You've been in a hotel room for what feels like three weeks.
No phone. Just you, bad rom-coms, room service, and the slow creeping realisation that you signed up for this with your whole chest and now you actually have to do it.
The car smells like new leather. The driver hasn't said a word. Outside, the island blurs past in green and gold and you keep waiting to feel ready and you keep — not.
You smooth your scrubs out of habit.
Right. Not wearing scrubs.
You're wearing this backless chiffon maxi from — Meshki?
Mooski?
Something with an M.
The stylists picked it out this morning when they knocked on your hotel room door at 7AM and you answered it with your hair looking like a mess. A month ago you were literally packing fits with your best friend at 3AM giggling like it was fake.
It is not fake. You are in a car. This is happening.
The girl across from you— Evie, she said in the hotel lobby, very straight handshake, very direct eye contact— is sitting with perfect posture and tracking the road like she's mentally rehearsing something. You've said maybe twelve words to each other. She seems nice. She also radiates I have a five step morning routine and I will tell you about it energy and you respect that and also it's a little much at 8AM.
She catches you staring.
You were absolutely staring.
❝Ready?❞ she asks.
You think about the last two years. The one who said you're being paranoid every single time, for six months, until you found the texts and he said okay but hear me out— You think about the one before that who cried. Actually cried. When you ended it. Which would have been more convincing if you hadn't known he'd cheated for like two weeks already. You think about being twenty-four and tired.
❝Absolutely not,❞ you say.
Evie breaks into a real smile. ❝Same, honestly.❞
The car stops.
The gates are ridiculous. Like embarrassingly beautiful. You almost don't notice the camera mounted above them.
Almost.
You pull in one breath that fixes nothing and walk through.
Paradiso.
Okay. Fine. You've seen the photos. You've watched previous seasons in your break room at the hospital with your coworkers talking over it. You thought you were prepared.
You were not prepared.
White stone and terracotta and a pool so blue it looks fake, and the light is doing something genuinely unfair, and a production assistant is already in your ear going make an entrance, be yourself, be natural which are three contradictory instructions but sure. You follow the sound of voices around the side of the villa and step out onto the terrace and—
Three girls. Already there. Already mid-laugh about something.
You and Evie are last.
❝Is there room for two more?❞ Evie says, and the two girls by the pool make a noise that honestly shakes something loose in your chest because it's so immediately warm—
❝BITCHHHHH!❞
There's a third girl behind them with a glass raised and a smile like she's been waiting to see how this goes.
Everyone's laughing. Immediately. Before you've even said your name. It's that thing where you meet certain people and it just- clicks, instantly, and you don't know if it's real yet or if it's just the adrenaline and the cameras and the fact that you're all terrified and performing brave.
Probably both.
You'll figure it out later.
❝It's gonna be one hell of a summer,❞ Evie announces to the group.
There's a camera literally right there in the bougainvillea. It's not hidden. It's right there.
❝I know right—❞ ❝Oh absolutely—❞ ❝Don't even—❞
You look at the four of them and your mouth opens and what comes out is: ❝You guys are all insanely pretty, can we just— not do the boys thing and go on a girls trip?❞
❝Okay wait,❞ Jasmine says, and she's laughing, but she's also already doing a little scan of everyone. ❝If the girls look like this the boys better show up. Like they actually better bring it the fuck on.❞
❝I KNOW RIGHT, we are literally a collection of goddesses,❞ Monica says, gesturing at everyone, wine sloshing slightly.
❝Enjoy it now.❞ Evie is already assessing the far end of the deck. ❝Once the testosterone gets in here the whole energy changes. I'm already figuring out where I'm doing 6AM Pilates.❞
You catch Carmen's eye. She's been laughing at everything since you arrived, big and unself-conscious, and she catches your look and immediately clocks it.
❝Evie,❞ Carmen says, very seriously. ❝I'll be right there with you. By which I mean I will be fully asleep. But I will be thinking about you. So supportively.❞
❝That's not—❞ Evie starts.
❝So supportively,❞ Carmen repeats.
You're laughing and you haven't even sat down yet. The five of you end up sprawled across the daybeds, drinks found from somewhere, someone's playlist going, and for maybe four minutes the whole thing feels easy and warm and like nothing bad could possibly happen in a place this pretty.
Then the villa doors open.
The first thing you notice about Cupid is that she walks like she owns the whole island.
She probably does, legally. But still.
Metallic gold dress, warm brown skin literally glowing, moving through the pool deck with the energy of someone who finds this genuinely fun after six seasons which should not be possible and somehow is. She is — a lot. In the best way. The most unsettling best way.
Monica grabs your arm so hard you nearly spill your drink.
❝Oh my GOD,❞ she whispers. ❝It's literally Cupid.❞
❝She is even MORE gorgeous in person—❞ Carmen starts, at full volume. Because Carmen doesn't really have a volume button on her.
❝Carmen—❞
❝What—❞
Cupid hears her. Smiles. Completely unsurprised.
❝Don't get up—❞ she waves a hand. Stops walking. Reconsiders. ❝Actually, get up, I want to look at all of you properly.❞
The scramble to stand is...not elegant. Monica goes immediately. Carmen almost takes out her drink. Jasmine rises like she's been ready for this. Evie is already up, composed, because of course she is. You're half-laughing and half on your feet when Cupid opens her arms and the group hug happens and she smells like expensive vanilla and something that might literally just be the scent of confidence.
She holds you all at arm's length. Looks. You get the feeling she's cataloguing things.
❝I wanted to get in here before the chaos,❞ she says, dropping onto the daybed across from you like she's done it a thousand times. She picks up a drink that wasn't hers. ❝How are we feeling? Terrified? Excited? Somewhere in between?❞
❝Honestly?❞ Monica says. ❝All three and I've only been here twenty minutes.❞
❝Good.❞ Cupid clinks her glass against Monica's. ❝That's the right answer.❞
❝We were literally just talking about locking the gates,❞ Jasmine says. ❝Keeping the villa to ourselves.❞
Cupid's smile stays exactly where it is. Her eyes do something else for half a second. ❝I know you were. The boys will complicate that.❞ A pause. ❝They tend to.❞
❝Great,❞ Jasmine says, which sounds like obviously.
❝The boys always do,❞ Monica sighs, leaning back.
❝That is rather the point, darling.❞ Cupid looks around at all five of you with the warm, slightly terrifying attention of someone who knows exactly how this plays out. ❝Right. Tell me things. First impressions, what you're looking for, what you're actually looking for.❞ She tilts her head. ❝I'll find out eventually. Might as well be now.❞
Carmen opens her mouth.
Evie puts her hand on Carmen's arm.
Carmen closes her mouth.
She asks about your types like it's the most casual thing in the world, dropped into the middle of a completely different conversation.
Carmen goes first because Carmen always goes first, voluntarily or not. Fun guys, she says. Spontaneous. Actually geeks if they're funny about it and they can keep up with her. She says this with zero embarrassment and complete sincerity.
Jasmine: someone who won't try to manage her. A tree to climb. She says it completely straight-faced and Monica short-circuits for three full seconds.
❝A tree,❞ Monica says.
❝Tall, stable, something to hold onto,❞ Jasmine says, like this is normal. ❝I didn't stutter.❞
Carmen snorts. ❝Sure. We can say you meant stable when you said tree.❞
Then, Monica: someone who'll actually come with her. Not I'll visit you in Barcelona someone. Actually come with her.
Evie: reliable. Emotionally mature. Someone she can bring home and not have to explain. She says this like a requirements list, and you watch Carmen bite down on something.
Then Cupid looks at you.
And you think about it for about half a second too long, which you're aware of, and which you do anyway.
❝Someone who means what they say,❞ you say. ❝Genuinely that's it. The bar is on the floor and I just want someone to not trip over it.❞
❝That's a very interesting bar,❞ Cupid says.
❝I'm a very interesting person.❞
Cupid smiles at you the way people smile when they know something. ❝Yes,❞ she says. ❝You are.❞
Then she asks— casually, like it barely counts— whether anyone likes having a roster.
No and obviously not and what, no— go around the daybeds so fast and so unified that it's almost funny. You say no too. Genuinely, you don't. Also none of you would say yes to this question right now even if you did, and everyone knows that, and nobody says it.
Good, says Cupid, like she's taking you all entirely at your word.
Then: the rules.
She goes through them like she could do this in her sleep. The Altar. Recouplings — you're always coupled, uncoupled means vulnerable, vulnerable means Exile. Cupid's Den. Temptation Bay, which she mentions once, quickly, with a smile that doesn't quite reach casual.
Then she reaches beside her and brings out five small scrolls. Gold ribbon. Wax seal, little arrow stamp.
She holds them out.
You take yours. It's heavier than it looks. The wax is still faintly warm.
❝One each,❞ she says. ❝Don't open them yet.❞
You take yours. Heavier than expected.
❝They're all the same question? ❞ Monica asks.
❝No,❞ Cupid says pleasantly.
A beat.
❝I pick the question I think will cost you the most to answer honestly. ❞ She looks around the group. ❝You're going to find someone tonight whose answer to their question tells you something real. Not their favourite colour. Not their type. Something real. ❞ She pauses. ❝The boys have scrolls too. Same rules. When they get here, open them. Compare. See what happens. ❞
Carmen looks at her scroll like it might bite her.
❝What if we don't want to answer?❞ Evie asks.
❝Then you can explain that to the person asking, ❞ Cupid says, ❝and see how that goes. ❞ She stands. ❝Open them when the boys arrive. Not before. ❞
She looks at the villa doors.
❝Which will be— ❞
They open.
❝—now,❞ she says. ❝Lovely. ❞
Five boys come down the steps.
Okay.
Okay.
You do the thing— thirty seconds, read the room, clock who's where. Trauma nurse thing. Force of habit.
First one through the door and he knows it. Dark jacket, easy grin, the specific kind of handsome that's been handsome long enough to stop being surprised by it. He spots the five of you and his whole face does something warm and immediate— not performed, just genuinely pleased, like this is the part of the whole production he actually showed up for.
Behind him, broader, quieter, hands in his pockets. He comes down the steps and takes the space in before he takes the people in— clocks the layout, the exits, where everything is— and then, only then, looks at the group. And the build on him? Gol-lee. Has to be a football player.
Then one who comes down the steps mid-sentence to the person beside him, hands going, explaining something with complete conviction to someone who has clearly stopped listening. He steps off the last step, keeps walking, and walks directly into a sun lounger.
Doesn't fall. Recovers. Looks around.
Oh but Carmen saw.
Carmen is already pointing, shoulders shaking, absolutely no help.
He goes slightly pink and keeps walking like it didn't happen, which makes it worse, and also— somehow— better.
Then the guy behind him.
You'd clocked him in the group without fully landing on him yet— not because he's not worth landing on, he very much is, but because he doesn't announce himself. He comes down the steps with his hands loose at his sides and the particular ease of someone who has been the most attractive person in most rooms and decided a while ago that performing it would be exhausting.
He surveys the terrace once, briefly.
Meets nobody's eyes specifically.
Smiles at nothing in particular.
Which is somehow more unsettling than if he'd looked directly at you.
And then one, at the edge of the group, who isn't looking at the terrace at all.
He's looking at you.
Not the group.
Not the villa.
You.
Direct and unhurried, for about two seconds, like he's confirming something he already suspected.
Then away.
You look at Carmen, who is still pointing at the guy who nearly fell over and completely losing it.
❝Yo, why do the three brunettes look like they're brothers.❞ You hear someone muse, Monica probably and you can't help but laugh at it because they do.
Carmen still laughing over the lounger boy, somehow laughs even harder. ❝Cousins, maybe!❞
Is she not allowed to laugh at home?
Cupid steps into the space between both groups.
❝Boys, meet the girls. Girls, the boys.❞ She looks around at all ten of you. ❝Thirty minutes, one scroll each, one rule: be honest. After that, we couple up.❞ A pause. ❝Go.❞
Two seconds of nobody moving.
Then Carmen physically tears her ribbon off. ❝Right, who's interesting then?❞
And it begins.
The terrace does its thing.
You don't open your scroll yet. You watch.
The sun lounger boy has already found Carmen— they're in something fast and loud and mutual within about forty seconds, both of them talking at the same time, neither of them caring. He says something and she absolutely loses it, head back, the kind of laugh you can't fake. He looks delighted by this in a way that's completely unperformed.
Theodore, was it? You smile at this. She's done for.
