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“Hey…uh, dude? Or er- well I guess not but uh-”
“What. Just spit it out already.” Neha ground out in frustration. It was hot. Stupidly hot. She had ditched her sweater and teal shirt a long time ago leaving only her white undershirt sort of hot.
“Your er… your shirt had kind of gone a little see-through.” Tyler said, stubbornly staring ahead slightly red.
See through? She looked down and- fuck. Neha’s face burned in humiliation. She had completely forgotten that she had decided to wear her red one today. But this morning she thought it had made logical sense- they hadn’t been to a cold climate in a while, so she went with the one that matched her sweater, not expecting to take it off. Fuckkkkk. She should have just worn her white one, but it needed washing from all of the consecutive hot and physical challenges that she didn’t want to wear a sweaty bra. She hadn’t packed many either on account of not expecting to have lasted this long.
It was a logical choice at the time. Too bad Neha forgot that this show was anything but logical.
“You can't tell anyone about this,” she groaned, very tempted to just fall off the emu and stay there until she shrivelled up in the stupid sun and the ground absorbed her remaining particles.
Something about her tone caused Tyler to turn and look at her again much to her chagrin. “Woah- hey uh, you don’t need to be embarrassed. Linds has one just like that one.” He squinted at her chest and Neha immediately crossed her arms with a scowl. But of course, Tyler had to be oblivious as he grinned at her. “Yup! I'd recognise that little charm anywhere! Linds definitely has the same bra.” Fucking hell. As if she could get anymore embarrassed by the situation.
Being compared to Lindsay of all people.
Lindsay.
Yeah, Neha wasn’t letting her Amma help her pack anything ever again if this was what she got for it. She was lucky enough that she had brought a spare swimming costume that was more ‘Noah’ friendly instead of the frilly mess her Amma had initially insisted on. “I bet Linds would help you pick out some really cute ones if you asked, since you clearly shop at the same brand! There's this really pretty flowery one that has lace or something like that on it- I think that’s what it's called- but it actually cove-”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” she cut him off. Neha was not going to talk about bras on international television. Let alone with Tyler. “Thanks.”
Then there was silence, sweet silence of which Neha was debating whether or not she should put a layer back on and suffer through the heat to prevent any further embarrassment, or if she should just commit to it and not go through the embarrassment of heatstroke.
Unfortunately, the silence and internal debate didn’t last very long at all seeing as Tyler was apparently in a chatty mood this challenge. Probably just grateful that she didn’t let him carry the alien artifact last challenge, considering how he blew himself up. Well, thankfully, Neha also put a quick stop to that because she wasn’t stupid enough to run blindly through a mine field and managed to grab him fast enough that he was only minorly injured. It’s Tyler she’s talking about here, she was surprised the other two weren’t keeping an eye out for the clumsiest person alive when the challenge called for everyone to be at the finish line to win.
“So, uh… why are you wearing a bra anyways? Is it a crossdressing thing like Chef does where you like dressing like a girl? I know it's actually a pretty common thing in cosplaying- I debated doing it myself actually for this con, but Lindsay suited her so much better so we couple cosplayed instead!” well that was certainly interesting information. “Oh- or is it more of a uhh… what's the word…transvestite?”
“I think you mean transgender, transvestite is another word for a type of crossdresser, but it’s really outdated in some spaces so I wouldn’t throw it around willy nilly if I were you. Unless we’re talking rocky horror picture show.” She liked that movie. “And no- it’s more like the first one. But the other way round.” She cleared her voice up and stopped putting on the ‘Noah’ one, having to cough a bit from her scratchy throat not helped by the heat. “I’m a woman crossdressing as a dude.”
"Woah! You’re like Haruhi!” …what?
“Who?”
“Haruhi! She's a main character in this show I've been watching about a girl who cross-dresses as a guy in a host club to pay off the debt she owes them after breaking a vase. It’s a reverse harem where-” okay, seriously. She expected this kind of thing from Harold but Tyler? …was Tyler an otaku? Damn, and here she thought he was just a one note failed excuse of a jock. Colour her impressed, breaking stereotypes.
“Sure, I’m like Haruhi then.” She doubted it.
He frowned before he lit up like he was remembering something important. “Wait! So is that why you wear a wig?” Neha choked.
“A what?!”
Your wig.” He tilted his head slightly. “You are wearing a wig, aren’t you?”
“Since when did you know I wore a wig.” Neha demanded, absolutely baffled.
