Surprise!, Part 6

Mark gave Andy a firm squeeze on the shoulder, then shifted back into Mary and melted into the crowd, with Ellen and the mechanical ASTRID trailing behind, heading in Tracy’s general direction. Then, Claire headed determinedly towards the foyer, gesturing for Andy to follow.

The foyer was a pressure chamber of air conditioning and party echo. The doors to the ballroom stood propped open, sound ricocheting off marble and muted by the ornamental ficuses. Claire led Andy halfway down the tiled runway before stopping, her back ramrod straight, tail swishing in a measured arc as she assessed the landing site.

For half a minute, the foyer was all hush and high-gloss marble, the kind of space where people went to recalibrate before diving back into the party. Andy waited, hands in his pockets, while Claire did a full body-scan of the entry. Her ears, more pronounced than usual, twitched twice—a tell he’d learned meant “big news incoming” rather than “there’s a lizard on the ceiling.”

The outer doors, for all their drama, muffled sound so well that Andy didn’t notice the approach until the first guest approached, and the glass whuffed open silently.

Four figures entered in a close clump, all blinking rapidly and moving as if the floor might shift beneath them. The first—a man, late twenties, of the sort-of-handsome-if-he-tried variety—wore a black suit that looked excellently made, the sleeves perfectly tailored, but his hair was too casual for the event. He hesitated inside the threshold, eyes flicking from chandelier to check-in stand to Andy, doing a full threat assessment in less than a second.

The man’s suit said lawyer, but his eyes said deer in headlights. He was followed by three women who could not have been more different if they'd been assembled in a casting office on opposite sides of the country. The first, small and sharp, wore a tailored forest-green dress that did not hide her brown cat tail or the matching brown cat ears set neatly into her hair. She was a head shorter than the man and moved with the posture of someone who had learned to weaponize smallness—every stride precise, deliberate, zero wasted motion.

Next came a curvy woman with straight blue hair down to her butt, arms tanned, a short-sleeved, long-skirted dress barely containing her, and despite her apparent softness, the air of a minor-league pitcher, all **** and snap.

The third woman trailed by half a pace, moving with a hesitation that contrasted with the others' forward energy: red hair in pigtails, a pale dress with a high neck and long sleeves, the kind of modesty that dared you to find a flaw in it. Her green eyes were huge, and she held her hands together in a way that suggested she was either about to pray, or needed to.

They looked around. The party was not what they expected; Andy could see it in the way the man’s mouth dropped a quarter inch and stayed there, and in the way all three women blinked in unison at the flashes of color, skin, and chaos pouring out of the ballroom.

There was a brief, awkward moment where both sides just stared, caught in the mutual uncertainty of whether someone had made a mistake in the RSVP.

It was the man who broke, striding forward with a hand outstretched and a smile that was two parts “pleased to meet you” and one part “please tell me I’m not hallucinating.” “You’re Andy Cooper, right?” he said.

Andy shook his hand. “I am. Welcome…?” He trailed off, hoping the man would supply the needed noun.

“Uh… Nick Reynolds,” the man said, holding onto Andy’s hand just long enough to make it a challenge. “This is Dawn, Dani, and my wife, Mary.” He pronounced the last with an extra squeeze, like an anchor in a storm.

Dawn and Dani both nodded, still clearly trying to come to terms with the party. Dawn’s eyes flicked between Andy and Claire, measuring, calculating, then coming to a rest on Claire’s cat ears with visible befuddlement. Dani gave Andy a thumbs-up and said, “Nice jacket,” then looked past him at the commotion behind the glass.

Mary just smiled, kind and cautious. “Nice… nice to meet you,” she offered. Her eyes didn’t leave Andy’s face, though Andy noticed her glancing at Claire’s tail, then at Dawn’s, as if comparing operating systems.

