Outback Hearts (Beyond Reality Book 1) (16 page)

Five months later...

Sam, Beth, and Christina were gathered in Beth’s apartment, ready for the season premiere of
Love in the Outback
. Sam chuckled. They hadn’t changed the name after all. It seemed like everyone in Albuquerque knew Sam had been on the show. She’d interviewed with the local news stations as well as radio stations. She’d done her best to talk up the show, but not reveal anything either. She figured if she refused to be interviewed that would keep the interest of the media even longer so she just gave in and did the interviews. Even though the interviewers wanted to know the outcome of the show and if she was a finalist, Sam was prohibited from saying anything by the contract she’d signed. Eddie and the other producers made it very clear from the start if she let any information leak out about the outcome of the show, she’d be sued for millions of dollars.

The three friends decided they’d rotate whose place they watched the show at each week. Beth and Christina were beyond excited, Sam was definitely not. She knew that watching the show would bring back memories, mostly bad, but bittersweet too. She wasn’t sure she wanted to watch the “behind the scene” shots of Al’s dates. She didn’t want to see what went on that she didn’t know about. She was interested to see how the producers edited the show, though. She knew many people who were on so-called reality shows complained about the editing. She couldn’t think of anything she’d done that would embarrass her or make the editing difficult, but who knew what the editing would make her look like.

Even though several months had passed since she’d seen Al, she missed him. It seemed like every night she lay in bed thinking about him. Where was he? Did he miss her? Did he think about her? She was embarrassed to admit she thought about him while pleasuring herself as well. She remembered everything about their date and the kiss they shared. That one kiss was better than any sex she’d ever had with anyone else. That was almost embarrassing because she had no idea if Al felt the same way.

The show had a cutesy opening, complete with music and pictures of all the women. Sam’s head shot was toward the beginning of the montage, and it was only on for a few seconds, but none of the women had theirs up for long. The show started at the hotel with the women frantically searching through their bags, trying to pack what was needed. It continued with the video introductions for Al. The camera kept panning from the bus driver to the women. Sam laughed out loud.

“What?” asked Christina.

“The bus driver is Al!!” Sam exclaimed with a laugh, realizing now that it was clever on the part of the producers and that Al must’ve had quite the laugh over all the videos that had been shot on the bus while he’d been sitting there.

The three women burst out laughing. “Wait, shhhh,” scolded Beth as she tried to hear the show.

The show continued on. It showed the women settling into the bunkhouses. Sam thought that overall the show was actually pretty boring. It ended with Wendi’s name being pulled out of the cheesy cowboy hat. The cameras milked it for all they were worth and had close up shots of Wendi crying and carrying on and sobbing in her interview in the car.

Hey.
Sam thought to herself.
I wonder why they didn’t talk to me when I was leaving.

The three friends laughed at the show and discussed the contestants. Of course, Beth and Christina didn’t like any of the women, except for Sam. They laughed at how Sam had to be called “Sammi” and rolled their eyes at how everyone’s names ended in the sound of “ie.”

Beth commented at the end of the first show, “Sam, where were you? I didn’t see much of you at all! Weren’t you there?” She said it jokingly, but Sam had noticed the same thing. Granted she didn’t socialize much with the other women, but there really were only a few shots with her in them.

“I was there,” Sam insisted, trying to laugh about it. “I’m sure you’ll see my fat butt next week!” They all laughed.

Finally, it got late enough that Christina and Sam had to get back home because they had to work the next day. They made plans for the next week to watch the second installment of the show.

Sam arrived at her house to a noisy greeting from her dogs. Blue, Albert, and Duke were always very excited to see her. Most of the time they just slept, but it was always nice to have an audience to listen to her ramblings. It made her feel less lonely. They were especially glad to see her when she got back from Australia. Her mom had watched them for her, but it was obvious they’d missed her.

Sam thought about Al. He looked just as good as she remembered. She wished she’d taped the show so she could watch it again and see Al. He was just so good looking, and now that she knew what a good person he was, he was even better looking in her eyes. She sighed and wished things were different.

The next day at work was pretty crazy. Everyone wanted to talk to her about the show and let her know they’d watched it. They had a ton of questions about what Sam thought about the other women, and of course they all wanted to know who “won.” Sam, of course, couldn’t tell them anything, so she politely fended off the questions. She had two calls from local reporters who wanted to interview her and she made appointments for the next day. Around three in the afternoon, Sam looked up from her desk to see a giant bouquet of flowers making its way toward her desk. Okay, it was actually the receptionist carrying them, but it almost looked like they were floating on their own.

