlie shuts his eyes and braces for impact.

“Isaac.”

“You fucker,” snarls Elle right away.

And honestly, Charlie’s right there with her. He can see how this one might look more justifiable to the audience—Isaac literally told the whole group just now that he has no chance of forming romantic relationships ever. But what about all of the growing Isaac’s been doing as he has come to terms with his orientation and has been teaching himself to value the importance of platonic relationships? In a way, isn’t the epitome of Too Hot to Handle's moral message to put emphasis on relationships that aren’t sexual, even if they also aren’t romantic?

But then, Charlie realizes, Harry’s probably cutting that entire storyline from the show, too. And without that to air onscreen, Isaac’s not giving Harry any new workable material to keep himself relevant.

Charlie really, really hates this show. Loathes it.

“So I don’t suppose you heard any of what Isaac was saying to us when he got fined about why he got fined?” says Tao hotly. “You’re just going to show him as the same kind of sex-crazed maniac that the rest of us are?”

As Harry just stands there and smirks, Tori responds, “Isaac, you showed early signs of willingness to follow the rules of my retreat, but you caved to your desires as soon as Darcy and then James demonstrated a sexual interest in you. According to my calculations, you are not yet ready to embrace deeper connections over meaningless sexual flings.”

“Yeah, because I’m going to be having so many meaningless flings now that I know I’m asexual.” The sarcasm of Isaac’s words is a little lost due to the fact that he’s clearly trying not to cry.

Charlie, who’s sitting next to Isaac on a sofa, leans in and wraps his arms around Isaac wordlessly. Isaac responds by clinging to Charlie’s arm and sniffling.

“It’s shit to lose you,” Charlie whispers. “You deserve a chance at the prize fund more than anyone here does. You’ve grown so much.”

“Yeah,” adds Elle, her voice a little softer now that it’s not directed at Harry (or Tori—Charlie’s not sure he can tell the difference anymore). “All of us should be so lucky as to learn from you.”

Isaac shakes his head, his chin rubbing against Charlie’s forearm where Charlie’s still holding him. “It’s not even about the money. We all came on the show for the exposure more than the money. I just wish the world would get to see my actual story instead of… whatever they’re going to show.”

“You can still tell the world,” Tao insists. “Post it on social media—”

Harry breaks in, “He can’t.” When everybody whips around to look at him, he’s smiling smugly. “He signed an NDA. You all did. You can’t disclose your relationship status publicly until after the season airs. Coming out as… whatever the fuck Isaac’s claiming he’s supposed to be would pretty much give it away.”

And that is so unfair that Charlie sees red. He loses track of himself for a few seconds there, but he must stand up because the next thing he knows, he’s on his feet shouting himself hoarse at Harry while James restrains him. “He’s not worth it,” James says in Charlie’s ear, but how could it not be worth it to stand up for Isaac and his journey? How is asexual and aromantic visibility not important? Doesn’t anyone on this cast give a shit about the way they’re being treated by production?

“Charlie, it’s okay,” Isaac tries to tell him. When Charlie turns around, Isaac is smiling through tears. “We know what really happened. We’ll tell everyone when the NDAs expire. It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay. I don’t want to do this without you. You’re one of my best friends here. Isaac…”

“I’ll be okay. We’ll be okay. I expect updates on what went down when you guys get out of here, all right? All of you.”

As Isaac stands, Elle immediately comes around to put her arms around his shoulders. “You, too. Keep Sahar out of trouble for us.”

Isaac chuckles. “I definitely will. Keep an eye on Charlie for me. And maybe quit blowing the entire prize fund with Tao while you’re at it?”

Tao grins. “We make no promises.”

It takes a while for everybody to say goodbye to Isaac, partly because Elle doesn’t seem to want to stop hugging him long enough for anybody else to get the chance. Charlie knows it’s not the end—they’ll talk again when Charlie’s out of here, too—but it scares him a little to know that he’s going to be completely cut off from Isaac for the next few weeks. Isaac opened up to Charlie about his sexuality when he started questioning it. Who’s Charlie going to open up to about his sexuality now that he’s questioning that?