The broad quiet one— Beckham, someone says it nearby— has drifted to the pool edge where Monica is. You're close enough to catch fragments.
❝—actually never tried it—❞
❝You've never had—❞
❝I'm from Colorado, we don't—❞
❝That's not even a reason—❞
❝It's a completely valid reason—❞
❝It is genuinely not—❞
They're arguing about something. Monica looks deeply offended. Beckham looks like someone weathering a completely unreasonable storm with mild amusement, which you suspect is just his face in conflict. He says something you don't catch and Monica makes a noise that's half outrage and half laugh and shoves his arm.
He was ready for it. Doesn't move.
Monica notices. Looks at her own hand. Looks at him.
Interesting, you think.
The one with the grin— Lorenzo— has made his way to Jasmine. You clock that. The way the grin shifts when they start talking. The way Jasmine's doing the thing where her face gives nothing away, which means it's giving everything away.
And then there's Maverick.
You hadn't quite placed him yet — he'd been in the middle of the group coming down the steps, not announcing himself particularly — but you place him now because the energy on the terrace shifts slightly, the way it does when someone walks into a room and the room recalibrates.
He's talking to Evie, of all people, and Evie is laughing, which is the most surprising thing you've seen today, because Evie's laugh does not come out easily.
You've known her for four hours.
He's not even doing anything that flashy. He's just— present in a specific way. Like he knows exactly how much space he takes up and has made a conscious decision about it.
You watch him for a minute.
He catches you watching.
Doesn't look away immediately. Holds it for half a second, something slightly amused in it.
You look away first. Again.
File that, says your brain.
I know, you tell it.
You hold your scroll and don't open it.
You're waiting, you realise, for the right moment. Which is a thing you do— wait for the right moment, the right conditions, the right whatever — until the moment has passed and you've managed the situation instead of being in it.
You open it.
What do you know about yourself that you keep pretending you don't?
You read it twice.
Then you put it face down on your knee.
Okay, Cupid. Fine.
❝You haven't opened yours.❞
You turn.
The one who looked at you. Up close he's— you made the right call looking at Carmen. He's in a grey linen shirt and he has the specific kind of quiet that feels like it cost him something.
❝Oh no, I have,❞ you say.
He looks down at the scroll. ❝Ah.❞
A pause.
❝Shoji.❞
❝MC.❞
❝Should we just—❞
❝Yeah.❞
You both laugh.
Shoji drops into the seat across from you. He has his scroll in his hand, unrolled, and he's looking at it with the expression of someone who has just been asked something extremely specific.
❝What did you get?❞ you say.
He shows you.
What would you let someone do for you, if you trusted them enough?
You look at it. Look at yours. Show him.
He reads it. Looks up.
❝She knows things,❞ he says.
❝She knows things,❞ you agree.
A pause.
❝You go first,❞ he says.
❝Why do I have to go first❞
❝You're holding yours face down. Which means you've already thought about it. Which means you already know.❞
The annoying thing is he's right. You've known your answer since before you opened the scroll, because Cupid picked the question you've been not-answering for about two years.
❝I know that I'm better at being needed than being loved,❞ you say. ❝Like, I know the difference, yeah? I know that being needed feels safe because it has a function and being loved doesn't have a function it just— is, if you get what I mean, and I don't know what to do with things that just are.❞ You look at the pool. ❝And I keep pretending I don't know that because if I admit I know it then I have to do something about it.❞
Shoji doesn't say anything for a moment.
Not the uncomfortable kind of nothing. The kind that means he heard you and is treating it like it deserves to be treated.
❝That's a real answer,❞ he says.
❝Your turn.❞
He looks at his scroll. Back at the pool. ❝Someone to just— show up,❞ he says, finally. ❝Like not because I asked. Not because something's wrong. Just.❞ He stops. Tries again. ❝I do a lot of showing up for other people. I don't— I've never really let anyone do it back.❞
He says it like he's diagnosing a structural problem in something, quiet and matter-of-fact. ❝That's what I'd let someone do. If I trusted them.❞
You look at him.
He looks at you.
The camera in the bougainvillea is right there and you are both extremely aware of it.
Neither of you says anything.
You don't need to.
You look up and Lorenzo is making his way across the terrace.
He's been at Jasmine's side— you caught that earlier, the specific frequency of his attention there— but Jasmine has moved on to someone else now or Lorenzo has or it's one of those mutual redirects where nobody technically made the call. He picks up a drink from the table like it's his and drops into the seat across from you with the ease of someone who's never once been awkward in their body.
❝Hey,❞ he says. Then, to Shoji: ❝Hey man.❞
Shoji does a small nod and takes the social cue. ❝I'll catch you,❞ he says to you, which is two words more than you expected, and moves off.
Lorenzo watches him go. Something passes over his face, brief. Then he turns to you and gives you the full version of the grin and it is — effective. You make a note of the fact that it's effective.
❝MC,❞ he says. ❝Marketing executive, twenty-five. Miami.❞ He says it like a pitch. ❝What've you got?❞
You stare at him. ❝Are you introducing yourself like a LinkedIn profile?❞
He points at you. ❝Okay, fair, that was bad. Let me try again—❞
❝It's fine—❞
❝No I can do better—❞
❝Lorenzo, it's genuinely fine—❞
❝I'm gonna start over—❞
❝Please don't.❞
He laughs. Actually laughs, caught out. It's a better look than the grin. ❝Hi. I'm Lorenzo. That was terrible. You are?❞
❝MC.❞
❝And what do you do, MC?❞
❝Trauma nurse.❞
He blinks. ❝Oh.❞ A recalibration. ❝So you've like. Seen things.❞
❝Some things yeah.❞
❝Wild.❞ He sits back. ❝I was gonna make a joke about how that must be good for reading people but I feel like you'll tell me that's obvious.❞
❝Little bit,❞ you say.
❝Right.❞
He shows you his scroll.
When did you last want something you couldn't charm your way into getting?
You look at it for a second. ❝Ouch,❞ you say.
❝Right?❞ He looks genuinely ruffled for about half a second, which is the most interesting thing you've seen from him. ❝How does she even— I've been here forty minutes.❞
❝She picks the question that costs the most,❞ you say.
❝Yeah, well,❞ He taps the scroll against his knee. ❝Mission accomplished.❞ He looks at yours. ❝What did you get?❞
You show him.
He reads it. Looks up. ❝And?❞
❝I answered it already tonight.❞
❝Tell me.❞
Not pushy. The same way he asked before— like he's just genuinely decided he wants to know and is waiting.
You give him the same answer you gave Shoji. He listens the same way— still, actually in it.
❝Your turn,❞ you say when you're done.
He's quiet for a second. Longer than you've seen him quiet. ❝My mum,❞ he says. ❝Getting her to—❞ he stops. Recalibrates. ❝She didn't want me to do marketing. She wanted me to do something she understood, like accounting or finance instead- shit, she even told me to reconsider a medical pathway. And I spent about two years trying to explain it to her in the right way, frame it right, show her the right numbers.❞ He looks at his scroll. ❝Never worked. She came around eventually on her own but it wasn't because of anything I did. I couldn't— yeah.❞ He shrugs, but it's a smaller shrug than usual. ❝Couldn't charm my way into it.❞
You look at him. ❝That's not what I expected,❞ you say.
❝What did you expect?❞
❝An ex-girlfriend.❞
He laughs — caught out, short. ❝There's probably one of those too,❞ he says. ❝But that's the honest answer.❞
That's the honest answer.
You file that. Not as evidence. Just as— data.
❝You're interesting,❞ he says.
❝You keep saying that.❞
❝Keep meaning it.❞ He stands up, helps you up and then moves back into the terrace.
Maverick finds you with about five minutes left.
He sits down without a big entrance, which you've noticed is a thing he does— arrives in spaces without announcing himself, which is somehow more disorienting than if he did.
He shows you his scroll without preamble.
What do you want that you'd be embarrassed to admit wanting?
You look at it. ❝She doesn't mess around,❞ you say.
❝At all,❞ he agrees. He looks at yours. ❝You already answered yours?❞
❝Twice tonight.❞
❝What did you get?❞
You tell him. Short version. He listens in a way that's slightly different from how Lorenzo listened— Lorenzo listened like he was gathering information, Maverick listens like he's just— present. There. Not doing anything with it yet.
❝Your turn,❞ you say.
He looks at his scroll for a long moment. ❝Someone to come home to,❞ he says. ❝That's it. Like not— I don't need it to be complicated, I don't need it to be a thing. I just want to come home and have someone be there.❞ He says it like he's slightly annoyed at himself for saying it. ❝Which sounds so—❞
❝Normal?❞ you say.
❝Basic,❞ he says.
❝Normal,❞ you say again.
He looks at you. That small crooked smile again. ❝You do the thing.❞
❝What thing.❞
❝Where you reframe something without making it feel like you're doing it.❞
❝That's not a thing,❞ you say.
❝It's a little bit a thing.❞
You open your mouth. Close it.
He raises his eyebrows.
❝Marginally,❞ you say.
He laughs— quiet, real. Cupid's voice carries across the terrace before either of you can say anything else.
Scrolls down.
Maverick stands. ❝Good to meet you, MC.❞
❝You too,❞ you say.
He moves back. You watch him go.
He's trouble- good or bad, you don't know yet.
Everyone drifts back to the center. The evening has gone gold and warm and the pool lights are just starting to come on.
Cupid stands at the head of The Altar.
❝Boys are choosing first tonight,❞ she says. ❝Girls— stand there and look like you haven't been analyzing everyone for the last thirty minutes.❞ A pause. ❝That was a joke. Mostly.❞ She nods at Maverick. ❝You first.❞
Maverick crosses the terrace like he decided ten minutes ago.
He stops in front of Jasmine.
She looks up. Her face does the thing where it tells you everything by telling you nothing.
❝Jasmine.❞ He looks at her for a second, like he's making sure he has the right words. ❝You're the most interesting person I've spoken to tonight. And I don't say that to everyone.❞ A beat. ❝I'd like to keep finding out why.❞
She holds it for a moment. Lets him stand there.
❝Keep up then,❞ she says, and steps forward.
Their physical attraction to each other is immediate and almost undeniable, his arm around her waist.
Lorenzo's name is called next.
He stands.
Pauses— barely, less than a second, eyes going somewhere just for a moment— then moves.
He stops in front of you.
The smile is the good version. Not the LinkedIn one.
❝Okay so I had something prepared,❞ he says, ❝and I'm scrapping it because you'd clock it immediately and I'd rather not start there.❞ He looks at you. ❝You're sharp and you're funny and you didn't let me get away with anything tonight, which— honestly, that doesn't happen a lot.❞
He tilts his head slightly. ❝I'd like to get to know you properly. If you'll let me.❞
The back of your brain tells you there has to be an ulterior motive.
You step forward anyway.
You're done overthinking everything.
❝Likewise,❞ you say.
Shoji is called.
You feel him looking before you check. That specific weight of being watched by someone who's trying not to watch.
You look up.
One second.
Then he walks to Evie.
He stops in front of her. Quiet for a moment, like he's choosing carefully.
❝You seem like someone who means what she says,❞ he says. ❝I think that's rare. And I think we'd be good for each other.❞
Evie's face does something genuine. Unperformed. ❝Yeah,❞ she says. ❝I think so too.❞
You watch them. She actually likes him. That's obvious and real and it means something and it also means this is going to get complicated in a specific slow way later, and you are already thinking about how it ends, which is the thing you do, which is a problem, which you are aware of and currently cannot stop.
Theodore walks up to Carmen.
He stops. Takes a breath. He clearly had something ready — you can see it on his face, the specific look of someone who rehearsed — and then Carmen is already looking at him and he loses about sixty percent of it immediately.
❝So I had a whole— I wrote something, kind of, in my head, on the way over here, and it was actually pretty good—❞ he starts.
❝Theodore,❞ Carmen says.
❝Yeah?❞
❝Just say the thing.❞
He exhales. ❝You're the most fun I've had in a really long time,❞ he says, simply. ❝And we've known each other for thirty minutes. I'd like to see what that looks like with more time.❞
Carmen looks at him for a second.
❝That was the thing?❞ she says.
❝That was the thing.❞
❝That was a good thing.❞
❝I know, right? The prepared version was worse.❞
❝Obviously,❞ she squeals, doing a little dance before bouncing over to him.
Beckham gets to Monica last.
He stands in front of her with his hands in his pockets and the easy, unhurried manner of someone who has decided something and is just getting to the part where he says it.
