Chapter 19

“GOD I’M THIRSTY.”

It was Dan who spoke into the darkness of the villa where the four of us were lying, sweating, and staring at the shadowed rafters. I heard a sigh from Santana as she rolled over in bed.

“Me too. I’ve had a dehydration headache ever since we started rationing the water. But until it rains, I’m not sure what else we can do.”

“Being in charge of our own supply would help.” Dan’s voice was resentful, and I knew why. The long gap between breakfast and supper had been particularly hard today, and I’d seen Dan down by the sea, rinsing his mouth out with seawater more than once, though I wasn’t sure the harshly salted tropical water would do much to slake anyone’s thirst. The idea of a small gulp of fresh water, even one that had to come out of our supper allowance, had been almost unbearably tempting.

“If we’re not careful, we’re all going to end up like Zana,” Dan said.

“I’m sorry, what?” Joel said. He sounded puzzled. “What the hell has Zana got to do with anything? And what do you mean, end up like her?”

“I mean… he’s pretty controlling,” Santana said. “Don’t you think? And not just over her.”

There was a long silence. No one had discussed Conor’s increasing autocracy, and the decreasing willingness of the group to stand up to him. It wasn’t just his grip over the food and water. It wasn’t just the brutal efficiency with which he had taken out Bayer. It was everything. In the beginning I think we’d all been grateful for his willingness to take charge, set the rules, make us all feel safe, but day by day, inch by inch, Conor had slowly eased himself more and more into a position of control. Now, somehow, we had found ourselves in a situation where he was dictating not only how much we ate and drank, but when, and even if. His remark to Angel, that he was letting her eat, had been an admission of something that none of us had wanted to face up to—but now Conor had put it into words, and I felt a cold, chill certainty coalesce in the pit of my stomach. Zana was not okay. None of us were. And we were too scared to challenge him.

“She’s frightened of him,” I said. It felt like a realization, but as I said the words, I knew that it wasn’t, not really. It was an admission of something I’d suspected almost since the first day on the island.

“What?” Joel sounded nonplussed. “How do you make that out? I’ve never seen them exchange a cross word.”

“You’ve never seen them exchange a cross word because she never stands up to him,” Santana said tartly. I nodded.

“That argument tonight, about Angel’s food—that was literally the first time I’ve seen her push back at anything—even though she’s terrified of that bloody water villa. And she’s a completely different person when she’s not around him. I spent all day trying to rig up a rain catcher with her, and it was like being with another girl.”

“What do you mean?” Joel asked.

“It’s like…” I struggled to put it into words. “Well, for one thing, she’s got a personality when she’s not looking over her shoulder and worrying about what he’s thinking. She’ll argue back, she’ll make her point. She had this genius idea about sinking the bottles into the sand to minimize evaporation. But when she’s around him…” I trailed off.

“When she’s around him, she seems scared,” Santana finished my sentence for me, and I nodded, though I knew no one could see me in the darkness. On his mattress on the other side of the double bed, I could hear Joel shifting uncomfortably, as if he didn’t know what to say.

“I should have known from the start,” Dan said bitterly. “It was all right there in his videos. But he seemed so nice in person.”

“Videos?” I was puzzled. “You mean his YouTube channel? How did you manage to access that without a phone?”

“He was on the list they posted round to everyone’s houses.” Dan said. “The first thing I did when we got the info pack was google everyone on it. He’s… well, he’s quite a piece of work.”

I frowned. What info pack? But Dan was still speaking, sounding like he was trying to marshall his thoughts.

“He’s… he’s one of those I’m just asking the question guys, you know? The kind it’s really hard to pin down, because they never actually say the racist stuff themselves, they’re just like, hey, thought experiment here, but what if racism wasn’t so bad? He’ll have someone incredibly shitty on his channel and he’ll be like well, now, I’m not endorsing Andrew Tate, obviously, but I am interested in his point of view on… and the end result is that you find you’ve sat through twenty minutes of some men’s-rights nut not being challenged about his views, because Conor’s just quote, unquote asking questions.”

“Yeah, but…” Joel sounded like he was struggling. “I have to say, I’ve seen some of his stuff—”

“Wait, you’ve seen it?” I don’t know why, but the news shocked me. Then I remembered Joel’s words to Conor on the boat, the day we met. I know who you are of course. At the time I’d assumed he’d simply come across him in the press. Now, the remark had a very different slant. “Are you one of his subscribers?”

“I’m not a Co-bro if that’s what you mean,” Joel said a little defensively, and Dan burst out laughing.

“Co-bro? Is that what his fans call themselves?”

Joel carried on, doggedly, as though Dan hadn’t interrupted.

“In fact, if you want to know the truth, I came across him because he had a run-in with Romi. So I’m hardly some kind of uncritical admirer.”

“What?” This was all getting more and more confusing. “I’m sorry, did Romi know him?”

“No, but he called her out on his channel. She was absolutely furious about it. He did this whole segment on beauty influencers and body image, and he called out a load of TikTokers he felt had damaging messages. Romi wasn’t the target, but she was one of the channels he quoted. Anyway, she was mad as hell, but when I watched it…” He shrugged helplessly. “Honestly… I thought he had a point. Some of the stuff she says—” He swallowed painfully, and I saw him correct himself. “Said, was… kind of toxic, when you really thought about it.”