The receptionist placed them on her desk and said, “Delivery for you.”

Sam couldn’t imagine who they could be from. She wasn’t dating anyone, it wasn’t her birthday, and it wasn’t any kind of special day. Sam leaned over to smell the beautiful blooms. They were a mix of several different kinds of flowers. There was a lily, a carnation, a rose, some baby’s breath and some other flowers that Sam didn’t recognize.

The receptionist hadn’t left and nosily asked, “Who’re they from?” Sam looked for a card. There wasn’t one.

She shrugged and said, “I have no idea, I can’t find a card.”

“Who sends flowers without a card?” the receptionist asked almost rhetorically. “Maybe it fell off, I’ll look for it. Maybe it’s a secret admirer who saw you on TV last night, or maybe it’s Al!” she said animatedly. Sam could tell she really liked that idea. 

“I doubt it,” Sam told her. “I wasn’t on the show enough last night for anyone to notice me, and we’re strictly forbidden to have any contact with anyone that was on the show. It was in the contract. So even if I
did
win,” she paused and winked at the receptionist, playing it up, “I can’t have any contact with him until the show is over.” Sam smiled to herself. Let her think about that one a bit!

After work, Sam carefully put the flowers on the front seat next to her and strapped them in using the seat belt. It wasn’t often that she received flowers and she wanted to savor them in private at home. She had no idea who’d sent them. It wasn’t as if she saw many people other than the ones she worked with, and there were only a few men at work anyway, and she certainly knew none of them would send her flowers. She considered throwing them out, but at the last minute couldn’t make herself to do it. Hopefully her “fame” hadn’t garnered her a stalker.

When Sam arrived home she put the flowers on her kitchen table. She then fed her dogs and popped a microwave meal in to cook. She sat down at her table to eat her solitary dinner. She sighed. She was lonely. She had lots of friends, and her dogs to keep her company, but it wasn’t the same as having someone at home to talk to and to share the day with.

The next week arrived quickly. Beth and Christina came over to Sam’s house this time to watch
Love in the Outback
. Sam knew this was the week when they’d have the fish competition and meet Al. It was interesting watching the show from an outside different perspective. She was there, she knew what happened, but it was weird to watch the editing and see what the producers pulled out of the show.

The three friends got their popcorn and sodas and sank onto the couches to watch the show. Albert was sleeping on his favorite pillow, Blue was on the couch next to Sam, and Duke was curled up on a pillow in the corner.

The theme song came on and the montage of pictures was on again. The teaser this week had many shots of the women looking bedraggled. Finally, the show was on. They saw some background on Al to start with. First of all his name wasn’t Al, it was Alex. Sam thought Alex fit him so much better than Al did. She supposed it wasn’t too far of a stretch to believe Eddie had made him change him name as well. After all, they’d changed hers. Sam briefly wondered how many of the other women had their names changed too, but her attention quickly turned back to the show. She was surprised to learn that Alex wasn’t “just” a rancher that the show led them all to believe. It turned out he was the CEO of his own business in Austin. He did live on a ranch, part of the time. He owned both a house in Austin as well as the ranch. The guy was loaded, that hadn’t been an exaggeration.

Beth sighed. “Wow, Sam,” she said, “he’s gorgeous and rich to boot!” Sam hadn’t told her friends the outcome of the show. She wasn’t allowed to, and besides, they said they’d rather wait and watch the show like everyone else. They said it heightened the suspense. Sam suddenly felt relieved she hadn’t won the show. There was no way she’d fit into Alex’s world. She might have been able to fit in on a ranch, but be the girlfriend of a CEO? No way!

The editing of the competition left much to be desired in Sam’s opinion. There were, of course, lots of shots of the women soaked with water. Lots of shots of the women bending over head first in the bucket, trying to get the fish out. There were a few shots of Sam, but mostly of the other women. The friends watched as the twist came, the winners had to meet Alex right then and there or wait until the next day. Sam laughed, remembering how mad they all were, especially Missy.

She watched as the “winners” were bussed off and the rest of them stayed. It was interesting that there was no mention of her falling into the water or her being wet. She thought for sure her fall into the water would have been played up just to embarrass her, but it wasn’t even mentioned. She watched the conversations Alex had with some of the women. They didn’t show all of the conversations, she supposed they just showed the “interesting” ones, and of course hers wasn’t included.