❝Best for last,❞ he chuckles. ❝Alright. Cards on the table. You argued with me for ten minutes about avocado toast. You were completely right the whole time and you knew it and you kept going anyway.❞ A pause. ❝I haven't laughed like that in a while. So. Here I am.❞
Monica looks at him. Tilts her head. ❝That's your speech? Avocado toast?❞
❝That's my speech.❞
❝Beckham.❞
❝Monica.❞
She gives him a dramatic, lingering look, but a genuine smile breaks through her defense, the initial friction between them melting into a mature, surprisingly comfortable foundation.
Cupid looks at the five new couples.
❝Night one,❞ she says. ❝Lovely. Nothing you see here is permanent — I'm telling you that not as a threat but as a fact about Paradiso.❞ She picks up her glass. ❝Enjoy tonight. You've earned it.❞
She walks toward the villa doors.
Stops.
❝I'll be in touch.❞ She smiles, not at anyone specific, at all of you. ❝I always am.❞
The first night does what first nights do.
Music from somewhere. Drinks from somewhere else. Pairs drift and settle and drift again. The pool lights come on fully now and the whole terrace goes warm and soft and loud and good.
You end up on the far daybed with Lorenzo, which is— yeah. Okay. Obviously.
He's good at this. The conversation, the ease. He asks things and actually listens to the answers. He remembered something you said in the scroll exchange and brings it back naturally and you can't decide if that's just him or if that's a thing he does but either way it works and you make a note of the fact that it works.
❝You're still doing it,❞ he says.
❝Doing what.❞
❝The— watching thing.❞ He nods toward the terrace. Carmen is laughing at something Theodore said, head thrown back. Monica and Beckham are in something surprisingly serious-looking. Evie and Shoji are sitting near each other, talking quietly.
❝Occupational habit,❞ you say.
❝Is it helpful?❞
❝Sometimes.❞ You look at the water. ❝Sometimes I just can't turn it off.❞
❝What are you seeing right now?❞
You think about it honestly. ❝Five first impressions that are all going to look different in a week.❞
Lorenzo is quiet for a second. ❝Including ours?❞
You look at him.
He's asking for real. Less charming-mode, more just — asking.
❝I don't know yet,❞ you say. ❝Ask me in a week.❞
❝I'll do that,❞ he says.
The music shifts. Across the terrace Carmen says something that sends Monica into hysterics. The night settles into something warm and temporary and genuinely good in the way that first nights are before everything gets complicated.
Your dress is perfect. The boy beside you just made you laugh before you decided to. That hasn't happened in a while.
You let yourself have it.
Just tonight.
Later— much later, when most people have gone in =— you're at the pool edge. Feet in the water. Listening to the quiet.
You hear footsteps. You know whose before you look. You have good ears. Also he's been doing this thing all night where he very carefully isn't looking at you, which has its own presence.
Shoji sits down. Not close. Just not far.
The water. The lights underneath. Somewhere inside, a laugh.
❝You alright?❞ he asks.
Such a normal question. You sit with it for longer than is probably natural.
❝Yeah,❞ you say. ❝I think so. You?❞
❝Yeah.❞ He looks at the water. ❝Lot to take in.❞
❝Mm.❞
Neither of you says anything for a while. The silence is fine. Not every silence needs filling. You know that, in theory. You are working on it.
❝We should probably go in,❞ you say.
❝Probably.❞
Nobody moves.
Then you do. And he does.
You go inside the villa.
The villa goes quiet in that specific way of a place that's been loud for hours and is only now remembering how to be still.
Cupid is gone. The boys have migrated to the kitchen for reasons that involve someone finding crisps. And the five of you are in the vanity room, which is— a lot. Ten mirrors, ten lit-up stations, the kind of lighting that's flattering enough to be suspicious, and a collective cloud of micellar water and setting spray and the particular chaos of five women simultaneously taking off their faces.
Carmen gets there first and has already claimed the middle station and is going at her mascara with a makeup wipe like it personally wronged her.
❝Okay,❞ she says, to no one and everyone. ❝Talk.❞
❝Give me a second I'm still—❞ Monica is wrestling with a lash. ❝Hold on. Hold on. Got it. Okay. Talk.❞
❝Theodore,❞ you say, because someone has to start and it might as well be the most obvious one in the room.
Carmen points at you in the mirror. ❝Do not.❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝I said what I said.❞
❝You literally said don't—❞
❝Exactly. Don't. Moving on.❞
❝She's already in love,❞ Monica tells you, at full volume, directly into the mirror.
❝I am not—❞
❝She's a little bit in love,❞ Evie says, which is the most devastating possible contribution from Evie because Evie does not say things like that and the fact that even she clocked it means it's extremely obvious.
Carmen puts her makeup wipe down. Picks it back up. ❝He's just—❞ she starts. Stops. ❝He lost his whole speech,❞ she says, almost to herself. ❝He had a thing prepared and he just — lost it. Right in front of me.❞
❝That's so cute,❞ Monica says.
❝It was so cute,❞ Carmen says miserably.
Everyone laughs.
❝Okay,❞ Monica says, tying her hair up. ❝Beckham.❞
❝What about Beckham,❞ Evie says.
❝His speech was about avocado toast.❞
❝To be fair,❞ you say, ❝it was a very good avocado toast speech.❞
❝It was!❞ Monica sounds genuinely offended on her own behalf. ❝That's the annoying part. It was charming. The avocado toast thing was charming. I wanted to be annoyed and I couldn't be annoyed.❞
❝You were fuckin' arguing with him for like ten minutes,❞ Carmen says.
❝Twelve,❞ Monica says. ❝And he didn't budge once. Not once. He just stood there being completely wrong and completely unbothered about it.❞
❝You like him,❞ you say.
❝I didn't say that.❞
❝Monica.❞
❝I said he was charming. That's different.❞
❝How is that different.❞
Monica opens her mouth. Closes it. Points at you in the mirror. ❝Can we talk about you.❞
❝We can absolutely not.❞
❝MC.❞
❝Moving on,❞ you say, in your best Carmen voice.
Carmen loses it. Actual wheezing.
Evie is at the station on the end, methodical, taking off her makeup in the precise order she always takes off her makeup, which you can tell is a specific order because she's doing it with the focused calm of a ritual.
❝Shoji seems nice,❞ you say, carefully.
❝He is,❞ Evie says. No performance. Just— yes, he is.
❝He said you seem like someone who means what she says,❞ Monica offers.
❝I know.❞ Evie smooths something onto her skin. ❝I heard him.❞ A pause. ❝That's a good thing to notice about someone.❞
❝It is,❞ you agree.
Evie looks at you in the mirror for a second. Something in her face that isn't quite a smile but is adjacent to one. ❝He seems like someone who shows up,❞ she says. ❝I think that matters more than most things.❞
❝Yeah,❞ you say. ❝I think so too.❞
You both look at the mirror for a second.
Then Carmen says ❝okay but Evie you have to admit the matching posture thing when you were talking was so—❞
❝I don't know what you're referring to,❞ Evie says.
❝You were literally standing like—❞ Carmen demonstrates, going ramrod straight.
❝I always stand like that.❞
❝He was doing it too!❞
❝He has good posture.❞
❝It was like two soldiers at a very romantic parade—❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝I'm just saying—❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝It was cute, Evie, I'm saying it was cute—❞
❝Goodnight, Carmen.❞
Jasmine has been quiet.
Not checked-out quiet — she's been laughing at everything, contributing, present — but there's a layer underneath it that you've been clocking for the last twenty minutes and not saying anything about because it's night one and some things take longer than night one.
She's reapplying her skincare in the mirror with the focused attention of someone who does this every night without exception. Vitamin C. Something in a glass bottle. Something else.
❝Maverick seems—❞ Monica starts, and then catches something in Jasmine's reflection and visibly recalibrates. ❝Good,❞ she finishes. ❝He seems good.❞
❝He's fine,❞ Jasmine says.
❝Fine,❞ Carmen repeats.
❝He's fine. He's good-looking, he's not an idiot, he listened when I talked.❞ She caps the bottle. ❝Fine.❞
❝That's like the most underwhelming review,❞ Monica says.
❝It's night one,❞ Jasmine says, pleasantly. ❝Fine is good for night one.❞
She catches your eye in the mirror.
You look at your own reflection.
Fine, you think.
You think about who Lorenzo's eyes went to when he paused. The half second before he walked to you. You think about Jasmine saying fine in that specific tone of voice.
You think about the fact that you notice things.
You think about the fact that noticing things has not, historically, made your life easier.
You put your moisturiser on and say nothing.
The bedroom is enormous and slightly absurd.
Ten beds, five couples, the other five made up and waiting on the far side of the room for whoever comes next— sirens, new arrivals, the future that hasn't happened yet. The whole thing is warm-lit and white-linened and smells like something expensive, and for a second standing in the doorway you think again like you did in the car: this is real, this is actually happening, you are actually doing this.
Then Carmen trips on her own slipper and the moment passes.
The boys are already in various states of settled— Theodore has somehow already found a book, which nobody questions; Beckham is horizontal approximately four seconds after sitting down; Maverick is on his phone — oh wait, no phones. He's just looking at the ceiling then. Contemplatively.
❝This is so weird,❞ Monica announces to the room.
❝So weird,❞ Beckham agrees, from horizontal.
❝Good weird,❞ Carmen says.
❝Jury's out,❞ Theodore says, from behind the book he definitely smuggled in somehow.
❝Where did you even get that,❞ Carmen says.
❝I packed it.❞
❝We were told no outside items—❞
❝It's a book, Carmen.❞
❝Theodore—❞
❝It's a book.❞
The lights go down slowly— dimmed from somewhere, probably production— and the room settles into the warm quiet of ten people doing the specific work of pretending to be more comfortable than they are.
❝Goodnight,❞ Monica says, to the room.
A chorus of goodnights, overlapping, some more sincere than others.
❝Goodnight Evie,❞ Carmen calls across.
❝Goodnight Carmen,❞ Evie says, in a tone that means please stop.
❝Goodnight Theodore's illegal book,❞ Monica says.
❝Goodnight Monica,❞ Theodore says.
❝That wasn't directed at you—❞
❝Goodnight Monica,❞ he says again, turning a page.
Beckham makes a sound that might be a laugh and might be him falling asleep. Unclear.
Maverick says goodnight to no one specific, ceiling-directed, quiet. Jasmine, in the bed beside his, says it back the same way. Neither of them looks at the other.
You file that.
Your bed is warm.
Lorenzo is in the one beside yours, close enough that you could talk without the rest of the room hearing if you kept it low, which is clearly what the producers intended and you're going to do it anyway because the alternative is lying there thinking.
He's on his back, looking at the ceiling, arms folded behind his head. He looks like someone whose brain is still going.
❝You're thinking very loudly,❞ you say, quietly.
❝I'm always thinking loudly,❞ he says. ❝You just usually can't hear it.❞
❝What are you thinking about.❞
A pause. Not the kind where he's deciding whether to tell you. The kind where he's deciding how much.
❝Tonight,❞ he says. ❝Just— going back over it.❞
❝And?❞
❝And it was a good night.❞ He turns his head slightly to look at you in the low light. ❝You?❞
❝Same,❞ you say. ❝Good night.❞
❝Yeah.❞
He shifts slightly, and his voice when it comes is casual, the particular casualness of someone keeping something light on purpose. ❝You and Shoji seemed like you had a good chat. Earlier. By the pool.❞
Something in you goes very still.
❝We talked during the scroll thing,❞ you say. ❝Same as everyone.❞
❝No, I mean after,❞ he says. ❝Late. When most people had gone in.❞
He says it the same way he says everything — easy, warm, conversational. No edge to it. No weight. Just — noting it. The way he notes things.
❝Oh,❞ you say. ❝Yeah. Just checking in.❞
❝Nice,❞ he says.
And that's it. That's all. He doesn't push it, doesn't follow it up, lets it sit there like it's nothing, like he mentioned it the way you'd mention the weather.
You look at the ceiling too.
❝Goodnight, Lorenzo,❞ you say.
❝Goodnight, MC.❞
A pause.
❝Ask me in a week,❞ he says.
❝You'll remind me,❞ you say.
❝Yeah,❞ he says. ❝I will.❞
The room goes quiet. Properly quiet. Someone's breathing evens out— Beckham, probably, he seems like someone who falls asleep fast and completely. The low light hums.
You look at the ceiling.
You think about ten people in five out of ten beds in one room at the start of something none of them can see the shape of yet.
