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Roslyn

Mate Match Transcript: S24 E5 INTERVIEW 7

Contestant: Roslyn|Producer: Sella

S: Roslyn, I have to say, you and Zandrel seem like you’ve been having a great few days

R: Yeah. We, uh, we’ve really been enjoying our time here.

S: I bet you have been. Can you tell me what you’re most looking forward to this week?

R: Umm, more of the same, I guess?

S: [laughs] Well, I can pretty confidently say it won’t all be the same this week.

R: What does that mean?

S: I can’t spoil the surprise, but I promise it’ll be great for you and Zandrel.

R: That sounds… awesome.

Our luck runs out two days later.

It starts in the morning, with Sella showing up bright and early at the bungalow.

Zan and I make a mad dash to put the living space back in order. We toss the pillow and blankets he’s been using on the couch into the bedroom, make sure all his comms gear is hidden, and by the time I open the door, I’m flushed and flustered.

Which, I guess is alright, because Sella gives me a wide, knowing grin, and I’m not about to correct her assumptions about what we were just up to.

“Big day today!” she says, sweeping in with gusto and waving a wardrobe assistant in behind her.

“Is it?” I mutter around a jaw held tight with anxiety when I spy a half-dozen new, no doubt expensive and ostentatious, dresses in their arms.

“Yes!” She directs the assistant to put the dresses in the bedroom, glancing into the room with another little satisfied smile at what a mess the bed is.

Fine. Let her think Zan and I are destroying the place. All the better for our performance.

“Sit,” she says to both of us, standing on one side of the wide kitchen island as we reluctantly drop into stools on the other.

“Production is out filming a couple of dates today, but they’re hosting a big bonfire tonight for all the contestants.”

“And?” Zandrel asks, surly and unamused, as always.

I have to hide my smile, even as I give him a nudge with my knee under the counter. A little reminder to get in the game.

“And,” Sella says, undaunted, “this is the perfect opportunity for the two of you to show the universe how your love story has been progressing. Get in front of the cameras. Give your audience something to swoon over.”

Gag.

I keep my face carefully neutral, but apparently Zan’s in a mood this morning.

“Would they not prefer us to be genuine rather than put on an act?”

Rich, truly, coming from him, but again I remain silent.

Sella, to her credit, doesn’t let her sunny smile slip an inch. “Marva would also like to see a little more from you both. As we approach the midpoint of production, we like to hone in on our main love stories for the season and really give the audience a chance to connect. For you two, we need to see more of that passion you had in the beginning. Let the audience see it, give them something to root for.”

There it is.

I like Sella, I really do, but she’s got a show to produce and a boss to impress and it’s probably good we’re getting that reminder.

Even if it also means my chest tightens, my stomach rolls, and that old familiar panic creeps in at the corners of my mind, chipping slowly away at the walls I’ve built against it.

Beneath the counter, Zan returns the nudge I gave him earlier.

An anchor point. A recognition that we’re still in this together.

Sella gives us a few more reminders about the bonfire tonight, suggestions for wardrobe, a brief pep talk on how wonderful it’ll be for us, and then she’s off in her trademark swirl of enthusiasm.

The silence in the bungalow as the door shuts behind her is absolute. Heavy, stifling, enough to have me nearly ready to jump out of my skin.

Okay.

Okay.

This is okay.

Breathe in, then out.

This is what we signed up for, and compared to plotting to steal one of the crew’s hovers and brave the Eritin wilderness, this is no big deal. Easy peasy. Just me and Zan convincing a whole universe full of viewers that we’re completely, utterly, madly in love.

And we have been, haven’t we?

We’ve been… better, these last few days. Pretending like we can actually tolerate each other. No, scratch that, we’ve been tolerating each other. We’ve almost been… friends.

Now we’ve just got to figure out everything else.

Which shouldn’t be a problem. It won’t be a problem. We were fine with it before, the physical side of things. True, it felt more like fighting than kissing, but we can figure it out again.

Only…

I look over at Zan, who’s stood from the island and walked over to stare out the front window, watching Sella’s retreating figure. My stomach does a strange little flip, something that feels like it’s falling and shooting up into my throat all at the same time.

Why did the prospect of everything else feel so much less daunting before?

Now that we’ve called our truce, now that we’re not constantly bickering, now that we’ve found this strange sort of trust between us, why does the thought of being physical with him feel so… different?

Like he can sense the clamor of those thoughts, Zan glances over his shoulder. When he sees my expression, his brow furrows, and he turns to face me fully.

“Something wrong?”

I shake my head. “No. Nope. Everything’s a-okay.”

He crosses the room to stand in front of me, and I can’t help the way my breath catches, the way a shock of awareness runs all the way through me at the continued reminder of… him. How tall he is, how broad, how much easier it might be if I still saw him as nothing more than an enemy to outwit, a massive headache, my nemesis.

Zan rests his hands on my shoulders. “We knew this was coming.”

The touch eases some of my anxiety, even if it makes me more painfully aware of his proximity, more awkwardly uncertain of how to handle this part of being… whatever we are now.

Still, I’ve got to get it the fuck together.

We’ve got a production crew to fool, and audience to appease, so I take a calming breath.