And Charlie really wasn’t going to say anything to anyone about that—but now he feels like maybe he should have and like he squandered his opportunity. Isaac’s leaving. They can’t hash it out together. Charlie’s trapped in this villa with only the rest of the cast to talk to, and he thinks he might lose his actual mind if he can’t tell someone that he thinks he might be gay and he definitely fancies Nick, but who’s he going to tell now? And how can he tell anyone at all when this entire experience is being caught on camera?

But he’d better figure it out because this storyline is probably going to be aired when this season goes online after post-production whether Charlie likes it or not. Wouldn’t he rather get some kind of control over it himself? Doesn’t he at least want to figure out a way to make peace with the reality before that reality gets distorted and aired for the whole world to see? If this thing is getting aired, won’t he at least be better off if he’s come to terms with it and figured out what the hell to say about it?

And what does he have to say about it?—because, if he’s being entirely honest with himself, there’s some truth to it. He doesn’t have a relationship with Nick… but he does fancy him. God, he fancies him so much. And if Nick did fancy him back—

He’ll tell someone, Charlie resolves. He’ll tell someone soon. He just wishes it could have been Isaac.

It’s going to be another late night, it seems, because after Sahar and Isaac film their confessionals, the rest of the cast will have to film theirs, too. Honestly, all Charlie wants to do right now is curl up in bed and stay there for the rest of this retreat—but it doesn’t seem he’s going to be afforded that luxury. Anyway, he knows he’ll just feel worse if he self-isolates right now.

So he tells Harry to come get him first as soon as Isaac’s done, and then he sits with Elle and Tao, not really talking, not really listening, just letting the conversation wash over him as he picks idly at his swim trunks and misses the hell out of Isaac. It’s not like Charlie was happy about Sahar going home, but for a minute there, he’d thought his immediate friend group was safe. He’d thought Isaac was safe.

He should have known he was wrong.

An eternity later, Kieran sticks his head in the room to inform Charlie that it’s his turn to film, so Charlie makes the familiar trek down the corridors and into the confessional room, where Harry is waiting. “Let’s get right into it,” says Harry gleefully.

Charlie rolls his eyes. “Can we just get this over with, please?”

“Let’s jump back to when you got to the cabana. What are you thinking in that moment?”

Charlie’s had all evening to think about how he wants to play this confessional, but right now, all his forethought goes out the door. Isaac is gone. Isaac is gone, and it’s Harry’s fault, and Isaac didn’t do a damn thing to deserve it. Neither did Sahar. Neither did anyone here, really, except maybe Ben, but fuck him because he’s the only person Harry has protected.

“Well, I guess I’m doing the maths,” he spits. “I’m trying to add up in my head who actually deserves to go because it certainly wasn’t Isaac or Sahar—”

“I need you to back up,” Harry interrupts, pouting pathetically. “Remember, we didn’t start with eliminations at the cabana: we started with fines for the last few days’ worth of rule breaks—”

Ignoring this, Charlie continues, “Who gets to decide who stays and who goes, anyway? Is it you? Is it your team? And what makes someone not deserve to be here, anyway? Is it really not ‘following the process’ or whatever shit you have Tori claim?—because, by that logic, Sahar should still be here. Or is it ‘not forming genuine connections?’—in which case Isaac should definitely still be here with how much he’s learned the last few days. Not that it matters. We’re all just here for the media attention, right? That’s how your team lured us in. There’s little to no chance of earning much money, but hey, it’s still worth working and filming incredibly long hours every day for no pay at all because we’ll get exposure and a social media following out of it. Right?”

Harry’s smug smile is completely gone. “That is not fair, Spring, and you know it,” he snarls. “You knew what the terms were when you signed your contract—”

“Yeah, and I also thought this was Sex, Love, Rock ’n’ Roll, but who’s counting, right? What’s one more lie? You’re certainly okay with telling the whole world Isaac is still the same sex-crazed maniac he was when he was struggling with his sexuality and so confused about who he was when he came in here a week ago—worse, even, because you’re cutting all the confusion out. You’re fine with lying your ass off about Ben’s character, and for what? How did he earn your protection? It’s not like you’re protecting anyone else on this cast.”

“That was hearsay,” Harry hisses. “You can’t just come on my show, accuse my cast member of misconduct with no evidence, and steamroll him out of anything we can air onscreen just because you’re—what? What was that?”