And for once, you let that be enough.
brrrr!!!... 𝓒UPID'S CALLING જ⁀➴♡
❝ Ten islanders. Five couples. One night down.
Paradiso does this thing where it makes everything feel meant to be— the light, the warmth, the fact that you are genuinely stuck here with nowhere else to be.
Something happened tonight though.
You know it did. ❞
Night One: who kept pulling your attention back?
Lorenzo: warm, chose you, and you're not sure what the pause before he did means
Shoji: said maybe twelve words to you and somehow that was enough
Beckham: funnier than expected, still figuring him out
Maverick: somehow still a question you haven't finished
Theodore: you only know what Carmen told you, and that's made you more curious
Voting ended on14h
Voting closes in a week before Episode 2.
I am SO SORRY ABOUT THE WAIT!!!! i've been so occupied with work and juggling my tutoring side gig PLEASE DONT SKEWER ME.. this episode was also pretty tough to write because this is yk the first impression and all that all the other episodes can flow in easily after this and i kept rewriting it, deleting it and doing it over again but ALAS. HERE IT IS, LONG, PROUD AND NOT PROOF READ LMAOO
please let me know what you think about how this episode was written through my ask!! feel free to leave feedback, critique and let me know what exactly you would love to see!!
i also would like to know how long you would like to wait until the next episode!! because there's the flow of reading and there's also whether if or not im gonna be getting enough engagement(votes) that ends up in favor of everyone yknowww but anyways!
Until the next episode!! BYEE LOVE ALL 30 OF U GUYS 🏹💌💗
hey heyyy first episode's out guys!! just reposting again for engagement <33 hope this first episode was enjoyable! and i would like to know how you enjoy the pacing, the character dynamics...who you want to see more of etc.
i will note that i did write too much descriptive passages and should be focusing more on dialogue and making that flow more smoothly !! but oh well, i was more like.. LMAO i js wanted to get this chapter out so that i can finally start pumping out more chapters
like a starter episode...quite literally.
LMAO BUT ANYWAYS hope you guys enjoyed reading this as much as i enjoyed struggled writing this over the week, tysm all sm for joining me on this journey <3
until the next episode, love u guys!!!
hi i’m just wondering is the mc in castaway cupid ment to be white (i don’t mean this to be rude but i’m interested in the story but i’m black woman)
hiii no this isn't rude at all in any way!! so mc's appearance, race, and ethnicity are 100% up to you as the reader <33
i intentionally wrote her character without any race-specfic descriptions so everyone can customize and picture her however they like! the only fixed details about her background are her job (which u guys have so kindly voted for) and that she lives in chicago!
i hope i've written her well enough in the first episode and that you enjoy reading and playing as her!! ʚ❤︎ɞ
You've been in a hotel room for what feels like three weeks.
No phone. Just you, bad rom-coms, room service, and the slow creeping realisation that you signed up for this with your whole chest and now you actually have to do it.
The car smells like new leather. The driver hasn't said a word. Outside, the island blurs past in green and gold and you keep waiting to feel ready and you keep — not.
You smooth your scrubs out of habit.
Right. Not wearing scrubs.
You're wearing this backless chiffon maxi from — Meshki?
Mooski?
Something with an M.
The stylists picked it out this morning when they knocked on your hotel room door at 7AM and you answered it with your hair looking like a mess. A month ago you were literally packing fits with your best friend at 3AM giggling like it was fake.
It is not fake. You are in a car. This is happening.
The girl across from you— Evie, she said in the hotel lobby, very straight handshake, very direct eye contact— is sitting with perfect posture and tracking the road like she's mentally rehearsing something. You've said maybe twelve words to each other. She seems nice. She also radiates I have a five step morning routine and I will tell you about it energy and you respect that and also it's a little much at 8AM.
She catches you staring.
You were absolutely staring.
❝Ready?❞ she asks.
You think about the last two years. The one who said you're being paranoid every single time, for six months, until you found the texts and he said okay but hear me out— You think about the one before that who cried. Actually cried. When you ended it. Which would have been more convincing if you hadn't known he'd cheated for like two weeks already. You think about being twenty-four and tired.
❝Absolutely not,❞ you say.
Evie breaks into a real smile. ❝Same, honestly.❞
The car stops.
The gates are ridiculous. Like embarrassingly beautiful. You almost don't notice the camera mounted above them.
Almost.
You pull in one breath that fixes nothing and walk through.
Paradiso.
Okay. Fine. You've seen the photos. You've watched previous seasons in your break room at the hospital with your coworkers talking over it. You thought you were prepared.
You were not prepared.
White stone and terracotta and a pool so blue it looks fake, and the light is doing something genuinely unfair, and a production assistant is already in your ear going make an entrance, be yourself, be natural which are three contradictory instructions but sure. You follow the sound of voices around the side of the villa and step out onto the terrace and—
Three girls. Already there. Already mid-laugh about something.
You and Evie are last.
❝Is there room for two more?❞ Evie says, and the two girls by the pool make a noise that honestly shakes something loose in your chest because it's so immediately warm—
❝BITCHHHHH!❞
There's a third girl behind them with a glass raised and a smile like she's been waiting to see how this goes.
Everyone's laughing. Immediately. Before you've even said your name. It's that thing where you meet certain people and it just- clicks, instantly, and you don't know if it's real yet or if it's just the adrenaline and the cameras and the fact that you're all terrified and performing brave.
Probably both.
You'll figure it out later.
❝It's gonna be one hell of a summer,❞ Evie announces to the group.
There's a camera literally right there in the bougainvillea. It's not hidden. It's right there.
❝I know right—❞ ❝Oh absolutely—❞ ❝Don't even—❞
You look at the four of them and your mouth opens and what comes out is: ❝You guys are all insanely pretty, can we just— not do the boys thing and go on a girls trip?❞
❝Okay wait,❞ Jasmine says, and she's laughing, but she's also already doing a little scan of everyone. ❝If the girls look like this the boys better show up. Like they actually better bring it the fuck on.❞
❝I KNOW RIGHT, we are literally a collection of goddesses,❞ Monica says, gesturing at everyone, wine sloshing slightly.
❝Enjoy it now.❞ Evie is already assessing the far end of the deck. ❝Once the testosterone gets in here the whole energy changes. I'm already figuring out where I'm doing 6AM Pilates.❞
You catch Carmen's eye. She's been laughing at everything since you arrived, big and unself-conscious, and she catches your look and immediately clocks it.
❝Evie,❞ Carmen says, very seriously. ❝I'll be right there with you. By which I mean I will be fully asleep. But I will be thinking about you. So supportively.❞
❝That's not—❞ Evie starts.
❝So supportively,❞ Carmen repeats.
You're laughing and you haven't even sat down yet. The five of you end up sprawled across the daybeds, drinks found from somewhere, someone's playlist going, and for maybe four minutes the whole thing feels easy and warm and like nothing bad could possibly happen in a place this pretty.
Then the villa doors open.
The first thing you notice about Cupid is that she walks like she owns the whole island.
She probably does, legally. But still.
Metallic gold dress, warm brown skin literally glowing, moving through the pool deck with the energy of someone who finds this genuinely fun after six seasons which should not be possible and somehow is. She is — a lot. In the best way. The most unsettling best way.
Monica grabs your arm so hard you nearly spill your drink.
❝Oh my GOD,❞ she whispers. ❝It's literally Cupid.❞
❝She is even MORE gorgeous in person—❞ Carmen starts, at full volume. Because Carmen doesn't really have a volume button on her.
❝Carmen—❞
❝What—❞
Cupid hears her. Smiles. Completely unsurprised.
❝Don't get up—❞ she waves a hand. Stops walking. Reconsiders. ❝Actually, get up, I want to look at all of you properly.❞
The scramble to stand is...not elegant. Monica goes immediately. Carmen almost takes out her drink. Jasmine rises like she's been ready for this. Evie is already up, composed, because of course she is. You're half-laughing and half on your feet when Cupid opens her arms and the group hug happens and she smells like expensive vanilla and something that might literally just be the scent of confidence.
She holds you all at arm's length. Looks. You get the feeling she's cataloguing things.
❝I wanted to get in here before the chaos,❞ she says, dropping onto the daybed across from you like she's done it a thousand times. She picks up a drink that wasn't hers. ❝How are we feeling? Terrified? Excited? Somewhere in between?❞
❝Honestly?❞ Monica says. ❝All three and I've only been here twenty minutes.❞
❝Good.❞ Cupid clinks her glass against Monica's. ❝That's the right answer.❞
❝We were literally just talking about locking the gates,❞ Jasmine says. ❝Keeping the villa to ourselves.❞
Cupid's smile stays exactly where it is. Her eyes do something else for half a second. ❝I know you were. The boys will complicate that.❞ A pause. ❝They tend to.❞
❝Great,❞ Jasmine says, which sounds like obviously.
❝The boys always do,❞ Monica sighs, leaning back.
❝That is rather the point, darling.❞ Cupid looks around at all five of you with the warm, slightly terrifying attention of someone who knows exactly how this plays out. ❝Right. Tell me things. First impressions, what you're looking for, what you're actually looking for.❞ She tilts her head. ❝I'll find out eventually. Might as well be now.❞
Carmen opens her mouth.
Evie puts her hand on Carmen's arm.
Carmen closes her mouth.
She asks about your types like it's the most casual thing in the world, dropped into the middle of a completely different conversation.
Carmen goes first because Carmen always goes first, voluntarily or not. Fun guys, she says. Spontaneous. Actually geeks if they're funny about it and they can keep up with her. She says this with zero embarrassment and complete sincerity.
Jasmine: someone who won't try to manage her. A tree to climb. She says it completely straight-faced and Monica short-circuits for three full seconds.
❝A tree,❞ Monica says.
❝Tall, stable, something to hold onto,❞ Jasmine says, like this is normal. ❝I didn't stutter.❞
Carmen snorts. ❝Sure. We can say you meant stable when you said tree.❞
Then, Monica: someone who'll actually come with her. Not I'll visit you in Barcelona someone. Actually come with her.
Evie: reliable. Emotionally mature. Someone she can bring home and not have to explain. She says this like a requirements list, and you watch Carmen bite down on something.
Then Cupid looks at you.
And you think about it for about half a second too long, which you're aware of, and which you do anyway.
❝Someone who means what they say,❞ you say. ❝Genuinely that's it. The bar is on the floor and I just want someone to not trip over it.❞
❝That's a very interesting bar,❞ Cupid says.
❝I'm a very interesting person.❞
Cupid smiles at you the way people smile when they know something. ❝Yes,❞ she says. ❝You are.❞
Then she asks— casually, like it barely counts— whether anyone likes having a roster.
No and obviously not and what, no— go around the daybeds so fast and so unified that it's almost funny. You say no too. Genuinely, you don't. Also none of you would say yes to this question right now even if you did, and everyone knows that, and nobody says it.
Good, says Cupid, like she's taking you all entirely at your word.
Then: the rules.
She goes through them like she could do this in her sleep. The Altar. Recouplings — you're always coupled, uncoupled means vulnerable, vulnerable means Exile. Cupid's Den. Temptation Bay, which she mentions once, quickly, with a smile that doesn't quite reach casual.
Then she reaches beside her and brings out five small scrolls. Gold ribbon. Wax seal, little arrow stamp.
She holds them out.
You take yours. It's heavier than it looks. The wax is still faintly warm.
❝One each,❞ she says. ❝Don't open them yet.❞
You take yours. Heavier than expected.
❝They're all the same question? ❞ Monica asks.
❝No,❞ Cupid says pleasantly.
A beat.
❝I pick the question I think will cost you the most to answer honestly. ❞ She looks around the group. ❝You're going to find someone tonight whose answer to their question tells you something real. Not their favourite colour. Not their type. Something real. ❞ She pauses. ❝The boys have scrolls too. Same rules. When they get here, open them. Compare. See what happens. ❞
Carmen looks at her scroll like it might bite her.
❝What if we don't want to answer?❞ Evie asks.
❝Then you can explain that to the person asking, ❞ Cupid says, ❝and see how that goes. ❞ She stands. ❝Open them when the boys arrive. Not before. ❞
She looks at the villa doors.
❝Which will be— ❞
They open.
❝—now,❞ she says. ❝Lovely. ❞
Five boys come down the steps.
Okay.
Okay.
You do the thing— thirty seconds, read the room, clock who's where. Trauma nurse thing. Force of habit.