“Siii-” he looked up in thought before counting his fingers, “-iiiiince back in island- I think? I didn’t actually notice it, Linds did! She said you were wearing the ‘ugliest looking wig she’d ever seen in her life’ and asked me if she should talk to you about it or buy you a new wig. I just told her that if you’re wearing it, you probably just really liked it, and she said no one would willingly want to wear something like that and it was probably because you had that Alice sounding disease and were bald.” He concluded with a nod.
Alopecia.
Lindsay and Tyler, the dumbest couple on the stupid show, were the only people to notice the fact that she was wearing a wig but they wrote it off as her having alopecia?!?!
It had to be the Twilight Zone. The thought almost made her laugh in hysterics. The next time Heather or Courtney or Alejandro or other any self-proclaimed perceptive and ‘smart’ person on this show tried to gloat she is going to have a very hard time keeping a straight face and not spontaneously combusting into laughter. And maybe she also gained a sliver of respect for Lindsay too, perhaps there was a hint of hope for her intellectually after all.
“Oh! She also said she felt super bad about it because clearly you were too poor to buy a better one, and said she should probably not say anything after all so she doesn’t make you feel any worse about your appearance!! Isn’t she so kind…” …any worse? Wow. Way to cut a girl down. Neha knows she’s not the most physically attractive- too strong of features- but she never thought that she was ugly enough to be pitied.
“Did you know her and Justin are actually planning on making a charity together? It's for poor ugly people who don’t have enough money to be pretty. I mean, I didn’t really get it but Linds said tha-”
“Are you going to tell anyone?” Neha cut him off. She really didn’t want to listen to any more superficial talk. Like seriously, so what if she wasn’t physically attractive- other things were important in life, like intelligence or personality. Even if most guys she met hated when a girl was smarter than them, and most girls she met didn’t like her personality and thought she was a bitch. It'll happen eventually. Once someone can ignore all of her many, many flaws.
“Huh?”
“Are you going to tell anyone about the whole wig and being female thing?”
He hesitated. “I mean um, I’ll try not to?” Intimidation didn’t work on this guy based off of the Duncan thing. Honestly, she didn’t know if she trusted him to keep his mouth shut, especially if he’s anything like Owe-
Well, that gave her an idea.
“Thank you, I can only imagine Lindsay’s reaction.” He managed to keep a secret when Lindsay told him to, so hopefully she wouldn’t mind if Neha uses her name to get him to keep another one. Just like how Owen was better at keeping things to himself when distracted over food.
“What do you mean?” he looked at her in confusion.
“Well, she’s a girl’s girl, right? And she kept the wig thing a secret to help out a fellow girl. Or contestant, but I have a feeling she might have known I was a girl deep down.” Probably not.
“She is smart like that. And got amazing insinuation.”
“Intuition.”
“What was that?”
Neha sighed and waved him off. “Nothing. But I do feel like you’ll be doing her proud, continuing on with Lindsay’s legacy of helping people out and protecting her fellow women.”
“Really? Do you really think so?”
“Of course! You’ll be like… her… knight in shining armour! Carrying out her royal highness's mission. With her favour while she watches you fight for her honour.”
“Like her knight…” he muttered, starting to be convinced.
“Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if the first thing she does after the competition is give you a big fat kiss. On the lips.” She added to seal the deal.
He was clearly imagining it based on the way he his eyes practically hazed over, he goofily grinned and he flushed slightly.
“If you do end up slipping up, though, then it's okay, I get that you've been trying your best.” It’s true. At this point it was literally out of her hands, she had been mentally preparing for it to happen at some point. Doesn’t mean she couldn’t give it a shot to prolong this information until after her elimination, or once the show was long over. “But if Lindsay has that much faith in you then I'm sure I can trust that you can be awesome with this.”
“Hey, of course you can trust me duuuuudette? Dude? What do you prefer? What about your name actually?”
“Just keep calling me Noah, I don’t mind. If you start calling me by my real name then I might start slipping up.” And she didn’t want him slipping up by calling her by her real name in front of everyone.
“Got it! Gotta admit, I thought you were gonna ask for an alliance or something in return. Like you’ve been acting pretty weirdly around me during this season and at first I thought you were flirting but then I tho-”
“Oh my god- I wasn’t flirting with you. No offence, but you’re really not my type.” Neha immediately defended. Who could blame her- the fans jumped to conclusions with the Cody-Island accident, and she did not want a repeat. On another note though, what was up with this season and flirting.
“None taken, I only have eyes for my Linds anyways. So I was figuring that I would’ve had to let you down somehow and I went to Owen about it but he actually told me that you were actually interested in A-” he froze, “nothing. He told me absolutely nothing.” Neha didn’t believe him, but she was not going to open Pandora's box here. Owen could be a bit delusional at times.