“Let me guess,” Santana’s voice was unimpressed, “all the toxic people he called out were young women, yes? And his 10.4 million followers probably descended on their feeds and made their lives miserable? So much for standing up for women. If it looks like a misogynist and barks like a misogynist—”

“Can we not just go by what he’s actually said?” Joel broke in. He sounded like he was becoming frustrated. “Okay, he’s had the odd controversial guest on, and okay, his followers don’t always behave perfectly. But unless you can point me to where he’s said or done something wrong, this feels a bit guilt by association.”

“Look, you’ve clearly watched his channel more than me,” Dan said. His voice was placating, though beneath it he didn’t sound convinced by Joel’s point. “So I’ll take your word on that. But for someone who claims he’s not a racist, homophobic piece of shit, he sure attracts a lot of racist, homophobic piece-of-shit followers.” Joel made an unhappy noise, and Dan waved his hand, dismissing the point of Conor’s YouTube. “Let’s put that aside though—I wasn’t even talking about YouTube originally. It was the food and water situation I wanted to discuss. Is no one else bloody uncomfortable about all this?”

“Yes,” Santana and I both said, at the same time as Joel said, “But it makes sense.”

“What makes sense?” Santana demanded. “Him hoarding all the supplies over at his villa? How does that make sense, Joel? Help me understand, because at the moment, all I’m seeing is some animals are more equal than others.”

“What?” Dan sounded puzzled, and Santana made an impatient noise. “Animal Farm, Dan. We were in a tutorial together at uni. Did you pay any attention that year? But regardless, it doesn’t make sense, Joel, and you know it. All that stuff about rats getting at the food was just an excuse.”

“How was it an excuse?” Joel said. His voice had risen and he sounded more than a little aggrieved. I guessed he was feeling got at by implication, because of the way he’d fallen into trying to defend Conor’s YouTube channel, and now his complicity in helping to move the food. “He wasn’t making that up. I saw it—there’d been rats at the cardboard boxes, and there were trails of ants all over the place. None of that’s a problem out at the water villa.”

“So what’s the excuse with the water? I can’t see rats getting at the water.”

“The reason,” Joel said, his tone irritable now, “is because some people didn’t seem able to stick to their rations. What if we came down and found Bayer had drunk the whole lot?”

“First, Bayer is dead, Joel. Do I need to remind you? At Conor’s hands, no less. Second, you give everyone their own allocation!” Santana’s voice was rising too. “You don’t take a unilateral decision to hold everyone’s water hostage.”

“And then what?” Joel said. He had sat up in bed, plainly too annoyed to lie down, and I could see his shape silhouetted against the night sky, his shoulders visibly tense even in outline. “When the water started to run out? What if someone decided they deserved a bit more and felt like they’d take it by force? No. You give it to the strongest, most trustworthy person and put them in charge of making sure it’s doled out fairly.”

There was a long silence. Then Dan spelled out what everyone, apart from Joel, was apparently thinking.

“The problem is, mate, we don’t trust him. And to your point about rations, we have no idea if he’s sticking to his allowance out there, because we have no idea what’s going on. No, I’m sorry, the longer we let this go on, the harder it’s going to be to challenge it. I’m going to say something tomorrow.”

“Dan…” Santana sounded worried. “Do you think that’s wise?”

“I’m not going to be a dick,” Dan said. “I’m just going to calmly point out that this isn’t a fair way of organizing anything. And if everyone backs me up, I don’t see that he can kick off about it. So will you?”

“Are you talking to me?” Joel asked.

“I’m talking to everyone. Will you back me up if I talk to him tomorrow, yes or no?”

“Yes,” Santana said. “But I wish you wouldn’t.”

“I’ll back you up,” I said. “But Dan, please tread carefully on this. The last thing we need to do is set up some kind of feud. Things are bad enough.”

“Like I said,” Dan said. “I’m not going to be a dick about this. I’m just going to point out that this is a democracy, and we didn’t agree to this. And what about you, Joel?”

“I just think—” Joel said, and then stopped. He didn’t sound convinced. At all. He sounded defeated, and like he’d had enough of arguing Conor’s corner, but he didn’t sound convinced.

“Go on,” Dan said, but not goadingly, like he genuinely wanted to know. “You can say it.”

“I just think… look, I think you’re hanging a lot on his girlfriend being a bit shy and some commenters on YouTube being twats. I feel like you’ve written the guy off based on—what? Nothing. Conjecture. Some video you didn’t like. And none of that has anything to do with his actions here, does it?”

“No,” Dan said. His voice, in the darkness, was persuasive. “No, it doesn’t. And look, I take your point. If this was a court of law and we were on a jury, I’m not saying I’d convict him on this evidence of being a dickhead wifebeater. But like you say, none of that’s relevant. All I’m asking him for is the water back, and a discussion, going forward, on how we handle things. Okay? That’s it. No one reasonable could possibly object.”

Joel didn’t reply, but I saw, silhouetted against the moonlit forest, his head nod slowly, and then he slid back to lie down.

But as I rolled onto my side to wait for morning, I couldn’t help but wonder, exactly how reasonable was Conor? Either way, we were going to find out. I just hoped we could live with the answer.