The show continued with the other women the next day getting to meet Alex. Sam and her friends laughed at the conversation Al had with Courtnee. They then watched as the competition with the pigs came up to see who’d be going home. It was pretty funny to watch them all running around trying to capture the pigs. Sam was absolutely dumbfounded when, through the magic of editing,
she
was left without a pig instead of Kimmie. They must’ve spliced together frames of her standing around empty-handed.

Sam couldn’t say anything as the “elimination” took place. She watched as she walked towards a car and was driven away. She knew the shot was taken out of sequence, but she was still amazed. The teaser scenes for the next week’s show came on talking about the days spent on the cattle station doing the chores. Beth and Christina hung around for a bit longer, commiserating with Sam about how she had to leave so early in the show and they told her that it wasn’t fair. Sam barely heard any of it.

After her friends left, Sam sat on her couch, hugging one of the throw pillows. She now understood what all the other reality stars had been talking about when they complained about editing. They’d edited her out of the show even though she’d been there much longer. She wondered how that was going to work. How were they going to get rid of Kimmie since she wasn’t at the station? She guessed they just weren’t going to deal with the shoveling of the barns much since she did most of the work. It must’ve taken a long time for them to edit her out of all the subsequent shots.

Sam felt betrayed, but she honestly wasn’t that surprised. She knew when the cameras didn’t follow her on her one and only individual date with Al that something was up, but she tried to brush it off with a flimsy excuse. She knew she wasn’t like the others, but she honestly didn’t think they’d just erase her from the show.

Finally, after an hour or so of feeling sorry for herself, Sam decided that what happened had happened. Since she couldn’t change anything about it, there was no use getting worked up and pissed off. She hadn’t won, they didn’t change the outcome of the show, just the order that people left. She also decided she wasn’t going to watch the rest of the show. As much as she loved looking at Alex and remembering how hot he was and how he made her feel, there was no telling how much other stuff they’d manipulated with their editing. Besides, Sam didn’t know if she could stand watching Alex make out with the other women. She still wanted to think of him as hers.

The next day at work was one of the longest in Sam’s life. Everyone wanted to know all about the show, and they wanted to tell her how sorry they were that she wasn’t able to stay longer. She was even teased by some coworkers for not being able to catch a pig. Sam laughed along with them, while inside she cringed. She’d never ever as long as she lived, agree to be on any kind of “reality” anything. It wasn’t worth it. Later that day the receptionist came into her office to deliver another package. It’d been a week since she’d received the flowers. It was a flat envelope. Sam opened it and was surprised to see a gift certificate to a National pet store chain. There was a note this time, however.

Sam opened it and read, “
Hopefully you can put this to good use
.” That was it. Sam turned it over to look on the back. There was no name or anything. Sam thought it was very weird. She certainly
could
use the gift certificate. Her basset hounds were constantly going through stuffed toys. They liked to “kill” them by taking out the squeaker. It was an odd gift to send to someone anonymously, but appreciated nonetheless.

The week continued and Sam constantly had to deal with the aftereffects of being on a national reality show. She participated in interviews for the local newspaper and even participated in an interview on one of the national morning news shows. She couldn’t say much about the show. She wasn’t allowed to say anything about who might win, and since Eddie and the other producers edited her out of the part of the show that she actually did participate in, she couldn’t say anything about that either. Sam told Beth and Christina that she wasn’t going to watch any more of the episodes. She explained to them since she’d been kicked out so early it didn’t matter to her who won, and she didn’t care to see the rest of the show. They tried to convince her to watch “just for fun,” but Sam refused. If she was honest with herself, it was just too painful.

Her feelings were really hurt by the whole experience. First, she was made to feel as if she was somehow less of a person than the other contestants. Second, no one cared about her at all on the show. Not when she was hurt, not when she’s saved Kina’s life, and definitely not when they edited her out of the show almost altogether. Then she thought about Al…no, Alex. She stupidly thought they’d connected on their date. They had explosive chemistry even before that, but everything he did for her and to her on their date just cemented her feelings. She didn’t think he had anything to do with getting her kicked off, but now that it was so much later, and her feelings were so raw, she wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Sam wouldn’t put herself through watching him interact with the other women on the show and having it proven to her that she was just another contestant to him and he was going and saying the same things to everyone.

