Page 89 of Beach Bodies

I brought Daniel to the Riovan.

My plea for help drew the attention of the man who has the power to undo me.

The irony is not lost on me.

We rattle down the runway, and when we take off I can feel the emotion held tight in my chest as I watch the island slide away, just as the sun is rising.

Here I am, soaring away from what I’ve done.

Not that it won’t follow me. The first episode of Daniel’s new season is dropping tomorrow, according to the website.

I crane to see Saint Lisieux until it’s out of sight, which doesn’t take long. It’s a small island in a large ocean, in an even larger world. Like my life– a speck, when you stop to think about it.

The airplane ride back is nothing like the ride here.

On the way to Saint Lisieux, I was fizzing like a shaken soda can, ready to burst.

Now, I’m contemplative. Present. Sober. I don’t know what I’m going to do yet; what’s going to happen to my life. But that’s OK, because it’s not my move. It’s Daniel’s move. And until someone stops me, I’m moving forward.

I pull out my phone and pay the surcharge for inflight wifi. A few taps of my fingers, and I’ve pulled upWho Killed Me?, Season One. Might as well catch-up.

I pop in my earbuds and press play onEpisode One: The Death of Sammi Jones.

Immediately, Daniel’s voice washes through me. It feels like he’s right next to me, telling me the story of Sammi’s tragically shortened life over drinks. As I eat my salted nuts and sip my wine and choose between the vegetarian lasagne and the chicken Vesuvio for my meal, I lose my gaze out of the window and allow Daniel’s voice to fill my senses. One episode melds into another, and during my layover in Miami, I just keep on going. I don’t want to stop being with Daniel in this way, his voice nestled in my ear, unravelling chaos into one smooth story. I can see why my friends are into this, after all. It’s not so much the lurid voyeurism involved in true crimethat makes this so enjoyable. No– it’s scratching the same itch that makes me enjoy completing a puzzle. Order from chaos. Finding a reason for the shit that happens.

Whatever happens to him, to me, I love that he knows the truth about me now– or most of it. There’s one part I didn’t tell him. Should I have? Who knows– maybe he could have helped me see the order in the chaos. But I held back, because I always hold back; of all the sources of pain in my life, this is the greatest, and most days, I can hardly bear to face it myself.

It almost makes me wish I’d told Daniel my one, final secret about Jess.

Because it’s always about Jess.

Chapter Thirty

By the time I unlock the door to my apartment, I’ve listened to all of Season One, and I have only myself and the silence and the stale air.

It was good. So fucking good, the way Daniel wove all the stories together– the way you felt his genuine care and investment, and the thrill of just how far he was willing to go to get the truth.

Sammi Jones, the subject of Season One, died during the pandemic, but even though the doctors classified it as a COVID-related death, her parents insisted she never had COVID. Enter Daniel, who had come across her story on Twitter. He started by interviewing Sammi’s parents, then went through all of the medical records her parents could get their hands on. Long story short, it turned out that during the supply chain crisis, an ice cream manufacturer couldn’t get hold of a crucial ingredient and made a formula switch behind the scenes to keep production going. The replacement ingredient contained a little-known allergen, which the company did not disclose on the label. Sammi had a reaction, and died from complications to her lungs.

The last episode was a tour de force. Daniel went undercover at the plant where the ingredient substitution had taken place, exposing the people who had covered up the formula change and forged the Quality Assurance documents. Thanks to Daniel’s research, Sammi’s parents were able to sue the company and were granted two million dollars in damages. I googled the company in question, Cold & Sweet, and– they’re out of business.

I feel irrationally proud of him.

First, I open the apartment’s sticky windows, bringing in the noise of the traffic and the merest bit of a breeze. It’s a hot day, and soon I’m sweating, but at least the air is circulating again. It’s humid, and the parquet floors are tacky underfoot. I turn on the ceiling fan, strip down to a crop top and shorts, then dump the contents of my luggage directly into the in-unit washing machine.

As I move about unpacking other odds and ends, including my unfinished copy ofCrime and Punishmentwhich I toss on the coffee table, I can feel the aftertaste of the podcast lingering like a good wine.

I move the clothes from the washer to the dryer. I pull out a frozen meal of rice pilaf and chicken and heat it up for the required two minutes, then stir, then two more minutes. I barely taste it; I’m too lost in my thoughts. I know I’m existing in a liminal space right now. A small parenthesis. Then, I lie in bed and stare at the ceiling and wait for midnight, when Episode One of my season will drop.

*

The season unfurls as I return to normal life, with one episode released each week. I imagine Daniel is back in the Statesnow, editing his material and piecing together the best way to tell the story. I don’t contact him, and he doesn’t contact me, though I sometimes pull up his WhatsApp number and let my thumb hover, for no reason.

I go out with my friends one Saturday night in the middle of August. We start the evening at Olé Mi Arte, a new small plates farm-to-table restaurant. From there, the plan is to hit the clubs, at which point I will quietly bow out and Uber home.

‘How was your island dream job?’ Nate teases as we convene outside the restaurant in our fit-to-kill garb, and I pretend to laugh.

It’s after placing our order that Rachel pipes up, ‘Um, weird coincidence, Lil, but did you hear about all these deaths that have apparently been going down at the Riovan?’

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