Their captain sat alone by the fire in front of his shelter. He stared into it sightlessly and passed his phone, now just a useless brick, from hand to hand.
"He seems..." Bood began.
"Off?" said Barrett. He looked around grandly at the sand, and the stars, and the massive fucking scar in the forest that their plane had left when it plummeted from the sky. "I wonder why."
The adrenaline from the crash had -- almost -- worn off. So had some of the fear: three days in and they had reliably clean water, manifestly non-poisonous fruit, no rain so far, and plenty of lobster to catch. That was especially easy, because Bood knew how to make basket traps; he'd learned it from a Bear Grylls book.
"Wow," Rozanov had said, while Bood walked the team through it. "Didn't know you can read. Is crazy."
Come to think of it, weaving his basket had been the last time Roz had looked like he wasn't considering offering himself up as a sacrifice if they had to start cannibalizing each other. He'd even used an extra reed to tie a bow on the top of it. That joie de vivre was good and gone now.
Barrett scrubbed a hand over his face.
"Fuck off," Bood said, without much heat behind it.
"I think he just feels like he has to watch out for all of us," Barrett said. "Like he's in charge here the way he's in charge on the ice. But all of us are alive; we all survived. They'll come find us sooner rather than later."
"Why are you so chill? Did you eat those mushrooms Haas found?"
A nibble of the mushroom in question on day one had left Haas tripping for twenty-four straight hours. Barrett was convinced the kid was lapsing into permanent psychedelic psychosis when suddenly he woke up from a dead sleep, energetic and thirsty as fuck. The pilot, who it turned out was named Bill, gave him some electrolyte packets from the First Aid kit. Rozanov had looked like he wanted to punch a tree until there were only splinters left. Fungi had been banned since.
Barrett shrugged. "We're famous as fuck. We're gonna be fine, they're gonna find us."
"We're not famous. Roz is famous."
Bood poked at their fire with a stick, frowning. Barrett knew that all the guys had stayed up more than once staring at the roofs of their shelters thinking about the possibility of never being found, but they all also knew that they were probably just somewhere in the Florida Keys; they could even see another island on the horizon that was just far enough to be too dangerous to try to kayak to. Not that a single one of them knew how to build a kayak. The point was, it was literally going to be fine. Seriously. For real.
"I don't know," Bood finally said. "Like, obviously, I'm worried sick about Cassie and the kids. I know Dykstra is worried about Caitlin and his kids." He turned fully to Barrett. "Okay, I'm about to say something fucked up."
Barrett was instantly intrigued. "Nice. Hit me."
"Don't say nice," Bood said.
"Come on, nothing fun is happening. We need to get a little bit Lord of the Flies about it."
So much for the 'Bood can read' allegations. "Can you just tell me?"
Bood leaned closer, lowering his voice. "He has like, no family, you know? Like, I think everyone in his family is dead, or he doesn't talk to them. He never goes back to Moscow. So I'm just like..."
Barrett sat back on their log, surprised. "Damn. That's cold."
"I don't mean it in a bad way!" Bood said. "Just, you know. We're all here and we're all fine, like you said, so he shouldn't have anything else to worry about, right?"
Barrett pondered that. It was true that Roz was crashing out at the level that Bood and Dykstra were, whereas Haas and Barrett and Harris had spent the whole evening kicking around a hacky sack made from Haas' last raggedy boxers and a handful of pebbles. Barrett had fumbled it twice passing to Harris because he was looking at his taut calves. Way too fit for a social media director.
"Are you saying this because you're too chickenshit to go ask him what's up yourself?" Barrett asked.
Barrett patted him on the shoulder, stood, and started off toward Rozanov.
"Your funeral," Bood said after him, but he sounded relieved.
Roz didn't even look up as Barrett approached. "Hey," Barrett said, and Rozanov jumped a little, startled. "Sorry. Can I sit?"
Wordless, Rozanov jerked his head at the space next to him on his log. "What do you need?" he said.
His voice was deep, rasping. Great stubble, too. Barrett was briefly struck by the porn version of this plane crash -- hockey team on a deserted island, come on -- but bravely moved on. "Bood's worried."
"It is because of Bood that we have food, shelter," Rozanov said. "He is doing a good job. No reason to be worried."
"Yeah," Barrett said. Maybe Roz was feeling inadequate because he hadn't known how to make baskets? "So are you."
"Doing," Barrett said, voice faltering, "A good...job."
"I know I am doing a good job," Rozanov said. "Are you dead? No? So I am doing a good job."
