Apricot reached into the suitcase and pulled out handfuls of thongs and string bikinis and threw them around her. “Fuck Daisy!”
A large eye makeup pallet frisbeed from Apricot’s hand into the sliding glass door. Her other hand threw Daisy’s favorite perfume, Daisy by Marc Jacobs, into the living room wall. It exploded like a glass bomb and sent shards and the air filled with the scent of pure alcohol and flower pollen so thick that Cassidy could taste it.
“Stop it!”
“What does it matter? We’re trapped!” Apricot screamed. “We’re trapped and we’re going to die on this fucking island!”
JamesleftCassidytoconsole Apricot and meandered toward the stage, passing by a woman in a cowboy hat doing some jerky TikTok dance and a drunk man lying on the paved path like a sunburnt starfish, though the dark clouds that lingered on the horizon all day had finally gathered over the island. The smell of fried fish floated heavy on the air. The closer he got to the stage, the more crowded the walkways got, and James had the sensation of being one of hundreds of lemmings. He was thankful for the cool air and the occasional raindrop but hoped the rain wouldn’t cancel the show.
The audience in front of the stage was packed even though the opener still had a half hour until stage time, so James got a White Claw tallboy and stood on the perimeter with his phone in one hand and the drink in the other.
On Twitter, he wrote, “There’s some weird stuff happening on this island,” with no tags.
On Instagram, he posted a picture of the dorm room taken that morning with the caption, “This is what you get for $3000 at @TheIslandXperience.” He figured that could be interpreted as neutral since it was just a statement of fact, but he wasn’t doing the photo any favors with the lighting and his messy bed and the approaching rainstorm outside the window.
On TikTok, he made a video talking at the camera with no filters. “So, I heard a rumor that the lineup for tonight’s show has changed …” he started. He put an emoji covering its mouth in the caption and used the #islandxperience hashtag.
Overall, that last one seemed positive, if blatantly untrue. But if nothing came of it, he wouldn’t lose any followers for spreading lies because he said it was just a rumor.
He saved the original videos and a screenshot of the tweet to his camera roll.
Maybe I can make this work in my favor,he thought. If the people controlling the festival and the island’s Wi-Fi were doing something insidious with people’s likenesses—influencer’slikenesses—maybe he could get away at the end of the week with proof. Cracking open something like that could afford him a lot more opportunities than trying to continue living off sleight of hand videos.
He went to Ryan LeHane’s profile and couldn’t find any comments that talked about the fall from the night before. Cassidy’s voice echoed in his head, so he tapped out of the app and searched Ryan LeHane’s name. Nothing came up.
Cassidy was right. There was no way that some minor entertainment news outlet hadn’t seen her post or been notified in some way about the fall, and yet there wasn’t even speculative coverage about the rumor of a death on the island. There was nothing.
Whether this whole thing was an experiment in AI or just a coverup, it involved some very powerful people, James concluded.
Cool ocean air blew over the crowd, further chilling his skin as the sporadic rain continued to fall but full of the salt and scent of the Atlantic, and James reminded himself that he was literally in paradise. The breeze smelled earthy with marijuana and body sweat and the damp sand underfoot. The opener finally started with an intense drumline that immediately flowed into lyrics everyone in the crowd knew from the song’s place on the top songs of summer 2022 according to Spotify, and James almost forgot that the festival had a death on their hands.
The songs flowed easily from one to another. James knew most of the lyrics, and the band was wise to keep the energy upbeat enough for everyone to at least be able to dance along. Forty-five minutes passed before anyone could realize, and the musicians left, having successfully primed the audience and left them wanting more.
The houselights came up high in the canopy air above the crowd, illuminating them in a dim yellow light. The murmur of their talking rose gently as they all waited for the next act to start. After fifteen minutes or so, a small figure walked across the stage dressed completely in white, looking very Instagram business casual, and spoke into a microphone.