“Riiiight. I'm sure he didn’t.” Neha paused before deciding to admit the truth, it wasn’t like any of this could get any more embarrassing. “Gonna be honest here, but I was actually trying to be your friend.”
“Wait, really?”
“Yeah man, you seem pretty cool.” She shrugged. “Obviously we’re on the same team, and with Owen and Izzy I didn’t really befriend them, they more so just… nabbed me I guess? Anyways, I told myself that I wanted to actually make a friend on my own.”
“Why me then?” He looked absolutely baffled which made Neha question just how bad this guy’s self-esteem was.
“You’re a safe guy; I’m not surprised that Lindsay likes you so much.” She shrugged. Again. “Hell, I’m sure you’ve noticed it yourself. How barely any of the guys respect the girls here as people? Especially your girlfriend. Compared to them you’re literally a Godsend.”
Tyler frowned, “… I don’t really like when they do that to her. Insult her to her face and behind her back or say she’s only good for her looks.”
“Exactly. And hey, at least you stand up for her and don’t objectify her.”
“Huh?”
“You don’t treat her like an object because of her appearance. You don’t only like her for her looks.” Neha explained.
Tyler actually looked offended. “What? Of course not! Of course she’s super pretty, but she’s also really kind, funny, smart, and just really awesome!”
“Which is why I'm sure Lindsay likes you so much, I think you might actually be soulmates.” If they even existed, though she supposes the two are probably the closest thing to evidence that it does.
“Aww, dud- er Noah- that’s really nice of you!”
“Yeah, it’s easily why I’m more comfortable around you then the other guys. Especially with everything that has been going on. The stuff they’ve been saying about women are genuinely disgusting.”
“Yeah…I don’t like it either…but Al said it’s just for the competition, that if we don’t go along with Duncan then he might lash out. Especially since I exposed him… and Duncan is feeling a bit emotional? He seemed friendly enough after and didn’t try to kill me.”
“It might be just for the competition.” She nodded. “I doubt they meant anything bad about it,” that’s a lie, she was certain they knew what they were doing, “but it doesn’t make it okay. I mean, you didn’t really join in with them, did you? And you were just doing what you thought was right in Greece. Granted you should have told Courtney in private but I get it, you were just repaying a favour you owed from Alejandro.”
“Woah, how did you know that?”
“I overheard, you two weren’t exactly quiet. Speaking of though, between you and Alejandro as the only other guys it was an easy choice of who I’d rather be friends with.”
“Huh? Why me? Alejandro is so much cooler.” …didn’t he literally already ask this? And didn’t Neha also already answer it?
“You’re devoted enough to Lindsay that I knew you wouldn't hit on me.” She stated plainly.
“But Alejandro wou…dn..t. Well, uh, I'm sure if you asked him to, he wouldn’t!” Tyler defended.
“Well, so far he hasn’t really had the best track record of not flirting with someone who doesn’t want to, has he?” She deadpanned. “He’s literally doing it with Heather now too, despite her constantly rejecting him. Even if she’s clearly into him. Hell, his and Duncan’s entire plan- you know, the one you actually objected to- is to mess with both Heather and Courtney. Which is unfair since Courtney isn’t thinking straight already, it's why she took his advice to flirt with you last challenge.”
“Al told her to?” he frowned in utter disbelief. “That can't be right…”
Neha sighed and decided to take a more digestible stance on this so that he didn’t start not believing her at all since she supposed from his POV, Alejandro really hadn’t done anything wrong. “He probably didn’t mean anything bad about it, he might have just thought that you would be the safest guy for her to flirt with since you wouldn’t try to date her. But it is a bit weird that he’s flirting with and encouraging flirting with people who are either in relationships or say they don’t want people flirting with them.” There, he should get it now.
“Oh! You think he keeps chasing after people who are taken or not interested in him?” she thinks he’s a man whore who can’t keep his slippery hands to himself, but whatever will get Tyler on the right track. “That would explain a lot! Like why he looks uncomfortable whenever they flirted back, and why he always looks super relieved after they’re gone! Wait- is that why he was flirting with you before London? Cause now that I think about it, I think he was flirting with you!” Okay, so he didn’t get it and was nearly delusional. Great.
“He wasn’t flirting with me.” Neha immediately denied. “He was just trying to befriend me, that was all.” Manipulate was more right, why else was he acting so friendly to her? especially since he was using a similar (though he didn’t shit-talk with any of the other contestants, did he?) tactic on all of the other contestants.
“Oh. If you're so sure… but I don’t really think he’s doing it to be mean- he’s definitely a good guy at heart!”