For a second, Andy wondered if he was supposed to know them. The name “Nick Reynolds” rattled around his head for a second, bumping into dead-ends and not finding purchase. He shot Claire a quick glance: Help?

Claire, who had been standing at rigid attention, sprang into motion. She opened her notebook and flipped three pages in, holding it up with both hands so everyone could read at once. The handwriting was clinical, precise, a little too big—probably for the benefit of people reading from a few feet away.

It read:

Hello, Nick, Dawn, Dani, and Mary.

You are not in the wrong place. This is a “joint set event,” as per my invitation duly sent to the Host of the Island Vacation season.

If you are confused, that is okay. This is the Harem Hotel, but not your version of it. You are guests today, not contestants. You are safe and under Arabella’s protection for the evening. Arabella said some of your transformations have been suppressed to make you feel more at ease.

I contacted your Host directly and asked for your attendance. Nick, I thought you and Andy might want to meet, as there are many similarities between you and him, and also between myself and Dawn, and Dani and Sam, one of the other Contestants in our season. Please don’t be alarmed by transformations or the degree of casual nudity. It is normal for this set as well as some others.

If you have questions, ask me or Andy. I am Claire.

The next page had a diagram of the ballroom, complete with seating chart, drink stations, and a “Safe Zone” annotated in highlighter. Andy had never seen a more thorough briefing. Nick read the notebook, his brows knitting tighter, then relaxed by degrees as he parsed each point. “So… this is Andy’s set.”

Claire gave a single, precise nod.

Nick exhaled, the tension draining from his neck. “Okay. Good. I mean, I thought maybe…” He looked at Dawn, as if she’d be the one to confirm or deny his reality. “We thought we were supposed to meet someone else here? For a high school reunion. That’s what we were told.”

Dani elbowed him, hard, but said nothing. She was already scanning the crowd, eyes puzzled when she spotted Sam near the bar.

Mary, for her part, was taking it all in, calm but visibly cautious. She spotted several naked women immediately—Erin, mid-conversation and utterly unselfconscious; Emily, whose hair somehow covered every strategic inch while moving; and Skye, the drow from Harper’s set, who hadn’t bothered with clothing at all, other than her rope bra. Mary’s face flushed, but she held her composure and nodded to each one with gentle courtesy. Andy studied her surreptitiously. Why did she look familiar?

Claire flipped another page and presented it. This one had a more narrative explanation, each bullet point ticked with a tiny paw-print sticker:

• Nick and Andy: both lost their childhood best friend in a river accident; both never fully recovered and spent the rest of their lives in a trauma loop.
• Both are currently leading Harem Hotel seasons with identical numbers of active contestants.
• Dawn and Claire: both catgirls, both socially awkward and highly intelligent.
• Dani and Sam: both lesbian, both serving as emotional support for the Master, both underrated in their respective seasons.

Dawn read the whole thing, then looked up at Claire and said, “That’s a little on the nose, isn’t it?” Her voice was edged. “Are you saying we’re… what, duplicates?”

Claire took her notebook back and wrote, quickly:

Not duplicates. Narrative echoes. I speculate that the Producers recycle emotional patterns to optimize drama and engagement. We are not you. But the similarities are interesting and potentially useful.

Andy watched this exchange in awe. Dani was now looking over Claire’s shoulder, reading the notes upside-down. “So if I’m reading this right,” she said, “this is like a crossover event.”

Claire gave her a thumbs-up.

Andy cleared his throat, attempting to reassert some control over the conversation. “You’re all welcome,” he said. “Sorry we didn’t have time to roll out the red carpet. This was a surprise for me as well, and sometimes things move fast.”

Nick shook his head. “No, this is great. It’s just… I guess I never thought I’d see another set, you know? And it’s weird.” He shot a glance at the ballroom, where Norah was arguing with Tracy, who was waving a drink held in her chrome arm. “Really weird. Feels like… like a fever dream.”

Dawn stepped forward, tail flicking with calculated impatience. “So what happens now? Do we just… mingle?”