“Tonight’s lineup has changed slightly,” they said. Sounds of disappointment and anger rose from the crowd. The figure put the microphone back to their mouth. “I know, I know, but don’t worry. I think you will be very happy with what we have in store for you instead. May I present to you Bad Bunny!”
Another figure ran across the stage with a microphone in hand, greeting the crowd as the houselights went down and the stage lights took on a rhythmic beat of changing colors. Everyone screamed with excitement and surprise, but James stood motionless in shock. In his video posted on TikTok less than an hour before, he predicted this exact turn of events.
Thenextmorning,Cassidyawoke to pale darkness in her room after a restless night of almost no sleep. After Cassidy swept up the broken glass and removed all the knives in the kitchen, she locked herself away from Apricot. She still cared about her friend but needed to maintain distance to protect herself. This meant that, instead of going and clearing her mind on the island, Cassidy remained inside the villa to make sure Apricot did, too. Every time Cassidy heard a noise outside the room’s glass door, she stopped breathing and listened hard for the sounds of footsteps or breaking glass. Yet, it was worse once the storm hit, and she couldn’t hear anything through the torrential rain and crashing lightning.
While still lying in bed, she began scrolling. Her social feeds were full of dark videos from last night’s headliner performance and selfies with captions gloating about how lucky they were to be on the island and to get to see a surprise show from Bad Bunny. Cassidy knew it wasn’t luck, though. She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she knew it wasn’t just by chance that Bad Bunny played.
Maybe Rose was right to suspect people she’d only just met of lying about their intentions. Cassidy watched James’ video last night before the show started and knew that he predicted Bad Bunny would appear, but it was entirely possible he legitimately heard this as a rumor or had inside information before sharing the video.
Before leaving the villa the day before, James suggested that everyone make negative posts about the island. Was that some sort of ruse? Did he intend to make everyone else look bad by posting something delicious like this when everyone else was complaining? If that was the case, what purpose did it serve? None of it made any sense.
She checked the Island Xperience app and was unsurprised to see that there was still no statement about Ryan LeHane’s death. If they didn’t acknowledge it within the first 24 hours, it was unlikely they would say anything about it until the festival was over. Still, someone had to have seen her video—therealvideo—and tried to investigate it off the island, maybe even Ryan’s parents or friends who hadn’t heard from him.
Searching online for his name produced nothing. Literally nothing. Querying “Ryan LeHane” produced no relevant hits. The results felt to Cassidy like walking full-speed into the sliding glass door that led to the porch. She thought that the Wi-Fi failed, but that couldn’t be it because there were still populated results for similar searches that included “Ryan” and “LeHane” separately. She refreshed the search and got the same results. She looked for his profiles on YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter, but found nothing.
It’s like he doesn’t exist anymore.
A chill ran down Cassidy’s spine and she shot up to a seated position in bed. Her thoughts began to spiral, wondering what kind of conspiracy she’d fallen into the middle of, and quickly reined herself in. Cassidy turned the phone screen off and threw it on the bed. This was too much to deal with before even having a morning tea.
Sunlight broke through fell in photogenic golden rays into the living room, which last night was in complete disarray from Apricot’s mental break but now looked as tidy as the day they arrived. The couch and loveseat set hugged around the small, barren coffee table. All the chairs sat neatly pushed into the round breakfast table, complete with the salt and pepper set and the four woven placemats right where they belonged. It looked like Apricot even scrubbed the perfume rivulets off the wall. Cassidy was proud of her. For diving completely off the deep end the previous night, this was a much more mature rebound than she thought Apricot capable of.
Cassidy kept the TV off and moved about the kitchen in silence as she boiled water for tea. Nothing in the pre-stocked cabinets was appealing, and she wondered what the restaurants on the island offered this morning. She reached into her cami’s bra for her phone and when she didn’t find it there, she winced at the reflex. She could just explore the island and find food later after Apricot woke up.
