Meet Your Match

12

I showed Hanna my favorite viewer comment so far: "I'm a 68 year old man watching this against my will. Please tell those two young women that I don't need my wife catching me blushing like a school girl when I'm supposed to be in the role of the grumpy but supportive husband."

There were so many replies: "We love you!" "Keep watching!" "I'm 30 and I've been crying the whole time."

I was rewarded with the tiniest smile. I thought our morning was going well.

Right up to the moment Hanna turned green and threw up. She made it to a trash bin just in time.

I was immediately removed from her side.

Half the mansion was retching within the next hour. Or, as Mitch put it, "filling up the toilets". I felt like I'd walked into a room expecting a party only to find everything on fire.

Several people had food poisoning.

After being placed with others showing no symptoms, I eyed my backside in the foyer mirror and said over my shoulder, "Don't you dare act up. Hanna might need me."

"Leave your butt alone, Hanna'll be fine," Kieran said from an enormous heart-shaped cushion. A little while ago Jennifer had been hissing at him about his lack of concern for her, and he'd said it was his assumption that if she was looking well, she was feeling well. Apparently that wasn't the point.

In the chaos, a fallen water bottle had been overlooked. I picked it up and set it against the wall, near the buckets that had been lined up in case anyone else got queasy.

Too anxious to sit, I wandered to the double doors.

Behind me, reflected in the glass, Mitch was mimicking someone's panic as they became ill. In a repeat of when he'd choked on the hot dog, he clutched his throat, widened his eyes, and imitated a monkey.

What a hypocrite. I meant to turn my attention elsewhere, but something wouldn't let me. The night of our formal introductions, hadn't Hanna been standing just like this in the living area before she'd stepped out? And hadn't I been the monkey in the back?

Was it possible that she hadn't been staring into the night at all, but at my reflection? To Jane's, "There's nothing out there. What are you looking at, Hanna?" she had said—

"My downfall."

Was I just trying to find evidence to support my infatuation? Get real, Halle.

I could've gone to a TV in another room and asked for a replay of what I'd already been shown once in the confessional. Except I wasn't enough of a jerk to do it while Hanna was too ill to see in person.

Besides, even if my suspicion was true, maybe she'd simply foreseen our matching and assumed it would cause her to lose. Maybe she'd been talking about someone else in the room or the room itself, in a "this show will be the end of me" kind of way. There was more than one possible explanation.

"Guys! Announcement..."

Those of us who were able would be completing a solo challenge. I sent Hanna a note reminding her to drink plenty of water, as she'd be at serious risk of dehydration.

When we stood before the row of bicycles, their large baskets full of what we would be delivering, Megan said, "I'd rather barf all day."

"Drama queen," somebody muttered.

"Who was that!"

I grabbed a bike, intending to flee the scene, aware that I was also acting on behalf of Hanna. My path was blocked by Crystal, her arms crossed.