Claire wrote:

If you want. Or you can take some time to adjust. There is no expectation. If you need a companion to help you process, I volunteer.

Dawn read this, then looked at Nick and Dani, then at Claire again. “I’ll take you up on that,” she said.

They peeled off, Dawn talking in low tones. Dani immediately beelined for the bar, where Sam was deep in conversation with Marissa and had not yet noticed her. Mary trailed after Dani, but paused to offer Andy a small, steady handshake. Her palm was cool and dry, her grip stronger than he expected.

“Thank you for having us,” Mary said. Her voice was soft but confident. “I know it must be strange to have strangers show up at your birthday party.”

Andy shook his head. “Honestly, it’s not even the weirdest thing that’s happened tonight.” He gestured to the noise and motion inside. “You’re in good company.”

Mary smiled, her cheeks dimpled. “I’m glad,” she said. “I hope it’s okay if I just… observe for a while?”

“Please,” Andy said. “Make yourself at home.”

She nodded, then drifted after Dani, but not before giving him one more searching look.

Andy leaned against the wall, exhaled, and tried to process what had just happened. He’d started the day thinking his life was unique—tragic, sure, but at least unrepeatable. Now he realized that not only was he not the only person living out this pattern, but that someone else had built a life from the same raw materials. He wondered if Nick would want to talk about it, or if, like him, Nick needed a buffer of distraction and laughter before he could risk digging too deep.

He watched the four of them as they adjusted: Nick took a lap around the foyer, hands in pockets, a low whistle under his breath as he catalogued the sights; Dawn and Claire sat on a bench, already deep in the kind of conversation that didn’t need small talk; Dani found Sam, and within two minutes they were high-fiving and mocking each other’s drinks, as if they’d been friends for years; and Mary hovered near the drinks table, every so often checking on the other three, but mostly watching the room as if looking for somewhere she might be needed.

The sense of symmetry was almost overwhelming. Andy felt a little lighter, somehow, knowing he wasn’t alone in his weird orbit. He wondered if it was possible to be both a main character and a background extra in someone else’s story at the same time.

---

When Andy re-entered the Hall, he found Nick standing just inside the ballroom, shoulders hunched and hands shoved deep into his suit pockets, eyes darting around as if waiting for a prank to reveal itself. Andy sidled up and, after a moment, matched his stance: not quite facing the party, not quite turning away, both of them keeping one eye on the exits.

“You want to get some air?” Andy asked. Nick shrugged, the universal sign for “I don’t know what else to do,” and together they wandered toward a side corridor lined with wall sconces and fluted glass. Here, the noise of the party faded, replaced by the muted thrum of the building’s hidden machinery. They found a spot by a window overlooking the moonlit lagoon. The glass was cold, and Nick pressed his forehead to it for a beat before stepping back and folding his arms.

For a minute, neither spoke. Andy was content to let the silence stretch, but Nick finally broke it with a low, embarrassed laugh.

“I… thought it was a joke,” he said. “The high school reunion. When has… our Host… ever really cared what happened outside the island? I didn’t think it’d be…” He gestured at the wall, as if all the bodies and transformations could be summed up with a single handwave.

“It never is what you think,” Andy said.

Nick nodded, eyes still fixed on the distant water. “So you’re the Master of this season?”

Andy smiled. “Yeah, technically.” He glanced at Nick, then at the reflection of the ballroom in the glass. “You too, right?”

Nick grunted, a sound that could have meant yes or don’t remind me. After a second, he said, “I met some other Masters and a whole lot of Hosts when I got married. But this is the first time I go to another set. It’s weird, isn’t it?”

Andy leaned back, feeling the bite of the windowsill against his hips. “It gets less weird, but it never gets normal.”

Nick’s lips quirked. “Story of my life.” He fidgeted with a loose thread at his cuff, then said, “Claire said we were a matched set. What did she mean when…” He trailed off.