First one through the door and he knows it. Dark jacket, easy grin, the specific kind of handsome that's been handsome long enough to stop being surprised by it. He spots the five of you and his whole face does something warm and immediate— not performed, just genuinely pleased, like this is the part of the whole production he actually showed up for.
Behind him, broader, quieter, hands in his pockets. He comes down the steps and takes the space in before he takes the people in— clocks the layout, the exits, where everything is— and then, only then, looks at the group. And the build on him? Gol-lee. Has to be a football player.
Then one who comes down the steps mid-sentence to the person beside him, hands going, explaining something with complete conviction to someone who has clearly stopped listening. He steps off the last step, keeps walking, and walks directly into a sun lounger.
Doesn't fall. Recovers. Looks around.
Oh but Carmen saw.
Carmen is already pointing, shoulders shaking, absolutely no help.
He goes slightly pink and keeps walking like it didn't happen, which makes it worse, and also— somehow— better.
Then the guy behind him.
You'd clocked him in the group without fully landing on him yet— not because he's not worth landing on, he very much is, but because he doesn't announce himself. He comes down the steps with his hands loose at his sides and the particular ease of someone who has been the most attractive person in most rooms and decided a while ago that performing it would be exhausting.
He surveys the terrace once, briefly.
Meets nobody's eyes specifically.
Smiles at nothing in particular.
Which is somehow more unsettling than if he'd looked directly at you.
And then one, at the edge of the group, who isn't looking at the terrace at all.
He's looking at you.
Not the group.
Not the villa.
You.
Direct and unhurried, for about two seconds, like he's confirming something he already suspected.
Then away.
You look at Carmen, who is still pointing at the guy who nearly fell over and completely losing it.
❝Yo, why do the three brunettes look like they're brothers.❞ You hear someone muse, Monica probably and you can't help but laugh at it because they do.
Carmen still laughing over the lounger boy, somehow laughs even harder. ❝Cousins, maybe!❞
Is she not allowed to laugh at home?
Cupid steps into the space between both groups.
❝Boys, meet the girls. Girls, the boys.❞ She looks around at all ten of you. ❝Thirty minutes, one scroll each, one rule: be honest. After that, we couple up.❞ A pause. ❝Go.❞
Two seconds of nobody moving.
Then Carmen physically tears her ribbon off. ❝Right, who's interesting then?❞
And it begins.
The terrace does its thing.
You don't open your scroll yet. You watch.
The sun lounger boy has already found Carmen— they're in something fast and loud and mutual within about forty seconds, both of them talking at the same time, neither of them caring. He says something and she absolutely loses it, head back, the kind of laugh you can't fake. He looks delighted by this in a way that's completely unperformed.
Theodore, was it? You smile at this. She's done for.
The broad quiet one— Beckham, someone says it nearby— has drifted to the pool edge where Monica is. You're close enough to catch fragments.
❝—actually never tried it—❞
❝You've never had—❞
❝I'm from Colorado, we don't—❞
❝That's not even a reason—❞
❝It's a completely valid reason—❞
❝It is genuinely not—❞
They're arguing about something. Monica looks deeply offended. Beckham looks like someone weathering a completely unreasonable storm with mild amusement, which you suspect is just his face in conflict. He says something you don't catch and Monica makes a noise that's half outrage and half laugh and shoves his arm.
He was ready for it. Doesn't move.
Monica notices. Looks at her own hand. Looks at him.
Interesting, you think.
The one with the grin— Lorenzo— has made his way to Jasmine. You clock that. The way the grin shifts when they start talking. The way Jasmine's doing the thing where her face gives nothing away, which means it's giving everything away.
And then there's Maverick.
You hadn't quite placed him yet — he'd been in the middle of the group coming down the steps, not announcing himself particularly — but you place him now because the energy on the terrace shifts slightly, the way it does when someone walks into a room and the room recalibrates.
He's talking to Evie, of all people, and Evie is laughing, which is the most surprising thing you've seen today, because Evie's laugh does not come out easily.
You've known her for four hours.
He's not even doing anything that flashy. He's just— present in a specific way. Like he knows exactly how much space he takes up and has made a conscious decision about it.
You watch him for a minute.
He catches you watching.
Doesn't look away immediately. Holds it for half a second, something slightly amused in it.
You look away first. Again.
File that, says your brain.
I know, you tell it.
You hold your scroll and don't open it.
You're waiting, you realise, for the right moment. Which is a thing you do— wait for the right moment, the right conditions, the right whatever — until the moment has passed and you've managed the situation instead of being in it.
You open it.
What do you know about yourself that you keep pretending you don't?
You read it twice.
Then you put it face down on your knee.
Okay, Cupid. Fine.
❝You haven't opened yours.❞
You turn.
The one who looked at you. Up close he's— you made the right call looking at Carmen. He's in a grey linen shirt and he has the specific kind of quiet that feels like it cost him something.
❝Oh no, I have,❞ you say.
He looks down at the scroll. ❝Ah.❞
A pause.
❝Shoji.❞
❝MC.❞
❝Should we just—❞
❝Yeah.❞
You both laugh.
Shoji drops into the seat across from you. He has his scroll in his hand, unrolled, and he's looking at it with the expression of someone who has just been asked something extremely specific.
❝What did you get?❞ you say.
He shows you.
What would you let someone do for you, if you trusted them enough?
You look at it. Look at yours. Show him.
He reads it. Looks up.
❝She knows things,❞ he says.
❝She knows things,❞ you agree.
A pause.
❝You go first,❞ he says.
❝Why do I have to go first❞
❝You're holding yours face down. Which means you've already thought about it. Which means you already know.❞
The annoying thing is he's right. You've known your answer since before you opened the scroll, because Cupid picked the question you've been not-answering for about two years.
❝I know that I'm better at being needed than being loved,❞ you say. ❝Like, I know the difference, yeah? I know that being needed feels safe because it has a function and being loved doesn't have a function it just— is, if you get what I mean, and I don't know what to do with things that just are.❞ You look at the pool. ❝And I keep pretending I don't know that because if I admit I know it then I have to do something about it.❞
Shoji doesn't say anything for a moment.
Not the uncomfortable kind of nothing. The kind that means he heard you and is treating it like it deserves to be treated.
❝That's a real answer,❞ he says.
❝Your turn.❞
He looks at his scroll. Back at the pool. ❝Someone to just— show up,❞ he says, finally. ❝Like not because I asked. Not because something's wrong. Just.❞ He stops. Tries again. ❝I do a lot of showing up for other people. I don't— I've never really let anyone do it back.❞
He says it like he's diagnosing a structural problem in something, quiet and matter-of-fact. ❝That's what I'd let someone do. If I trusted them.❞
You look at him.
He looks at you.
The camera in the bougainvillea is right there and you are both extremely aware of it.
Neither of you says anything.
You don't need to.
You look up and Lorenzo is making his way across the terrace.
He's been at Jasmine's side— you caught that earlier, the specific frequency of his attention there— but Jasmine has moved on to someone else now or Lorenzo has or it's one of those mutual redirects where nobody technically made the call. He picks up a drink from the table like it's his and drops into the seat across from you with the ease of someone who's never once been awkward in their body.
❝Hey,❞ he says. Then, to Shoji: ❝Hey man.❞
Shoji does a small nod and takes the social cue. ❝I'll catch you,❞ he says to you, which is two words more than you expected, and moves off.
Lorenzo watches him go. Something passes over his face, brief. Then he turns to you and gives you the full version of the grin and it is — effective. You make a note of the fact that it's effective.
❝MC,❞ he says. ❝Marketing executive, twenty-five. Miami.❞ He says it like a pitch. ❝What've you got?❞
You stare at him. ❝Are you introducing yourself like a LinkedIn profile?❞
He points at you. ❝Okay, fair, that was bad. Let me try again—❞
❝It's fine—❞
❝No I can do better—❞
❝Lorenzo, it's genuinely fine—❞
❝I'm gonna start over—❞
❝Please don't.❞
He laughs. Actually laughs, caught out. It's a better look than the grin. ❝Hi. I'm Lorenzo. That was terrible. You are?❞
❝MC.❞
❝And what do you do, MC?❞
❝Trauma nurse.❞
He blinks. ❝Oh.❞ A recalibration. ❝So you've like. Seen things.❞
❝Some things yeah.❞
❝Wild.❞ He sits back. ❝I was gonna make a joke about how that must be good for reading people but I feel like you'll tell me that's obvious.❞
❝Little bit,❞ you say.
❝Right.❞
He shows you his scroll.
When did you last want something you couldn't charm your way into getting?
You look at it for a second. ❝Ouch,❞ you say.
❝Right?❞ He looks genuinely ruffled for about half a second, which is the most interesting thing you've seen from him. ❝How does she even— I've been here forty minutes.❞
❝She picks the question that costs the most,❞ you say.
❝Yeah, well,❞ He taps the scroll against his knee. ❝Mission accomplished.❞ He looks at yours. ❝What did you get?❞
You show him.
He reads it. Looks up. ❝And?❞
❝I answered it already tonight.❞
❝Tell me.❞
Not pushy. The same way he asked before— like he's just genuinely decided he wants to know and is waiting.
You give him the same answer you gave Shoji. He listens the same way— still, actually in it.
❝Your turn,❞ you say when you're done.
He's quiet for a second. Longer than you've seen him quiet. ❝My mum,❞ he says. ❝Getting her to—❞ he stops. Recalibrates. ❝She didn't want me to do marketing. She wanted me to do something she understood, like accounting or finance instead- shit, she even told me to reconsider a medical pathway. And I spent about two years trying to explain it to her in the right way, frame it right, show her the right numbers.❞ He looks at his scroll. ❝Never worked. She came around eventually on her own but it wasn't because of anything I did. I couldn't— yeah.❞ He shrugs, but it's a smaller shrug than usual. ❝Couldn't charm my way into it.❞
You look at him. ❝That's not what I expected,❞ you say.
❝What did you expect?❞
❝An ex-girlfriend.❞
He laughs — caught out, short. ❝There's probably one of those too,❞ he says. ❝But that's the honest answer.❞
That's the honest answer.
You file that. Not as evidence. Just as— data.
❝You're interesting,❞ he says.
❝You keep saying that.❞
❝Keep meaning it.❞ He stands up, helps you up and then moves back into the terrace.
Maverick finds you with about five minutes left.
He sits down without a big entrance, which you've noticed is a thing he does— arrives in spaces without announcing himself, which is somehow more disorienting than if he did.
He shows you his scroll without preamble.
What do you want that you'd be embarrassed to admit wanting?
You look at it. ❝She doesn't mess around,❞ you say.
❝At all,❞ he agrees. He looks at yours. ❝You already answered yours?❞
❝Twice tonight.❞
❝What did you get?❞
You tell him. Short version. He listens in a way that's slightly different from how Lorenzo listened— Lorenzo listened like he was gathering information, Maverick listens like he's just— present. There. Not doing anything with it yet.
❝Your turn,❞ you say.
He looks at his scroll for a long moment. ❝Someone to come home to,❞ he says. ❝That's it. Like not— I don't need it to be complicated, I don't need it to be a thing. I just want to come home and have someone be there.❞ He says it like he's slightly annoyed at himself for saying it. ❝Which sounds so—❞
❝Normal?❞ you say.
❝Basic,❞ he says.
❝Normal,❞ you say again.
He looks at you. That small crooked smile again. ❝You do the thing.❞
❝What thing.❞
❝Where you reframe something without making it feel like you're doing it.❞
❝That's not a thing,❞ you say.
❝It's a little bit a thing.❞
You open your mouth. Close it.
He raises his eyebrows.
❝Marginally,❞ you say.
He laughs— quiet, real. Cupid's voice carries across the terrace before either of you can say anything else.
Scrolls down.
Maverick stands. ❝Good to meet you, MC.❞
❝You too,❞ you say.
He moves back. You watch him go.
He's trouble- good or bad, you don't know yet.
Everyone drifts back to the center. The evening has gone gold and warm and the pool lights are just starting to come on.
Cupid stands at the head of The Altar.
❝Boys are choosing first tonight,❞ she says. ❝Girls— stand there and look like you haven't been analyzing everyone for the last thirty minutes.❞ A pause. ❝That was a joke. Mostly.❞ She nods at Maverick. ❝You first.❞
Maverick crosses the terrace like he decided ten minutes ago.
He stops in front of Jasmine.
She looks up. Her face does the thing where it tells you everything by telling you nothing.