Christ. "Bood just thinks -- I mean, and me too -- that you seem, like -- you know, down."
"Troy," Roz said, "We are on deserted island."
"We're probably just in the Keys."
"In the Keys on deserted island, yes! Fuck!" Rozanov said. Barrett was startled by the outburst; Rozanov's shoulders dropped. He was still flipping his phone around in his hands. "Sorry. Fuck."
"Wow. Did you just apologize for something?"
"It could be a lot worse," Barrett said. "I mean, imagine if you'd been stuck out here with Boston, you guys would've already killed each other. Lord of the Flies style."
"What is this, Lord of the Flies?"
"The book where --" Why had nobody else read Lord of the Flies? It was the most obvious joke to make, and somehow he was the only one making it. Did they, like, not have Lord of the Flies in the 2000s in Russia? Maybe it wasn't allowed? Shit. Maybe it wasn't allowed. Was he being culturally insensitive?
"Oh, right," Roz said, saving him. "I remember. I would be Jack. Very good hunter. But you," he said, and made a face that said, well, what can you do. "Eh. You would be the boy who dies in the second chapter. Too slow to outrun the fire."
Rozanov finally cracked a smile, but it fell off his face again.
To break the silence, Barrett nodded to Roz's phone. "Sorry I don't have a charger." It was a bad joke, but Rozanov huffed a laugh. Maybe it was an in. "You waiting for a call?"
Rozanov looked into the fire, his sharp brow furrowed, his eyes very sad. He turned the phone over again in his hands. "Yes. I am."
Barrett's gaze snapped over to Bood, who was oblivious to this progress. Are you fucking seeing this? he wanted to ask.
"Wanna, y'know," Barrett began. He clenched his fist for courage. "Talk...about it?"
Roz sighed heavily. He looked down at his hands, at the phone, which the firelight glinted off of. "There's someone I love very much," he said slowly, as though carefully picking his words, "who is going to be very worried."
"And I worry about him because of it. He was hurt once, and I --" Roz turned his head sharply away. His voice had caught. "I was very worried, too."
Oh shit for real. Barrett's gaze darted to Bood again. Now he was mindlessly gnawing on a lobster claw. God damn it. Barrett had never heard Rozanov sound like this in his life, and he was totally alone with him while it happened. Why couldn't Rozanov just punch a tree like it seemed he was going to the other day? That would be so much easier to deal with. Fuck.
"Your brother?" he tried. "Back in Russia?" Roz had a brother, right?
Rozanov made a dry sound like a laugh. "No. No, not my brother."
What the fuck? Fuck! Was Barrett just supposed to keep playing 20 Questions with the quickly dwindling list of people Rozanov might care about until he hit gold?
"I'm sorry, man," he settled on.
Rozanov shrugged. "At least we are alive. If we weren't, I think he would still find a way to kill me." Now one hand was at the gold Orthodox cross around his neck. "He might kill me when we are back anyway. Smother me, I think. With pillow."
A realization was coming to Barrett as though from a great distance, not unlike the rescue boat that hadn't yet arrived. Did Roz have a boyfriend? He knew Roz was bi, but since when did he have a boyfriend?
But now that Roz had started talking, he wasn't stopping. "You know, I have always thought it would be nice to go to a place like this. He likes the forest, the lake, and of course I like the forest and the lake, but what about this, you know? Fucking sun and sand and palm trees. And coconuts. But now if I try to make him come to an island he will become very sad and say, Ilya, you almost died on an island; Ilya, do not get on another plane ever again; Ilya, you must retire; Ilya, I told you not to buy a motorcycle but you do not ever listen to me." Barrett blinked. What? "And I will say this was not buying a motorcycle, I had nothing to do with a plane falling out of the fucking sky!" He seemed really incensed. "And we are never getting a dog after this, he will be too scared that I will die and leave him as a widow with a dog. I must kiss the idea of a dog goodbye. Mwah." He mimed a kiss bitterly. "And who knows now if he will want to have that talk. He will probably be too guilty, and then we will never talk about it at all."
Barrett waited a full five seconds before deciding to poke at it. "Talk?"
Rozanov waved his hand. "We had a fight. It means nothing now. But we were supposed to talk when I landed. I had a plan. Dinner, yes?" His voice wavered. "As it went down," he said, apparently speaking of the plane, "I texted him. I know he has been reading those messages again and again. I wish he knew that the fight meant nothing, and that I was going to make him a big dinner."
Was Rozanov...? Holy shit. Rozanov was fucking crying. Barrett reached out a hand to pat his shoulder, thought better of it, dropped his hand, raised it again -- thought better of it, again -- and then patted the space on the log between them lamely.
