Somewhere, floating out there in the universe, Drew’s spirit is cackling. This is his revenge on Marcos and me for spying on his private love session. Eight gawping faces stare back at us, two shirtless boys in the most vulnerable moment of our lives. Mud stains track across Molly’s dampened shirt, while at her side leans a tree branch taller than she is; the branch’s greenish hue ends abruptly at a bare, blond tip that has been sharpened into a spearhead. I spy three more spears scattered among the crowd, but their owners’ faces don’t register—I’m too hot with embarrassment.

“We’ve been standing here for a minute,” Molly admits. “Sorry.”

“What did you see?” I accuse. Before any of the stunned onlookers can reply, Marcos blurts, “NOTHING!” and his warm fingers depart violently from my waist. As he bolts toward our shirts piled in the corner, a piece of my heart cracks off like a chip in a coffee mug. So, this is what it felt like for Ario when I pushed him away? I deflate at the possibility that it’s my cosmic punishment for Marcos to drop me like a pan of scalding oil; that the oasis I’ve been luxuriating in has been a cruel illusion, now meeting reality dead in the face. I glare at Molly, my disappointment pivoting to rage: “Why didn’t you say something?! JESUS. Is there nowhere on this island where people don’t invade your privacy left and right?”

“There wasn’t a good time to speak up,” she replies, agitated. “Your backs were to us, and it looked like you were crying. Anyway, here we are, at the waterfall, on time, as planned, as you should have expected.”

Of course, Marcos and I knew we were meeting the group around sunset, but I figured we would’ve at least heard them coming. Sadly, Karaoke Bill said it best: queers sneak around, padding silently as cats.

While I shield my bare chest like an actress caught without her top on in a sex comedy, Marcos collects our shirts. He chucks me mine so powerfully, it might’ve been shot out of a cannon. I slip the shirt over my head, but giggling erupts as it unfurls past my waist like a flag and my arms disappear inside wide, drooping sleeves. Marcos tossed me his by accident. He has my small one crammed halfway to his tummy by the time he realizes his mistake. I admire how adorably trapped he is, his arms squeezed into my sleeves, but the fun is short-lived. Beyond irritated, he growls and scrambles his way out of the fabric prison.

I can’t help dreading that the object of his agitation is me. I slide Marcos’s shirt over my head, intoxicated one final time by his unique musk. Who knows if I’ll ever get close enough to smell him again?