❝Jasmine.❞ He looks at her for a second, like he's making sure he has the right words. ❝You're the most interesting person I've spoken to tonight. And I don't say that to everyone.❞ A beat. ❝I'd like to keep finding out why.❞
She holds it for a moment. Lets him stand there.
❝Keep up then,❞ she says, and steps forward.
Their physical attraction to each other is immediate and almost undeniable, his arm around her waist.
Lorenzo's name is called next.
He stands.
Pauses— barely, less than a second, eyes going somewhere just for a moment— then moves.
He stops in front of you.
The smile is the good version. Not the LinkedIn one.
❝Okay so I had something prepared,❞ he says, ❝and I'm scrapping it because you'd clock it immediately and I'd rather not start there.❞ He looks at you. ❝You're sharp and you're funny and you didn't let me get away with anything tonight, which— honestly, that doesn't happen a lot.❞
He tilts his head slightly. ❝I'd like to get to know you properly. If you'll let me.❞
The back of your brain tells you there has to be an ulterior motive.
You step forward anyway.
You're done overthinking everything.
❝Likewise,❞ you say.
Shoji is called.
You feel him looking before you check. That specific weight of being watched by someone who's trying not to watch.
You look up.
One second.
Then he walks to Evie.
He stops in front of her. Quiet for a moment, like he's choosing carefully.
❝You seem like someone who means what she says,❞ he says. ❝I think that's rare. And I think we'd be good for each other.❞
Evie's face does something genuine. Unperformed. ❝Yeah,❞ she says. ❝I think so too.❞
You watch them. She actually likes him. That's obvious and real and it means something and it also means this is going to get complicated in a specific slow way later, and you are already thinking about how it ends, which is the thing you do, which is a problem, which you are aware of and currently cannot stop.
Theodore walks up to Carmen.
He stops. Takes a breath. He clearly had something ready — you can see it on his face, the specific look of someone who rehearsed — and then Carmen is already looking at him and he loses about sixty percent of it immediately.
❝So I had a whole— I wrote something, kind of, in my head, on the way over here, and it was actually pretty good—❞ he starts.
❝Theodore,❞ Carmen says.
❝Yeah?❞
❝Just say the thing.❞
He exhales. ❝You're the most fun I've had in a really long time,❞ he says, simply. ❝And we've known each other for thirty minutes. I'd like to see what that looks like with more time.❞
Carmen looks at him for a second.
❝That was the thing?❞ she says.
❝That was the thing.❞
❝That was a good thing.❞
❝I know, right? The prepared version was worse.❞
❝Obviously,❞ she squeals, doing a little dance before bouncing over to him.
Beckham gets to Monica last.
He stands in front of her with his hands in his pockets and the easy, unhurried manner of someone who has decided something and is just getting to the part where he says it.
❝Best for last,❞ he chuckles. ❝Alright. Cards on the table. You argued with me for ten minutes about avocado toast. You were completely right the whole time and you knew it and you kept going anyway.❞ A pause. ❝I haven't laughed like that in a while. So. Here I am.❞
Monica looks at him. Tilts her head. ❝That's your speech? Avocado toast?❞
❝That's my speech.❞
❝Beckham.❞
❝Monica.❞
She gives him a dramatic, lingering look, but a genuine smile breaks through her defense, the initial friction between them melting into a mature, surprisingly comfortable foundation.
Cupid looks at the five new couples.
❝Night one,❞ she says. ❝Lovely. Nothing you see here is permanent — I'm telling you that not as a threat but as a fact about Paradiso.❞ She picks up her glass. ❝Enjoy tonight. You've earned it.❞
She walks toward the villa doors.
Stops.
❝I'll be in touch.❞ She smiles, not at anyone specific, at all of you. ❝I always am.❞
The first night does what first nights do.
Music from somewhere. Drinks from somewhere else. Pairs drift and settle and drift again. The pool lights come on fully now and the whole terrace goes warm and soft and loud and good.
You end up on the far daybed with Lorenzo, which is— yeah. Okay. Obviously.
He's good at this. The conversation, the ease. He asks things and actually listens to the answers. He remembered something you said in the scroll exchange and brings it back naturally and you can't decide if that's just him or if that's a thing he does but either way it works and you make a note of the fact that it works.
❝You're still doing it,❞ he says.
❝Doing what.❞
❝The— watching thing.❞ He nods toward the terrace. Carmen is laughing at something Theodore said, head thrown back. Monica and Beckham are in something surprisingly serious-looking. Evie and Shoji are sitting near each other, talking quietly.
❝Occupational habit,❞ you say.
❝Is it helpful?❞
❝Sometimes.❞ You look at the water. ❝Sometimes I just can't turn it off.❞
❝What are you seeing right now?❞
You think about it honestly. ❝Five first impressions that are all going to look different in a week.❞
Lorenzo is quiet for a second. ❝Including ours?❞
You look at him.
He's asking for real. Less charming-mode, more just — asking.
❝I don't know yet,❞ you say. ❝Ask me in a week.❞
❝I'll do that,❞ he says.
The music shifts. Across the terrace Carmen says something that sends Monica into hysterics. The night settles into something warm and temporary and genuinely good in the way that first nights are before everything gets complicated.
Your dress is perfect. The boy beside you just made you laugh before you decided to. That hasn't happened in a while.
You let yourself have it.
Just tonight.
Later— much later, when most people have gone in =— you're at the pool edge. Feet in the water. Listening to the quiet.
You hear footsteps. You know whose before you look. You have good ears. Also he's been doing this thing all night where he very carefully isn't looking at you, which has its own presence.
Shoji sits down. Not close. Just not far.
The water. The lights underneath. Somewhere inside, a laugh.
❝You alright?❞ he asks.
Such a normal question. You sit with it for longer than is probably natural.
❝Yeah,❞ you say. ❝I think so. You?❞
❝Yeah.❞ He looks at the water. ❝Lot to take in.❞
❝Mm.❞
Neither of you says anything for a while. The silence is fine. Not every silence needs filling. You know that, in theory. You are working on it.
❝We should probably go in,❞ you say.
❝Probably.❞
Nobody moves.
Then you do. And he does.
You go inside the villa.
The villa goes quiet in that specific way of a place that's been loud for hours and is only now remembering how to be still.
Cupid is gone. The boys have migrated to the kitchen for reasons that involve someone finding crisps. And the five of you are in the vanity room, which is— a lot. Ten mirrors, ten lit-up stations, the kind of lighting that's flattering enough to be suspicious, and a collective cloud of micellar water and setting spray and the particular chaos of five women simultaneously taking off their faces.
Carmen gets there first and has already claimed the middle station and is going at her mascara with a makeup wipe like it personally wronged her.
❝Okay,❞ she says, to no one and everyone. ❝Talk.❞
❝Give me a second I'm still—❞ Monica is wrestling with a lash. ❝Hold on. Hold on. Got it. Okay. Talk.❞
❝Theodore,❞ you say, because someone has to start and it might as well be the most obvious one in the room.
Carmen points at you in the mirror. ❝Do not.❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝I said what I said.❞
❝You literally said don't—❞
❝Exactly. Don't. Moving on.❞
❝She's already in love,❞ Monica tells you, at full volume, directly into the mirror.
❝I am not—❞
❝She's a little bit in love,❞ Evie says, which is the most devastating possible contribution from Evie because Evie does not say things like that and the fact that even she clocked it means it's extremely obvious.
Carmen puts her makeup wipe down. Picks it back up. ❝He's just—❞ she starts. Stops. ❝He lost his whole speech,❞ she says, almost to herself. ❝He had a thing prepared and he just — lost it. Right in front of me.❞
❝That's so cute,❞ Monica says.
❝It was so cute,❞ Carmen says miserably.
Everyone laughs.
❝Okay,❞ Monica says, tying her hair up. ❝Beckham.❞
❝What about Beckham,❞ Evie says.
❝His speech was about avocado toast.❞
❝To be fair,❞ you say, ❝it was a very good avocado toast speech.❞
❝It was!❞ Monica sounds genuinely offended on her own behalf. ❝That's the annoying part. It was charming. The avocado toast thing was charming. I wanted to be annoyed and I couldn't be annoyed.❞
❝You were fuckin' arguing with him for like ten minutes,❞ Carmen says.
❝Twelve,❞ Monica says. ❝And he didn't budge once. Not once. He just stood there being completely wrong and completely unbothered about it.❞
❝You like him,❞ you say.
❝I didn't say that.❞
❝Monica.❞
❝I said he was charming. That's different.❞
❝How is that different.❞
Monica opens her mouth. Closes it. Points at you in the mirror. ❝Can we talk about you.❞
❝We can absolutely not.❞
❝MC.❞
❝Moving on,❞ you say, in your best Carmen voice.
Carmen loses it. Actual wheezing.
Evie is at the station on the end, methodical, taking off her makeup in the precise order she always takes off her makeup, which you can tell is a specific order because she's doing it with the focused calm of a ritual.
❝Shoji seems nice,❞ you say, carefully.
❝He is,❞ Evie says. No performance. Just— yes, he is.
❝He said you seem like someone who means what she says,❞ Monica offers.
❝I know.❞ Evie smooths something onto her skin. ❝I heard him.❞ A pause. ❝That's a good thing to notice about someone.❞
❝It is,❞ you agree.
Evie looks at you in the mirror for a second. Something in her face that isn't quite a smile but is adjacent to one. ❝He seems like someone who shows up,❞ she says. ❝I think that matters more than most things.❞
❝Yeah,❞ you say. ❝I think so too.❞
You both look at the mirror for a second.
Then Carmen says ❝okay but Evie you have to admit the matching posture thing when you were talking was so—❞
❝I don't know what you're referring to,❞ Evie says.
❝You were literally standing like—❞ Carmen demonstrates, going ramrod straight.
❝I always stand like that.❞
❝He was doing it too!❞
❝He has good posture.❞
❝It was like two soldiers at a very romantic parade—❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝I'm just saying—❞
❝Carmen.❞
❝It was cute, Evie, I'm saying it was cute—❞
❝Goodnight, Carmen.❞
Jasmine has been quiet.
Not checked-out quiet — she's been laughing at everything, contributing, present — but there's a layer underneath it that you've been clocking for the last twenty minutes and not saying anything about because it's night one and some things take longer than night one.
She's reapplying her skincare in the mirror with the focused attention of someone who does this every night without exception. Vitamin C. Something in a glass bottle. Something else.
❝Maverick seems—❞ Monica starts, and then catches something in Jasmine's reflection and visibly recalibrates. ❝Good,❞ she finishes. ❝He seems good.❞
❝He's fine,❞ Jasmine says.
❝Fine,❞ Carmen repeats.
❝He's fine. He's good-looking, he's not an idiot, he listened when I talked.❞ She caps the bottle. ❝Fine.❞
❝That's like the most underwhelming review,❞ Monica says.
❝It's night one,❞ Jasmine says, pleasantly. ❝Fine is good for night one.❞
She catches your eye in the mirror.
You look at your own reflection.
Fine, you think.
You think about who Lorenzo's eyes went to when he paused. The half second before he walked to you. You think about Jasmine saying fine in that specific tone of voice.
You think about the fact that you notice things.
You think about the fact that noticing things has not, historically, made your life easier.
You put your moisturiser on and say nothing.
The bedroom is enormous and slightly absurd.
Ten beds, five couples, the other five made up and waiting on the far side of the room for whoever comes next— sirens, new arrivals, the future that hasn't happened yet. The whole thing is warm-lit and white-linened and smells like something expensive, and for a second standing in the doorway you think again like you did in the car: this is real, this is actually happening, you are actually doing this.
Then Carmen trips on her own slipper and the moment passes.
The boys are already in various states of settled— Theodore has somehow already found a book, which nobody questions; Beckham is horizontal approximately four seconds after sitting down; Maverick is on his phone — oh wait, no phones. He's just looking at the ceiling then. Contemplatively.
❝This is so weird,❞ Monica announces to the room.
❝So weird,❞ Beckham agrees, from horizontal.
❝Good weird,❞ Carmen says.
❝Jury's out,❞ Theodore says, from behind the book he definitely smuggled in somehow.
❝Where did you even get that,❞ Carmen says.
❝I packed it.❞
❝We were told no outside items—❞
❝It's a book, Carmen.❞
❝Theodore—❞
❝It's a book.❞
The lights go down slowly— dimmed from somewhere, probably production— and the room settles into the warm quiet of ten people doing the specific work of pretending to be more comfortable than they are.