Andy nodded. “Yeah. I’m not going to lie, I’m curious too.”

Nick let the words hang, then, after a long pause, he said, “So. What happened with you? I mean—before all this.” He gestured at the world, vague but loaded.

Andy exhaled, feeling the old, familiar ache settle in behind his ribs. “What started all this? I lost my best friend and my other half when I was thirteen,” he said. “We were… inseparable. Then she drowned. River accident.”

Nick went dead-still.

Andy noticed, but kept going. “It was stupid, honestly. We fought over a girl—a kiss, actually.” He jerked his chin at the ballroom. “Chloe. That’s her, over by the cookie table. Laura heard rumors, and we argued. She tried to leave, I tried to talk to her, and next thing I know, she’s gone.” Andy let out a laugh that had no humor in it. “Whole life kind of imploded after that. Never really got it together.”

Nick’s hands gripped his biceps so tight the knuckles blanched. He stared at the floor, then up at Andy, and for a moment there was nothing but the quiet hum of the air system and the distant sound of someone’s karaoke attempt in the next room.

“That’s…” Nick started, then stopped. He looked at Andy, searching his face for the lie, and found none. “That’s almost exactly what happened to me,” he said, the words thick.

Andy blinked. “Seriously?”

Nick nodded, slow. “I was twelve. My friend—Dakota. She was everything. We’d known each other since birth, did everything together.” He laughed, but it sounded like gravel. “We had a fight. Stupid, too—a girl named Gina. Dakota saw her kiss me at summer camp. She got jealous and angry, she ran, I chased, she got to the river before I did and…” He trailed off, but Andy filled in the blanks.

“Shit,” Andy said. “I’m sorry.”

Nick shrugged. “It was fifteen years ago. I mean, I made it through college, wrote a book. But I never got over it. Not really. I tried, I really did, but one way or another, it never really worked out.”

Andy let the words settle. He knew that feeling—like you were waiting for the next collision, just so you’d know what came after. The silence between them stretched, not uncomfortable, exactly, but thick with the fact that neither man had ever expected to run into his own ghost. Andy leaned his head against the window and let the chill through the glass slow his pulse.

Nick was the one who finally looked up. "How did you handle it?" he asked, voice low. "Seeing her again, I mean. Was it—" He cut himself off, jaw working.

Andy's brow furrowed, his mouth opening slightly as he processed the question. "She never came back for me. Not in the show, not ever." He watched the confusion flicker across Nick's face before understanding dawned. "Wait—yours did? Arabella can do a lot, but she can't change the laws of the universe. Or the dead."

Nick’s eyes dropped, and for a second his whole posture crumpled, like the floor had vanished beneath him. “Sorry. I figured, with the way the stories are so similar, maybe…”

“Some days I wonder what I would do if she came back,” Andy said. “But I had to build my whole life on the fact she couldn’t.”

Nick nodded, shoulders hunched. “Sylvia brought Dakota in on day one,” he said, the words brittle. “I thought it was a trick, or maybe a test. But no, she was just… there. Like the years in between hadn’t happened.” He wiped at his face, rough with stubble. “I always thought if I saw her again, it would fix things. Turns out, it just makes you more aware of how broken you got.”

Andy couldn’t even begin to understand. The thought of Laura coming back was… too much to even let himself consider. He wanted to say something comforting, but there was nothing that didn’t sound like a self-help poster or a con. So instead he let it breathe, let the tension stretch out until the air was thin and honest. He glanced over, looked at Nick. “What about the rest of them?” he said, smoothly redirecting. “Your girls. You seem to care about them.”

Nick shrugged. “I do. But it’s not… it’s never the same, you know? They’re all women I wanted, once.” He paused. “I… messed up with most of them, back then. The show helped… fix those relationships. And I owe a lot to Mary.” He glanced toward the party, where the redhead with the pigtails was sitting, hands folded, watching the room with an air of calm patience.