The next few weeks went by and Sam received regular updates from her friends about what was happening on the show. She heard all about the ranch episode. Beth laughed herself silly at some of the girls trying to do their chores. They were both appalled at Kathi’s fake drowning. It seemed like Eddie and the other producers knew all along she’d faked her accident and decided it made good television. Sam felt sick when Christina had told her how the camera zoomed in on Kathi winking to Courtnee and played it in slow motion over and over again. It sickened her and made her want to hunt Eddie down and beat the crap out of him because she knew Alex must be watching the show and seeing he’d been made a fool out of on national television. She wouldn’t wish that betrayal on anyone. What she went through seemed like nothing compared to this.

Occasionally she’d see blurbs from the morning news shows about the show and she caught a few interviews with some of the contestants.

Throughout the weeks the show was on, Sam continued to get little gifts. After each show she received something. She’d received gift certificates to restaurants, another bouquet of flowers, the deluxe edition of the movie
Speed
, a pass to the local zoo…it was mostly all unusual stuff. There was never a name on who’d sent any of it. One week Sam actually called the flower place that delivered the flowers to try to see who’d ordered them, but the customer paid cash and didn’t leave his name, so that was a dead end on trying to figure out who was sending the gifts.

Sam wished she knew who it was so she could thank him or her. They really made her feel good, especially after hearing the rundown of the show each week. It seemed like the show was a huge hit and everyone was talking about it.

But another part of her was completely freaked out. Not knowing who was sending the gifts was a little freaky. She thought maybe Beth or Christina were sending the gifts, but when she asked them they both denied it. Sam knew them well enough to know they weren’t lying. So who knew her well enough to send such personalized gifts? She hoped the next reality show she’d be on wouldn’t be one where women talked about a stalker.

* * *

Soon, enough weeks went by that the season finale was to be aired. It was down to two women for Alex to choose from. Beth and Christina begged her to come and watch the last show with them. Finally, Sam agreed, just to get them off her back. She might as well. Nine months had gone by since she’d left the show. It wasn’t as if Alex was knocking down her door, and he couldn’t even if he wanted to because of the contracts they’d all signed. Sam knew the final two women were Amy and Kathi. She couldn’t believe that Kathi was still there. She hoped for Alex’s sake that he took the advice she’d whispered to him that last day she was there.

The show started with the montage of pictures like usual. It then recapped the last week’s episode where Missy left the show. The women were now staying by themselves in their own camp sites. The producers had separated them, of course, for dramatic effect. The women had one last individual date with Alex before he’d make the final decision. Kathi and Alex were flown to a nearby town where they had a romantic dinner, complete with candlelight. After dinner they took a carriage ride around the town. They then went back to a hotel where they were given the option of staying in one room together. Of course Kathi was all for that. She and Alex spent some time snuggling and kissing on the couch in front of the television in the room and then the last shot was of the two of them walking into the bedroom hand in hand.

Sam felt sick. She knew she shouldn’t have watched the show. She just knew something awful like this was going to happen. Of course, the editors left enough doubt as to what was going on in the room for the audience to make their own conclusions. And the truth was, no one had any idea of what happened. God, it hurt. She wanted to tear Kathi’s hair out at the same time she wanted to crawl into bed, put the covers over her head and not come out for weeks.

The final date with Amy was much the same. She and Al went out to eat, then spent some “quality” time together and were then given the option of staying the night together. After some heavy kissing on the couch, the two of them went into the bedroom together.

Beth and Christina were loving every minute of the show. They debated whether or not Alex had slept with either of the women and they were trying to decide which he should pick at the final ceremony. They knew he’d felt really sorry for Kathi after her “near drowning” and it looked like he felt responsible for her. On the other hand, Amy was a strong woman and, in Beth’s and Christina’s eyes, she was the prettier of the two. The added twist to the show was that the audience knew Kathi lied about the incident at the lake, but Alex didn’t. It made for a suspenseful ending.

Sam got up to refill their soda glasses as Alex was debating on which woman he should choose. He was lying on his back on a sofa in a hotel room, talking out loud to himself. He talked about how he thought Amy was beautiful and since she was from El Paso they lived closer to each other. She was an outdoorsy kind of girl and they got along really well. Kathi, on the other hand, was very fragile in Al’s eyes and he loved feeling like he could take care of her. She was from Knoxville, which wasn’t that far away really, and besides, since he was a pilot it wouldn’t make that much difference.

As much as Sam didn’t want to admit it, she was as sucked into what was happening on the show as Beth and Christina were. The show changed venues to a beautiful set with the Australian sun setting in the background. Alex was wearing a tuxedo and looked so good. Goose bumps rose all over Sam’s arms as she watched the show. He was so good looking and she regretted not being able to be his.