❝Goodnight,❞ Monica says, to the room.
A chorus of goodnights, overlapping, some more sincere than others.
❝Goodnight Evie,❞ Carmen calls across.
❝Goodnight Carmen,❞ Evie says, in a tone that means please stop.
❝Goodnight Theodore's illegal book,❞ Monica says.
❝Goodnight Monica,❞ Theodore says.
❝That wasn't directed at you—❞
❝Goodnight Monica,❞ he says again, turning a page.
Beckham makes a sound that might be a laugh and might be him falling asleep. Unclear.
Maverick says goodnight to no one specific, ceiling-directed, quiet. Jasmine, in the bed beside his, says it back the same way. Neither of them looks at the other.
You file that.
Your bed is warm.
Lorenzo is in the one beside yours, close enough that you could talk without the rest of the room hearing if you kept it low, which is clearly what the producers intended and you're going to do it anyway because the alternative is lying there thinking.
He's on his back, looking at the ceiling, arms folded behind his head. He looks like someone whose brain is still going.
❝You're thinking very loudly,❞ you say, quietly.
❝I'm always thinking loudly,❞ he says. ❝You just usually can't hear it.❞
❝What are you thinking about.❞
A pause. Not the kind where he's deciding whether to tell you. The kind where he's deciding how much.
❝Tonight,❞ he says. ❝Just— going back over it.❞
❝And?❞
❝And it was a good night.❞ He turns his head slightly to look at you in the low light. ❝You?❞
❝Same,❞ you say. ❝Good night.❞
❝Yeah.❞
He shifts slightly, and his voice when it comes is casual, the particular casualness of someone keeping something light on purpose. ❝You and Shoji seemed like you had a good chat. Earlier. By the pool.❞
Something in you goes very still.
❝We talked during the scroll thing,❞ you say. ❝Same as everyone.❞
❝No, I mean after,❞ he says. ❝Late. When most people had gone in.❞
He says it the same way he says everything — easy, warm, conversational. No edge to it. No weight. Just — noting it. The way he notes things.
❝Oh,❞ you say. ❝Yeah. Just checking in.❞
❝Nice,❞ he says.
And that's it. That's all. He doesn't push it, doesn't follow it up, lets it sit there like it's nothing, like he mentioned it the way you'd mention the weather.
You look at the ceiling too.
❝Goodnight, Lorenzo,❞ you say.
❝Goodnight, MC.❞
A pause.
❝Ask me in a week,❞ he says.
❝You'll remind me,❞ you say.
❝Yeah,❞ he says. ❝I will.❞
The room goes quiet. Properly quiet. Someone's breathing evens out— Beckham, probably, he seems like someone who falls asleep fast and completely. The low light hums.
You look at the ceiling.
You think about ten people in five out of ten beds in one room at the start of something none of them can see the shape of yet.
And for once, you let that be enough.
brrrr!!!... 𝓒UPID'S CALLING જ⁀➴♡
❝ Ten islanders. Five couples. One night down.
Paradiso does this thing where it makes everything feel meant to be— the light, the warmth, the fact that you are genuinely stuck here with nowhere else to be.
Something happened tonight though.
You know it did. ❞
Night One: who kept pulling your attention back?
Lorenzo: warm, chose you, and you're not sure what the pause before he did means
Shoji: said maybe twelve words to you and somehow that was enough
Beckham: funnier than expected, still figuring him out
Maverick: somehow still a question you haven't finished
Theodore: you only know what Carmen told you, and that's made you more curious
Voting ended on14h
Voting closes in a week before Episode 2.
I am SO SORRY ABOUT THE WAIT!!!! i've been so occupied with work and juggling my tutoring side gig PLEASE DONT SKEWER ME.. this episode was also pretty tough to write because this is yk the first impression and all that all the other episodes can flow in easily after this and i kept rewriting it, deleting it and doing it over again but ALAS. HERE IT IS, LONG, PROUD AND NOT PROOF READ LMAOO
please let me know what you think about how this episode was written through my ask!! feel free to leave feedback, critique and let me know what exactly you would love to see!!
i also would like to know how long you would like to wait until the next episode!! because there's the flow of reading and there's also whether if or not im gonna be getting enough engagement(votes) that ends up in favor of everyone yknowww but anyways!
Until the next episode!! BYEE LOVE ALL 30 OF U GUYS 🏹💌💗
Professional heavy lifter but I don't mean physical weight
You walk in quietly and settle in your seat just as quietly - but your eyes give off the idea you're starstruck by it all.
❝Hi. I'm MC. Twenty-four, from Chicago and I'm a trauma nurse— which means I'm professionally the most competent person in the room and personally, apparently, the easiest girl in the world to lie to.❞ You giggle softly with the roll of your eyes. ❝Those two things coexist. I've made my peace with it... Kind of.❞
❝I've been cheated on. More than once. More than twice, if I'm being fully honest on camera, which — great, LOVE that for me. And the thing that gets me, the thing I cannot explain no matter how many times I've turned it over, is that I always knew.❞ You explain by placing your hand sideways on your other hand's palm- emphasizing your point. ❝Before they said anything, before I found anything — I knew. I'm a trauma nurse. I read people for a living. I clocked every shift in behavior, every weird explanation, every moment where something just felt slightly off. I knew.❞
❝I just didn't want to be right. So I wasn't. Until I was.❞ You then go quiet.
❝I think I kept believing that if I was just—good enough, patient enough, steady enough— it would be enough. That's the thing nobody tells you about being the person who holds everyone else together. You get really good at convincing yourself that the cracks you're seeing aren't that bad. That you can fix it. That you can fix him.❞ You tense up in your seat, feeling your eyes glaze over.
You then utter, just maybe a decibel abover a whisper. ❝You can't fix him. I know that now. I've had some time.❞
But you smile nonetheless, not wanting to make things glum so fast. ❝I'm here because I genuinely don't know what it looks like to be chosen by someone who actually means it— and I want to find out before I talk myself out of wanting it altogether.❞ You chuckle lightly. ❝ Don't make it weird. I just said it out loud and I'm not taking it back.❞
Your MC's finally here!!! And the girls are finally complete!! I hope you guys love how I wrote MC and I wanna know if you mind MC being referred to as MC- I've debated using (Name), (Y/n) or (____). But IDK i've never really like using them as I feel it ruins the flow of reading. Lemme know what u guys think through my anonymous ask or drop a comment!!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A girl basically tumbles in, scream-laughing as she bounces from one set item to another. You can hear a muffled voice from behind the camera and that's when she settles down, looking a bit sheepish.
❝I was supposed to sit down right as I walked in, huh? My bad.❞ She takes her seat and faces the camera. Her cheeks are flushed pink from excitement.
❝Hi, I'm Carmen! Twenty-three, from Chicago and I run an NGO—environmental stuff, mostly community-based projects— and yes, I am aware of how that sounds next to "I'm here for a dating show," I've already made my peace with the irony.❞ Carmen says with a bright smile, dimples forming on both sides of her mouth.
❝I'm pretty up for anything, honestly. Spontaneous to a fault. I once flew somewhere for a long weekend because a stranger on a hike told me about a waterfall and I decided I needed to see it that week, not eventually.❞ She tousles her hair, giggles and then does a dead-pan, in the most unserious way ever. ❝My friends think it's fun until they're the ones who have to cover my shifts.❞
The girl then laughs. ❝I joke around a lot—like, a lot a LOT—and I think that's partly just who I am and partly a thing I do so people don't get too close to whatever's actually going on, y'know, underneath.❞ Her shoulders drops, and she has a solemn smile on her face now. ❝I had a relationship where I joked my way through basically the entire breakup conversation and only cried about it three weeks later, alone, in my car, which in retrospect was maybeeee...not the healthiest processing method.❞
❝I'm here because I want to find out if I can be serious about something- no, someone... without immediately like making it a bit.❞ Carmen gives a brave smile to the camera.
The girls are HERE!!! i'm kinda irritated because all my girls are likeable. NOT THAT IT'S BAD THING, why is it so hard to make villains without making it cliche or predictablee
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A tall dark skinned woman walks into the room, round eyes glittery as she takes it all in. She seems starstruck, almost giddy as she takes her seat.
❝Hey heyy! I’m Monica, twenty-four, I am from Portland, Oregonnn and I live out of a suitcase which has historically not been great for my love life. I’m always backpacking, always on the go. There’s not a single day where I’m staying still.❞ Monica's eye twitches. ❝Tell me to stay home for one day and I think I’d tweak.❞
Her hoop earrings catches the studio light, making her face seem bright and soft. ❝I travel for work. Thirty-two countries, counting. I have a whole thing about staying somewhere until it feels finished — which sounds romantic until you realize it means I've missed flights on purpose and once stayed in Lisbon an extra eleven days because the light was doing something incredible and I wasn't ready to leave. My editor was less moved by this than I was.❞ She looks away bashfully with a chuckle.
❝My dating history’s genuinely like scattered. I've had one relationship that lasted a year, ended because he wanted to settle down and I wanted to go to Thailand, and neither of us was wrong. And before that's just lot of really good short-term things that I probably let run their natural course a little tooooo enthusiastically.❞ The girl shrugged casually
Monica holds out her hand for the the camera and one by one folds her fingers down. ❝I've been called emotionally unavailable which I think is a misread — I'm emotionally available, I'm just also emotionally elsewhere at the same time. It's nuanced, people. ❞
❝I'm here because thirty-two countries in, I'm starting to think the thing I've been looking for might not be a place. Yeah. I said it. Don't make it weird.❞ She rolls her eyes with a wide smile.
The girls are HERE!!! Who's your favorite so far!!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A girl maybe as tall as 5'9" walks into the frame, pony tail swishing behind her. She struts like the camera owes her money. Settling down at the chair in the middle, her hands already finds their way to her front hair strands.
❝Heyy, I'm Jasmine. Twenty-six, from New York, and I'm a fashion influencer, before anyone asks — yes, the lighting in this room is doing me absolutely no favors and yes, I've already mentioned it to someone.❞ Jasmine giggles. ❝'M just messing, I know you guys put work into this set up.❞
Her acrylic nail gently lands on her plump lips. ❝I know what people think when they hear "influencer" — and look, I'm not going to pretend I don't care what things look like, because I do, deeply, unapologetically. But I think people mistake "cares about image" for "doesn't feel anything real," and that's like — actually kind of insulting, like what? I feel things. I just also know how to look good while feeling them.❞
She then snickers, throwing her head back. ❝I don't know what to tell you, girl but my dating history? HOT mess. I've had a few situations where I really felt something and then found out I was very much the only one feeling it, if you know what I mean — so I've gotten good at protecting myself early. Quick to call things out, quicker to walk if something feels off. My friends say I give people one chance and a half. Ummm, I think that's generous, actually.❞
❝Hot take? NO, cold take actually. Good men are like mermaids, heard of but never seen before.❞ The girl's in a fit of laughter before she schools her composure.
❝I'm here because I want someone who isn't intimidated by me, isn't trying to manage me, and also isn't a coward about what he wants. I've had enough of guessing games to last several lifetimes.❞ Jasmine flips her ponytail behind her shoulder, expression dead serious.
❝See guys? I'm not that demanding!❞ She ends it with a giggle.
The girls are HEREE!! Tysm for the wait <3
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
Has a 5 year plan and still was not prepared for this tomfoolery
A girl walks up to the chair in the middle of the room, long black hair flowing behind her. She takes a seat, crosses her legs — posture straight as a board.
❝Hey, I'm Evie. Twenty-six, from San Fracisco and I teach Pilates. I've had a five-year plan since I was nineteen and I have hit basically every single milestone on schedule, which either makes me very disciplined or means I peaked at goal-setting and nothing since.❞ She laughs lightly. ❝Jury's out.❞
Her hands rise to her front, moving as she continues to explain. ❝I like routine. I like knowing what a day is going to look like before it happens. People find that intense sometimes — my last relationship called it "exhausting to keep up with," which- hah- stung, because from where I was standing I thought I was just being responsible for both of us. Turns out there's a difference between being responsible and not letting anyone else hold anything.❞
She licks her lips, eyes now seemingly elsewhere. ❝We were together two years. He wanted to slow down, take things less seriously for a while, and I didn't know how to do that without feeling like I was failing at something. So... I didn't. And then it ended.❞ Her eyes dart back to the camera. ❝I've had some time to think about whether my plan has room in it for things I can't schedule. I'm still working that out.❞
❝This...Castaway Cupid. This is the least controlled environment I've ever voluntarily put myself in, and some part of me thinks that might be what it takes for me to finally let myself be at more ease, slow things down.❞ Evie manages a brave smile, shoulders still square.