"I would retire if he asked," Roz said thickly, nodding his head. He looked down at his phone as though in prayer. "I would."
Barrett didn't just glance at Bood this time, but rather cast around their entire little camp helplessly, begging anyone to hear this. Literally nobody was paying attention. Fear lanced through him.
"I know we're a shit team, but damn," Barrett said uneasily.
Rozanov sniffed wetly and looked at him. "We are not such a shit team," Roz said. "For example, if this was his team, they would have eaten each other already. Like Boston."
Then Rozanov blanched. Barrett opened his mouth and snapped it shut again.
"Well," Barrett said, in the interest of saying something.
"Nope. Yep." Now Barrett was just saying syllables. "Okay."
A silence fell. Roz's eyes darted between Barrett's, looking sharply for any sign of what he could only assume was weakness. A moment before he had been tragically beautiful, and now he was just straight up terrifying. "You will say nothing," he said, but it didn't come out threatening; it came out warily, like a question.
During the long silence that followed, Barrett ran through every guy in the league he could think of. Not a lot were coming up. Hollander in Montreal was gay, but it obviously wasn't him.
Unable to help himself, he ventured, "Is it -- is it Scott Hunter?"
"Scott Hunter?" Roz was loud enough that Bood finally looked over. Lot of good that was going to do Barrett now.
"Sorry, sorry," Barrett said. "Sorry. Duh. Of course not. He's like, married."
"I do not give a fuck if Scott Hunter is married, I would not fuck Scott Hunter if I came home and he was plugged and waiting on my couch!"
Barrett made a sound like a bark and slapped his hand over his mouth until he could control it.
"Hunter," Rozanov muttered.
Silence fell. A moment passed.
At full volume again, Rozanov said, "Hunter?"
"Do you know why I haven't come out yet?" Rozanov asked.
"Because everyone's really homophobic?" Barrett tried.
"Because Scott Hunter came out and now it will look like I want to be Scott Hunter!"
There was silence again, but now something was twisting inside Barrett. A need to make sure Rozanov knew that he was, like, a good person or whatever. And that his boyfriend probably knew that the fight didn't mean anything anymore, too. Like, there was no way that you were in love with someone and then they almost died and then you didn't want to have a big conversation with him where you said I love you a bunch of times.
He decided to give it a go.
"I'm sure he knows that you..." Barrett gestured. "Love him. You know? I'm sure he knows that it's fine between you two. And I bet he'll still want to talk."
"You do not even know who he is." Roz's voice was faraway again, despondent.
"Sure," Barrett agreed. "But after all of this, that fight probably feels pretty meaningless to him now, too."
All of this. Yeah. It really was crazy that they almost died. Barrett was doing his best to keep it off his mind, and he was doing a pretty good job of it, too -- putting up a carefree front with Bood helped. Fake it til you make it.
But still. If he let himself think about it for too long, he started to shiver.
Somehow, Rozanov picked up on it. "Hey. We are okay, you know?" he said. He took Barrett's shoulder and gave him a little shake. "I would not let you actually die in a fire like that kid in Lord of the Flies."
"I thought I was the one making you feel better."
"You were the one coming to my fire and bothering me," Roz said. "And asking if I am fucking Scott Hunter."
Time to see himself out. He nodded and stood up. "Gotcha. I'll just --"
"Troy," Rozanov said. Barrett paused, looking down at him. He was no longer passing his phone from one hand to the next so compulsively, but rather holding it. "The rescue will be here tomorrow or the day after. I am fucking famous and they will not let me die either. Would be very bad press."
"Also I am really excellent at catching lobster," Rozanov added. "Did you eat dinner?"
"Good. Now go stare more at Harris' legs and leave me alone." Before Barrett could sputter out something about that, Roz said, "What is the game called? Hackensack?"
"That's a town in New Jersey. It's hacky sack."
"Whatever. I don't care. Go do that. And --" Rozanov's face twisted a bit. He said, as though it was difficult to get out, "Thank you. For checking. He is always telling me, Ilya, you must be nicer, say thank you. So thank you."
Barrett tried to check his smile, and probably failed. "No big."
But who the actual fuck was it, if not Scott Hunter? Barrett thought about that as he picked his way back over to Bood. Untrue though it was, there came the image of Rozanov fucking Scott Hunter regardless. Topping him, apparently. Barrett's mind looped back to the deserted island hockey team porno before he could help himself.
Actually, maybe better if he never found out.
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