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It was over. For the first time in her life, she had cut someone off from her, instead of the other way around. She felt sick. She wanted to scream, to cry, to throw out everything inside herself and be reborn a completely different person. But she knew she couldn’t. She would have to deal with being Cabby for the rest of her life.
Cabby wandered Indefinite Island for a long time after the Exit Interview. For fun (and to distract herself from any of the dozens of thoughts in her head), she began a surface-level catalogue of the flora and fauna living on the island. For every creature she believed she hadn’t seen before, Cabby would search through her whole system of files before deciding to put new marks to a blank page. She hadn’t really studied insects or flowers before, she believed in learning more generally practical knowledge anyhow, so it was a little exciting for her.
Thinking back on it, she realized that Goo unknowingly did her a favor by asking for her file on pinecones as opposed to anything else in that field, even though that file was barely passable by her standards as worthy of being seen by others, and it was only because of this one project in school where she had to observe the local wildlife in her backyard that it was even presentable and the only reason she picked pinecones was that they were the easiest to pick up and examine closely and… right, she was checking for a file on a six-legged organism with a dark green shimmer that averaged (from her two sightings) approximately four centimeters long.
...What was she doing?
Cabby knows that she messed up. She knows it, she’s been replaying the scene of her rolling away from her corkboard, and how she trusted Test Tube to understand her intuitively, just like how Cabby thought she understood her. She never should have shown her full hand, but at the same time she shouldn’t have even had that hand to begin with. Really, who was she to think she “understood” anyone? She was nothing but an asset, and shouldn’t have pretended to be anything more. She shouldn’t have pretended to be… someone that could have a relationship with anyone.
Snap out of it, Cabby. You and Fan left on good terms, and if nothing else, that’s proof that if you tried hard enough, if you just thought more, that things could have been different. Her files weren’t the problem! Well, they were, in a way, but the only problem was the way she used them. All she wanted was to be a team player. She needed all the information she could gather, on her opponents, on her allies, on her environment. It was all for them! For The Pinkers and The New Pinkers! Wow, those names were much worse when she said them herself.
She had shown that she had been worth becoming allies with, worthy of at least being acknowledged as a competent contestant. Why couldn’t the others see that? And if at any point they did, why did a few observations - all of which were true - turn every single one of them against her? What was she missing?
Why did she feel so cold?
Well, Cabby, maybe it’s the fact that the island on which you are currently stranded is constantly covered by heavy fog, or the fact that you haven’t seen the clouds open up for a second to let any sunlight through, or the fact that you’ve never been able to build a fulfilling personal relationship with anyone you’ve ever known, even when you thought you had finally met the one person who would have understood- no, not just understand, but help you the way you had wanted everyone, anyone to help you the way you thought they could, instead of relying on false prophecies penned in lines of ink on blank sheets of paper in one of your ten dozen manila folders stuffed with knowledge that no one would ever ask for or even consider asking you for in a million years, and you know just how long that is in seconds but none of that even matters because the one thing you have devoted your whole life to, the intricate tapestry you had been weaving yourself into, has just been pulled apart at the seams, because it turns out everyone hates tapestries so much that they would take the artist down with them instead of trying to understand why someone would go to such lengths to make-
“Hey, Cabby.”
“AH!”
Please, Cabby. Try to keep your spatial awareness about you the next time you spiral, okay? Just turn around and-
Oh. Great.
“H-hi… Blueberry.”
“Hello.”
Blueberry, Blueberry. A nihilistic fruit of few words, and even fewer aspirations. The first contestant eliminated after he refused to even attempt the challenge. Very, very lowkey, she could talk her way out of… whatever this was going to be whenever she wanted. But…
“How are you?”
“As of this moment? I’m still recovering from being startled by your shouting.”
Really? Because you neither look or sound like you ever felt anything in your life alright calm down Cabby. There has to be something here you’re missing.
“Oh, are you? I’m sorry, I guess that happens when you sneak up from behind someone’s back and announce yourself to them without warning.”
You’re not going to get anywhere with that.
“Sorry, Blueberry, what I meant was-”
“No, it’s fine. My emotional state is back to its normal, joyful self.”
What? Huh? Joyful? Just what is the cause of the disconnect between this man’s mind and body? Is he even aware that he comes across as an absolute pessimist?
“...Glad to hear it.”
Way to steer the conversation right off of a cliff, Cabby. Will Blueberry ever want to talk to you again after you were this insulting towards him? No, he won’t, because once again your need for information guided you straight into the depths of ostracization. There goes one of the few willing to talk to you on this island, because you know that even when more arrive, there’s no way they’ll treat you kindly.
Treat you kindly? Did you treat them kindly? Wait. Cabby, he’s still here.
“...Oh, right. I came over here because I wanted to cheer you up.”
“You wanted to… cheer me up?”
“Yeah.”
“…Why?”
“I don’t know, really, you just seemed down.”
He didn’t know? She just seemed down? Who would ever approach a would-be delicate scenario with such a baseless assumption? Cabby could never imagine herself doing anything like that without at least a half hour of planning, and he just walked up on a whim! …Had she even seen him walk before? Clearly, she would need to rewrite nearly everything in his file. For now, though…
“'Down'?”
“Everyone here wanders the island, but just now you were more lost than any of them.”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, it’s not uncommon to see you deep in thought looking at your files, but being the empathetic and emotional person I am, I sensed something was wrong.”
“And what gave you that impression?”
Blueberry pointed at her lower cabinet, “For starters, you seem a bit troubled in there.”
Cabby looked down, and saw that both her hands had been shakily straightening out and reorienting her files. As soon as she realized this, she forced her hands to stop. She recovered too quickly, practically slamming herself shut out of embarrassment, shame, and fear.
“Just a bit of multi-tasking! I can carry a conversation just as well when I am reorganizing myself.”
“Must be having an off day, then.”
Did… did Blueberry just crack a joke? Was he smiling right now? Yes, he was, and it was the smallest smile Cabby had ever seen. That was the first look of happiness she had seen from him, from anyone since being eliminated. It was a tiny, almost imperceptible change in his expression, but in it contained an entire universe of possibilities. In an instant, it felt like Cabby had learned everything she needed to just from this one moment. She wanted to laugh loud enough that even those in Hotel OJ could hear her, she wanted to pick up Blueberry and give him the biggest hug she could, she wanted to share this feeling with everyone she knew, and live in it for the rest of time.
It was that simple, all along.
Cabby looked down at Blueberry, and smiled.