The girls are finally HEREEE!! Tysm to all of you who voted for MC, hope you all are happy!! ALSO i have no clue why as to why this post has been marked as mature because there's no profanity, no sexual themes or drug mentions either?? LMAO
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A man with soft brown hair walks up to the chair in the middle of interview set, a slight swagger in his steps.
❝Hey, I'm Lorenzo, twenty-five, from Miami, marketing executive—which basically means I get paid to make people want things they didn't know they wanted. Turns out that's also just my personality.❞
Lorenzo throws his head back, a rich, easy laugh rolling from his chest as his shoulders dropped into a relaxed posture. He leans forward, holding eye contact with the camera effortlessly, like he was made for the cameras.
❝I'm a people person. Like, genuinely, not in the LinkedIn way,❞ he continues, flashing his pearly whites. He then gestures with his hands in a smooth and animated way. ❝I remember names, I remember details, I remember what you ordered the first time we met. People think that's a line. It's not a line, it's just—I pay attention. To everyone.❞
His expressive face shifts, his brows stitches together and his smile drops a bit too. It's almost like a flicker of vulnerability, but he's quick to mask it with a charming shrug.
❝Which has been a problem in relationships, if I'm being honest. Because apparently 'attentive to everyone' reads as 'not attentive enough to one person.' I don't fully agree with that assessment, but...❞ He pauses, running a hand through his hair and offering a rueful smirk. ❝I've heard it enough times that I'm willing to sit with it.❞
He shifts his weight, crossing his arms but keeping his chest broad, fully aware of the camera's angles.
❝I've had two serious relationships. Both ended with some version of 'you make me feel like I'm not the only one,' which—okay, fair. But also, is it so bad to just be likeable?" Lorenzo gestures down his own frame with a playful, self-deprecating wave of his hands, though the spark in his eyes suggests he knew exactly how good he looked. ❝I didn't choose this face. Joking, joking—mostly.❞
The grin returns, full-force and magnetic, before his tone softens into something a bit more grounded.
❝I'm here because I want someone who doesn't need to compete for my attention to have it. I just—I haven't figured out how to do that without making everyone else in the room feel like they're losing something. Y'know, work in progress.❞
Lorenzo blinks, breaking the gaze of the lens for a split second as a sudden wave of self-awareness hits him. He points a playful finger directly at the camera crew, his voice dropping into a conspiratorial whisper.
❝Edit that out.❞
REMINDER! Voting for MC's job and personality closes in a week before Episode 1. Vote here!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A broad-shouldered man takes a seat, adjusting his posture with the careful ease of an athlete used to nursing minor aches. He offers a slow, easygoing grin to the camera.
❝Beckham. Twenty-six. And I'm from Denver, Colorado. I play football professionally, which means my whole life is structured around hitting things and then icing the parts that got hit.❞
He lets out a low, rumbling laugh, rubbing at the back of his neck as his eyes crinkle around the corners.
❝It's a great sport. Terrible for your knees, great for your character,❞ he adds, his voice thick with a natural, warmth. ❝I'm pretty laid-back, generally. Things roll off me. My mates would tell you I'm the calm one, and they aren't wrong.❞
He pauses, his smile fading slightly into a more serious, intense expression. He leans forward, resting his thick forearms on his knees.
❝Except when it comes to people I actually care about. Then I get weirdly protective, weirdly fast, and it freaks people out a bit because the rest of the time I seem so chill.❞
Beckham shifts back, looking down at his large hands for a moment as he reflects. The relaxed facade drops entirely.
❝Last relationship lasted three years. Ended because—honestly, I think I got so used to being the steady one that I forgot to ask for anything back.❞ He swallows hard, his tone dropping to a quiet, candid register. ❝Just kept giving, kept being fine, until one day I wasn't fine and she had no idea because I'd never once said so. Shit- ha- that one's on me...for the most part.❞
He clears his throat softly, shaking off the momentary somber mood and looking back up at the lens with an honest, hopeful glint in his eyes.
❝I'm here because I want to find someone I don't have to perform 'easygoing' for,❞ Beckham says, his voice steadying with quiet resolve. ❝Someone I can just—be a bit much with, sometimes, and not worry about it.❞
REMINDER! Voting for MC's job and personality closes in a week before Episode 1. Vote here!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A striking man with razor-sharp features and an effortlessly polished posture glides into the seat. He leans back, crossing one long leg over the other, completely at home in front of the lens.
❝I'm Maverick. Twenty-seven. Born and raised in L-fucking-A.❞ He hooted, pumping his fist in the air before dropping it. ❝I'm a model, typical and I know sounds like I just said 'I'm hot for a living'—and yeah, kind of, but it's also a lot more boring than people think. Mostly standing very still in uncomfortable shoes.❞
He lets out a smooth, practiced chuckle, flashing a flawless smile that looks ready for a magazine cover.
❝Dating-wiseeee, I've had a lot of—I want to say 'situationships' but my publicist told me not to say that word anymore.❞ He laughs again, a bit more genuinely this time, uncrossing his legs and leaning in. ❝I've dated - slept around. A lot. Never been in love, if I'm being completely honest.❞
His expression grows slightly distant, the dazzle disappearing from his eyes.
❝I used to think that was just because I hadn't met the right person,❞ he admits, his voice dropping slightly. ❝But lately I'm wondering if it's because I never let it get far enough to find out. Easier to be the guy everyone wants than the guy someone actually has, right?❞
He shifts his position, casually adjusting the cuff of his shirt as if shit didn't just get heavy.
❝I got called shallow by an ex once. On camera, actually, for a different show, so that one followed me around for a while. I don't think she was wrong, necessarily, I just think she only caught me at the surface.❞ Maverick shrugs, a careless, dismissive gesture meant to show it doesn't bother him—but the tightness in his jaw says otherwise. ❝There's more down there. I just haven't shown anyone yet because nobody's stuck around long enough to ask.❞
He looks directly into the camera, his gaze locking on with an intense, raw sincerity that entirely replaces his earlier detachment.
❝I'm here because I'm tired of being someone's type,❞ Maverick says, his tone quiet but absolutely resolute. ❝I want to be someone's person.❞
❝But, hey- summer does come first. And I'm ready to see some.❞
REMINDER! Voting for MC's job and personality closes in a week before Episode 1. Vote here!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
❝Hi. I'm Theodore. Twenty-five, from Seattle and I'm a software developer. I build things that other people use without ever thinking about the person who built them, which honestly might be the most accurate metaphor for my dating life that I've ever come up with on the spot.❞
He lets out a soft, nervous laugh, his eyes widening slightly as the weight of his own words hits him. He rubs the back of his neck, a faint blush creeping up his collar.
❝Wow. Didn't expect to land that one,❞ he mutters, shifting slightly in his seat before refocusing on the camera. ❝I'm—look, I overthink everything. Texts, especially. I have drafted and deleted more 'good morning' texts than I'm comfortable admitting out loud, on camera, to a production team.❞
He gestures with a slight, self-deprecating wave of his hand, his speech quickening with a burst of anxiousness.
❝There's a version of me that's very funny and very present and a version of me that's run forty simulations of how a conversation might go before I've said a single word. And er...the second version usually wins.❞ Theodore pauses, his hands coming together again as his gaze drops momentarily to the floor. The nervous energy settles into a quiet stillness.
❝I've had one real relationship. We were together for two years, mostly over text and calls because she lived in a different city, and I think I was actually better at that than I am at in-person. There's an edit function when you're typing. There's no edit function in real life.❞ He swallows, looking back up with a vulnerable, honest expression. ❝She said I was 'hard to read,' which—yeahhh...❞
He takes a slow, grounding breath, locking eyes with the camera with a mixture of determination and genuine apprehension.
❝I'm here because I'd like to find out what I'm like when I don't have time to overthink it.❞
Theodore holds the gaze for a long, quiet pause, the silence stretching out between him and the crew. Finally, a small, wry smile breaks through the tension, his eyes slightly wide.
❝Yo- ha!- that actually sounds terrifying.❞
REMINDER! Voting for MC's job and personality closes in a week before Episode 1. Vote here!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
A man with a solid build sits down in the chair, his movements steady and purposeful.
He rests his calloused hands on his thighs, offering a calm, direct look at the lens. ❝I'm Shoji. Twenty-eight, and I was raised in Honolulu by my moms. I work construction. I like building things—there's something satisfying about a job where at the end of the day you can point at something and go, 'that wasn't there this morning, and now it is, because of me.' Not a lot of jobs give you that.❞
A small, quiet smile plays on his lips. He shrugs his broad shoulders casually.
❝People say I'm a good listener, which I think is just code for 'doesn't talk about himself much'. Guilty though. I'd rather know what's going on with you than make you sit through what's going on with me.❞ He shakes his head slightly. ❝Probably not the healthiest instinct. My moms call it 'emotionally outsourcing yourself to other people's problems.' They're not wrong, just... a tiny bit annoying for being right.❞
Shoji shifts his weight, his gaze dropping to his hands for a brief moment as the conversation turns personal. When he looks back up, his expression is entirely open, though his voice softens.
❝I'd like to say I’m a pretty low-maintenance guy to date. I don’t need the grand gestures or the constant drama. But I’ve noticed a pattern where I end up playing the anchor. I’m the steady guy, the rock, the one who stays calm while everyone else is spiraling. It’s a good role to play, until you realize you’re the only one keeping the ship, y'know, in one place and no one’s checking to see if you’re drifting.❞
The man then swallows thickly, Adam's apple bobbing.
❝My last relationship fell apart because we just… stopped talking about the real stuff. We got comfortable in the routine of being fine, and by the time I realized we were miles apart, it was already too late to build a bridge back. It taught me that being quiet isn't the same thing as being strong. Sometimes it’s just an excuse to hide.❞
The silence hangs comfortably around him. He seems sincere, deeply. He locks eyes with the camera quietly, almost vulnerable.
❝I'm here because I'm done playing it safe behind a wall. I want to find someone who actually wants to dig a little deeper with me, even if it gets a bit messy.❞
Then, a chuckle slips.
❝Does that even make sense?❞
REMINDER! Voting for MC's job and personality closes in a week before Episode 1. Vote here!
Can't wait to see you guys when Episode 1 releases, take care until then! ʚ❤︎ɞ
hi dolls ♡ ~ as my first official blog, i'll be talking about possibly the most crucial part of your makeup routine - and that is your base! I will mainly talk about how I do my base step-by-step, alongside details on why I use certain techniques!
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STEP 1: SKIN PREP
~ I personally prep my face with my full skincare routine; this include TONER - SERUM - MOISTURISER - SUNSCREEN (occasionally). Prepping your face is key to having a smoother & flawless base!
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STEP 2: FOUNDATION
~ Take whatever foundation you enjoy and put it on the back of hand and the pick the product up with either a FLUFFY FOUNDATION BRUSH (for more coverage; this is what I use as well) or a SPONGE (for less coverage). Never pump it directly onto your face dolls, as it gives less control of how much you want, often leading to a cakey base!
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STEP 3: BRONZER
~ For a seamless transition before adding your concealer, I underpaint! Bronzer around the temples of your cheeks + forehead, with a big fluffy brush; key tip when putting it on your cheeks is sweeping them in a upwards motion rather than just brushing it on!
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STEP 4: LIQUID BLUSH
~ Don't be afraid to go heavy-handed with your liquid blush ever, especially as powder will be added later on! I personally use a dense flat blush for it.
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STEP 5: CONCEALER
~ Finally, place your concealer around the areas where you want to brighten your face and blend it out with a flat concealer brush after letting it dry for a minute to bring more coverage!
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STEP 6: POWDER
~ Now, take a powder of your choice (loose or press; I personally use just a pressed powder) and press that all over your face using a big fluffy brush. Using a brush instead of a powder puff leaves a more natural finish due to less product build-up!
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STEP 7: POWDER BLUSH
~ To build up the blush, I put a paler shade across the apples of my cheeks then a brighter shade around the ends of my cheeks, inspired by PAINTED BY ESTHER!
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STEP 8: SETTING SPRAY
~ Lastly, to set everything in place, go ahead with a setting spray all over your face and let that dry !
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I hope you all enjoyed this girly blog and found it useful💝If any of you angels are interested in the products I use do lmk in the comments or through my "doll advice" , I would love to share them as well 🧁
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