“We did.”

“And we’re still doing just fine. I watch staff chatter on their internal comms systems, and aside from a few snide remarks—”

“About what? Us? Is it about the whole combat training thing? Because I swear to god, I’ll—”

“Roslyn,” he says, firmly. “Focus.”

“Right. Sorry. Focusing.”

“What I’m trying to say is, we’re fine. We’ll get through tonight. We’ll put on a show, give the cameras what they want. We’ll get through it.”

“Put on a show,” I say slowly, thinking back to all those lackluster, chaste kisses we’ve been sharing.

My eyes fall from Zan’s and land on his lips, the column of his throat. Lower. Across acres and acres of muscled, intimidating male that—until we decided to stop hating each other—I was perfectly content to climb all over in the name of giving the cameras something juicy to capture.

Zan drops his hands and takes a step away, and the bottom falls out of my stomach in a plummeting whoosh .

I still don’t know what’s going on with him, with us, with the whole vibe between us, and I have no idea how to get us back to something like we were before.

Maybe there is no going back. Or, maybe I’d have to hate him again to feel that kind of chemistry, that kind of ‘fuck it we’re doing this’ abandon that made it so easy to throw myself against him, run my teeth over his lip, bury my hands in his thick black hair and—

“Right,” Zan says, snapping me out of those thoughts and stopping the low, insistent heat just starting to spread through my veins in its tracks. “So. Beach day today. Bonfire tonight. Figuring out our next move just as soon as we can.”

“Right.”

A few heartbeats pass. Zan stares down at me, silver sparks wheeling in the deep black of his eyes. His jaw ticks, and I almost think he’s about to say something.

Maybe he feels this, too.

This terrible tension, the elephant in the room.

If he does, I hope he’s got some idea how to fix it, because I haven’t got a damn clue.

But the moment passes, and, like a coward, I retreat into my room to get ready for the day without saying a single damn word about it.

Early in the evening, we head back to the bungalow to get cleaned up before the bonfire. The new dresses are waiting in the bedroom, a reminder about our turn on center stage tonight.

It’s going to be fine.

We’ll be fine.

We’ve made it this far, and we’ll make it the rest of the way.

Even if this afternoon didn’t do a whole hell of a lot to perk up our physical chemistry.

And it’s not even all my fault.

I’m an awkward mess, sure, but Zan doesn’t seem to be having any easier a time with it. We’re both a mess, clumsy and uncertain, navigating this new set of circumstances between us.

But the bonfire’s still on, and we’ve only got an hour before we’re expected to arrive and step back into whatever spotlight’s waiting for us.

Finishing up in the shower, I wrap a robe around myself and walk through the bedroom to poke my head out the door into the living space. Zan’s at the island, eyes narrowed as he studies something on his ever-present comms screen.

“You’re up,” I tell him, nodding toward the bathroom door.

It’s the one concession I’ve made on space, letting him in to shower in the bungalow’s main bathroom. There’s a small half-bath in the living space, and an outdoor shower around back to clean off from the beach, but it seemed like a real jerk move to gatekeep the luxury bathroom indoors.

I might still be making him sleep on the couch, but I’m not entirely without mercy.

Zan gives me a curt nod, eyes fixed somewhere over my shoulder as he stands, crosses the room, and disappears inside the bathroom.

I walk to the dresser and let my robe drop, opening the top drawer and perusing the selection of ridiculous, skimpy little underthings. Apparently production thought even my underwear needed an upgrade, because they spared no detail in the wardrobe department. Sifting through the pile, I’m just about to pull out a set in nude lace—perfect for the flowy cream-colored dress I’m planning to wear tonight—when a noise catches my attention.

A faint click sounds from behind me, and it takes a second to realize what it is.

The handle on the bathroom door.

Whirling around, I find Zan in the doorway, hands raised and mouth hanging open.

“Sorry,” he chokes out. “I didn’t mean to—I forgot my—I was just going to…”

Giving his head a hard shake, he retreats into the bathroom and hastily shuts the door behind him.

I’m frozen where I stand.

Sun streams in the open window, a faint ocean breeze breaks over my bare skin, and the crash of waves on the shore sounds somewhere far in the background, but I’m barely aware of any of it. At least not over the pounding in my ears and the uncomfortable buzzing sensation spreading across my skin.

Zan just saw me naked.

Every inch of me.

Including my scars.

It’s that last fact that finally pierces through the numb haze of shock. My stomach drops. How much did he see? How good a look did he get at all the ink-covered burn scars on my back and shoulder?

The scars I’ve been studiously covering since I stepped on this beach.

The scars I haven’t told anyone about.

The scars I’m not even certain I’ve wrapped my own mind around.

He saw all of it.

As my senses return, I’m aware of the shower starting up, and hastily pull on my underwear and toss the dress on over it. I try to ignore the shaking in my hands and the way the silky smooth material feels like sandpaper on my skin, try to breathe, try to convince myself that maybe it all happened too fast. Maybe he didn’t see anything. Maybe he won’t mention it. Maybe…

Letting out a long, shaking breath, I leave the bedroom and plant myself on a seat at the kitchen island to wait.