“I don’t doubt that Alejandro is a good person.” She does. But neither is she so whoopty-doo, she had no place to judge. “And I know he’s a really good friend with the guys. But he hasn’t been respecting any of the girls’ boundaries.” Look, Neha wouldn’t admit it out loud, but she was unnerved about what might happen if he found out she’s a girl. If he treated her any differently purely because of what was between her legs. She’s unnerved by what Duncan would do, considering he had already made advances on the girls on Team Amazon. Plus she had pissed him off at multiple points in the past and Duncan’s favourite hobby was finding ways to humiliate people who pissed him off.
“Like the way they were behaving this challenge….the plan to play with girls emotions just to throw them off. Girls who have been victims.” Time to really hit the nail in the head. “It's kind of… uncomfortable knowing I've gotta sleep around those kinds of people…” she admitted. Because it was, she was at a vulnerable point of having pissed them both off when they're both petty people. Granted, so was she, but they had one thing Neha lacked- any kind of physical strength. She was really starting to wish that Owen hadn’t taken the dive for her in London.
“Noah?” Tyler frowned, but honestly, Neha kind of needed to rant this out and who better to then the guy who’d probably forget all about it in a couple of minutes.
“Like realistically, I’m the weakest person on the team, you saw me in Greece. And my only friends, the only people who would even bother to defend me,” because her personality was hard to digest and she’s been on the wrong side of basically every person in the competition at some point thanks to her chronic ‘can't keep her mouth shut’ disorder, “aren’t here with me. I know I don’t admit it enough, but I do rely on them. They’re the only people who can actually stand my shitty personality.” Then she muttered out, barely audible, “plus they make me feel safe.” For varying reasons, no one would dare cross Eva, Izzy or Owen. It kind of gave her blanket protection from any physical retaliation for her comments.
“Hey uh, it’s okay. I’ll protect you okay! We’re friends now, yeah- I’ll stick by your side. I’ll even show you that you can trust Alejandro too!”
“I really hope you do,” Neha sighed with a small smile because she didn’t know what else she was expecting from him.
Well, there was another reason too, the fact that his declaration at the end was perfect for her actually. It gave her the perfect opportunity to get him to see Alejandro’s true nature without any backlash being put on her. Because Tyler is going to be looking closer at his actions now to try and prove to her he’s a good person, he won't be able to ignore any of what he does.
And if Alejandro wanted to continue focusing on sewing discord on the other team with his blatantly obvious plays? Well then she wasn’t going to stop him. Not when it gives Neha the perfect opportunity to sneak into his unprotected henhouse unnoticed and wreck her own havoc by setting all the chickens free. She’ll turn them against him slowly and give him a real challenge since that was clearly what he wanted. Heather was not a challenge- she was too predictable, too simple. Can't look at the bigger picture, none of them can.
Neha will become the most influential person on the team, so Alejandro will need to keep in line and stop his pathetic excuses of schemes and manipulating the naïve (it was cheap and tacky) to ensure his own survival in the game. Not that he would actually be eliminated of course, Neha wasn’t stupid. He was currently Chris’ prized pig, the key to his precious season, so of course he was going to stay in the game. Hell, Neha was more than willing to bet that any future challenges that have Alejandro on the running for elimination would turn into a reward challenge. Especially if Chris’ treatment of Team Amazon the past season was to go by.
Seriously though, they haven’t had a single elimination yet despite the team losing four challenges (including London, a challenge they should have won but noooooo, precious Heather would have been eliminated). So that meant that Heather had consistently avoided elimination, Cody hadn’t been eliminated despite not singing for god knows how many challenges when they all had to, Sierra had been able to get away with her genuinely unsettling behaviour, and Gwen also avoided elimination last challenge because she’s the current source of drama. Courtney got a pass for now considering what happened, but one could claim that it was unfair that she won a challenge after not passing the officially set goal of the challenge and even got her boyfriend back in the competition.
It all screamed favouritism.
Neha didn’t like it.
So yeah, she’s going to monopolise the team and take great pleasure in watching the others break away from their labels and roles. She plans to bathe in the euphoria of knocking the first domino down to perverse Chris’ empire of a show. She’ll revel in ecstasy when the realisation pools in those stupidly bright green eyes as it finally hits the eel just how fruitless his actions have been all along- how he was focusing on the wrong person all along.
Neha wondered how far he’d go for the sake of survival and winning, how far he would believe a little white lie, how far she could flip the script in the other direction for something that in the end would essentially be meaningless. Fighting tooth and nail for a place that was already carved out for him because while she can't actually get him eliminated, it doesn’t mean that he knows that.
Neha was going to pull the mother of all tantrums.