BY THE TIME WE LANDED on shore, we were in second place. Not terrible, in my opinion, but not first place. Some people on the team clearly weren't terribly happy with that placement, though. As we all flopped down on the beach from the long row in, we scoped each other out and caught our breath.
One bland looking guy raised his hand, giving us all a friendly look. "This isn't the Hunger Games, so I figure we can all work together, right? I'm Gary from Ohio." He pointed at his jacket, which read GARY on the breast and across his back, since Endurance Island liked to clearly label us to make it easier for the audience to tell everyone apart.
The sniffly redhead was sitting next to him, and she gave us all a wobbly smile. "Clarissa, from Los Angeles."
"You a model?" Gary asked.
She giggled at him and swatted at his arm. "Flatterer!"
My eyes narrowed. That didn't mean no. I'd have to watch Clarissa. It was clear she was going to play the flirty card.
"I'm Patty," said another woman, and I immediately sussed her up. Everyone on the show seemed to fall into certain categories, after all. Looks, brains, or entertainment. Patty was clearly going to be entertainment. She had a sweet face, a dainty build, a necklace that said "Number One Mom" and the most godawful feathered mullet I'd ever seen since Billy Ray Cyrus.
Next around the circle was another guy. Small, nerdy. Glasses. Freckles. Ginger. "Kinda funny that your name is Patty," he said in a voice that seemed far more abrasive than should have come out of the mouth of such a tiny guy. "I'm Pat, too. As in Patrick." And he pointed at the breast of his pocket. Sure enough, we now had Pat and Patty.
"Wow," I said. "You think they could have figured that out a little better, don't you think?"
"Bettah?" Clarissa giggled. "Are you from Jersey Shore?"
Okay, if I didn't kill Clarissa in week one, it would be a friggin' miracle. "I'm from Boston. And I'm Luna." It nearly killed me to do it, but I smiled at all of them as if this were the most fun I'd had in forever. Whee.
"Owen," said the last guy, and I tensed at the sound of his voice. It was the ass**le that had pointed out I was rowing wrong. He was number one on my shit list at the moment. Owen was clearly on the island - uh, Alaska - for looks. He was hot enough, with dusky skin, a strong, clean jawline and the prettiest pair of amber-colored hazel eyes I'd ever seen.
Too bad about that whole total ‘douchebag’ thing he had going.
"Well," I said, sitting up and dusting off my hands. "Now that we've all introduced ourselves, we should probably make a fire and boil some water so we can have something to drink."
"No," said Owen.
I turned to look at him, incredulous. "What do you mean, no?"
"I mean, no." He straightened and got to his feet. Not only was he pretty to look at, but he was tall and muscular. I resented that, because every time he spoke, I hated him more, and I knew if he was tall and strong, he'd last that much further in the game. "We need shelter before we do anything. It's going to rain."
"Listen, Owen," I began, trying to keep my tone reasonable. "There are trees all along the edge of this beach. If it rains, we can duck under one of those. We need drinking water because we can't get dehydrated."
"No," he said again. "We can't just duck 'un-dah' a tree if it rains, Luna." His tone was scathing. "Haven't you ever heard of lightning?"
"Haven't you ever heard of waterborne parasites?" I was pretty sure I'd seen one too many episodes of House to ever drink anything from a stream. Like, ever.
"It's clear we need a leader here in camp," Owen said, those pretty eyes staring daggers down at me. "So why don't we have a vote? Those in favor of me being the leader, raise your hand."
Every hand went up but mine.
I gritted my teeth. "Okay, fine. Shelter it is." I could play along. I wasn't stupid.
If Owen wanted to run this tribe, I'd let him. And when he ran it straight into the ground, his would be the first name we'd write down.
BY THE TIME NIGHT FELL, we had about half of a shelter. Unfortunately, it was the wrong half, considering that Owen thought it was a brilliant idea to start from the floor and work our way up. Oh sure, I thought to myself. Because if it snows, what you totally want is a f**king floor instead of a roof.
But I kept that to myself.
In fact, I was pretty quiet all around. I mean, I knew I was right. I didn't have to rub it in anyone's face to prove that I was. They could already tell. I noticed some of the others kept shooting me looks as it grew dark.
"You think we should build a fire?" Patty asked in a perky voice. "How cold do you think it'll get?"
"My guess is pretty cold," Gary said. "Why else would they give us matches on day one without us doing anything to win them?"
And finally, someone had come to the same conclusion that I had earlier that day. They'd given us thick parkas and matches because they didn't want us to die, even though they were sending us out to rough it in Alaska in the dead of winter. Dead people probably didn't make good TV.
But I kept my mouth shut about this, too.
Instead, I huddled on my end of the uncomfortable, lumpy platform—because there was no way I was calling it a shelter - and decided to dig through the bag of supplies that they'd given each of us. Maybe we had some extra layers we could put on. I was already cold, and with the sun dropping below the skies, it was just going to get colder.