“That was real! That was what really happened. Just because you don’t want to face the consequences of misconduct happening on your show—”

“There was no misconduct—”

“And don’t even get me started on the misconduct you and the producers have done,” snaps Charlie. “You know, I’m getting really bored of this same old shit happening again and again. Plying us with too many drinks and not enough food—permitting sexual harassment between the cast—misrepresenting your cast in the editing—”

“Isaac and Sahar got what they deserved,” Harry barks right back. “Sahar gave us nothing to work with, nothing, and Isaac was dead in the water the second he decided he was done with sexual and romantic relationships entirely. You can’t be asexual and come on Too Hot to Handle. You just can’t. He misrepresented himself to me during the casting process—”

Charlie fumes, “He didn’t know who he was during the casting process! His sexuality storyline could have been beautiful if you’d been brave enough to air it. You know, I really thought you were progressive? I really thought there were signs you were going to make this season less regressive than all the others were. Casting Elle and Naomi—casting Felix—but you’re only interested in queer storylines you create out of thin air. Imogen and Sahar gave you a lesbian storyline, and you didn’t want it. Instead, you’re faking this whole thing between me and Nick—”

Harry’s face suddenly goes bright red. “Who the fuck said anything about you and Nick?”

For a second, Charlie goes cold. He’s not—he’s not wrong. Is he? Ajayi wouldn’t lie to him. Who does Charlie trust more: Ajayi or Harry?

“Your crew said plenty about me and Nick,” Charlie retorts a second later. “Not all of them are the twisted, sick fuck that you are, you know. Some of them have standards.”

It takes Harry a second to seem to decide how to respond—and then he laughs, cold and cruel. “Fine. Let’s say we are fabricating something between you and Nick. We had to make it believable that the producers would know to send Nick on that date with James, didn’t we? We couldn’t use lesbians. The only gay shit the previous seasons have shown was lesbian kisses. They asked for gay men, and I had to deliver.

“Do you have any idea how hard it is to deliver that when you’re supposed to bring in a cast that’s predominantly straight? We can’t just have two gay men and hope they fall in love, you know. The odds are against it. And we can’t just make all the men bisexual because then you’ll get too much gay content, and we can’t have that, either. You know, you have no appreciation for the kind of pressure I’m under here. May it gay, but not too gay! Make it trans, but only pick beautiful post-op people who pass well so that the audience can forget who they really are. Make it disabled, but don’t make it a spectacle—which is really hard, you know, with Felix carting that wheelchair around everywhere. I have an impossible job trying to make the network execs happy—”

Charlie claps back, “Yeah? Well, maybe you should have thought a little more about making your cast happy and a little less about how to do your impossible job. If it’s impossible, why bother? But we are living, breathing, hurting people whose lives you are fucking with—”

“Do you want to get written out? Is that what you want to happen?” roars Harry. “Because believe me, Charlie, that can be arranged. You know, you’re lucky we didn’t write you out tonight. The only storyline you’ve given us is the one we invented for you.”

And Charlie seethes, “Fine. You know what? Fine. Do what you want. I am done cooperating.”

And he launches himself off the sofa and storms out of the room.

Back in the bedroom, there’s one fewer bed tonight now that two of our cast have left us. It seems Charlie’s gone to bed early because all we can see of him is his curly hair when Imogen comes into the room, frowns at the bed she used to share with Sahar, and then walks around to Charlie’s bed and puts a tentative hand on his shoulder.

We see her lean in. The microphone picks it up when she whispers, “Hey, Charlie. Can I join you?”

We don’t hear Charlie’s response—he’s not even miked up—but he must agree because, the next second, Imogen goes around to the other side and gets in. “I’m sorry about Isaac,” we hear her murmur as she wraps an arm around his waist and cuddles close. “I know you two were close.”

“I’m sorry about Sahar,” we hear Charlie mumble. It’s so quiet without his mic that we can barely make it out.

“It’s okay,” Imogen tells him. “She’s not gone. She’s just gone away for a little while. I’ll see her again, and you’ll see Isaac, too.”

Our narrator remarks, But Isaac and Sahar won’t be seeing a penny from that prize fund ever again. I wonder what they will do to keep busy now that they’re leaving?

We cut to a shot of Sahar’s final confessional. Fuck you. Actually, no: I’d much rather fuck myself tonight. And she makes a hand gesture so lewd that our producers blur it out.

Our narrator sighs. Yep. They’re hopeless. Tori, you made the right call.