“She looks like she’s keeping everyone else safe,” Andy said.

“She is,” Nick replied. “It’s funny. When she arrived on the island, she thought I was a horrible person, because of what her friend Holly had told her. Now somehow, they are both among the few people I have fallen in love with. They take care of me.” He grins fondly. “Each in her own way.”

“Sam’s that for me,” Andy admitted. “Not romantic, mind you. Never dated, never wanted to. But she was always there. When I was falling apart, or about to do something stupid, she was the only person who could pull me back.”

“Lucky you,” Nick said, but without heat.

Andy shrugged. “It wasn’t luck. I pushed everyone else away. Even Erin, when we were together.”

Nick looked at him, the kind of look that knew exactly what it cost to say that. “What happened there?”

Andy hesitated, then told the truth. “Dated for two years. She tried everything to get me to open up. I just… couldn’t. She got tired of trying and left.” He watched Nick process that, saw the recognition in the slouch of his spine.

“I did that too,” Nick said. “The emotionally broken thing. Never even got a girlfriend, though, before coming here. I was in therapy, actually.”

Andy smiled, a sad little tic. “Me too. I think we’re the same kind of broken.”

Nick nodded, saying nothing.

A minute passed. The music from the ballroom had shifted to something low and slow, just enough to leak through the walls and make the silence between them feel orchestrated.

Nick rolled his shoulders, then jerked his chin at the window. “You ever wonder if it’s just… I don’t know. A feedback loop? We lose the one thing we care about, so we spend the rest of our lives trying to fill that hole, but it never works because we’re still the person who let it get empty in the first place.”

Andy snorted. “If I had a dollar for every time Marissa tried to tell me that.”

Nick grinned, then shook his head. “You got a therapist on staff?”

“I also got a medical doctor now.”

Nick considered that, then let it go.

They stood for a while, just letting it all hang. Eventually, Nick said, “I noticed… Claire thinks the Producers did this on purpose. Built our seasons like narrative twins. What do you think?”

Andy didn’t disagree. “You ever think it’s because the world likes symmetry? Or just that the same story’s easier to sell twice once you change the names?”

Nick’s lips curled, but his eyes didn’t. “Maybe. Or maybe it’s just that nobody ever really wants a happy ending.”

Andy stared at the lagoon, the moon painting a stripe across the water. “I do,” he said, and surprised himself with the conviction in it.

Nick shrugged. “I’m rooting for you, then. I’m hoping for one too.” Something in his voice suggested he didn’t think it likely, though. At least, not entirely.

Andy could have let the conversation end there, but he didn’t want to go back in with that kind of weight on his chest. “What about you?” he asked. “If you could go back, would you change how it happened?”

Nick laughed, this time real and bitter. “If I could go back, I’d have never let Dakota out of my sight. I’d have said something before Gina did. Or maybe I’d have drowned with her.”

Andy inhaled sharply. “You don’t mean that.”

Nick nodded, but didn’t argue.

“Would she have wanted that?” Andy asked, softer now.

Nick’s face creased. “No. That was the problem. She always wanted better for me than I did for myself.” He looked at Andy, and his voice was suddenly very old. There was something Nick wasn’t telling, something connected to Dakota’s story. But it was not Andy’s place to push.

They both turned to look at the ballroom, at the riot of color and movement and all the people who had, somehow, managed to keep dancing. Nick’s gaze found Mary, and Andy’s found Erin, and for a second, each watched the other’s center of gravity.

“I hope you win, Andy,” Nick said. “I hope you figure out how to hold onto it all.”

“I hope you do too,” Andy replied.

They stood there for another minute, then Andy clapped Nick on the shoulder, and the two of them made their way back toward the party.

---

Nick, Mary, Dawn and Dani are from Exarch-of-Sechrima's Island Vacation season. If you haven't read it already, you should. Check it out!