Brunettes or Redheads?

1. One-Shot

I don't own Total Drama Island, Action, or Musical or any related aspects, spin offs, characters, etc.

A helpful side note: This takes place during Total Drama Musical at Playa de Losers, but since TDM hasn't aired it's safe to say everything regarding the season is slightly AU – from elimination order to where/what Playa de Losers this time 'round is. TDI/TDA happened, just the third TD is messed with. Just making things clear :)

Annoying was what she was. Intolerably, unjustifiably, shamelessly annoying. Lindsay had achieved grating Noah's nerves with a greater ease than any of his siblings by leaps and bounds. It was as if she didn't realize just how irritating she was to be around. Like she had no clue how it required no effort on her part to irk Noah into being a miserable person. What an ignorant moron. What a naïve idiot. What a – what a –

What a blonde.

Noah threw a scandalized look across the pool at Lindsay for the seventeenth time in the past two minutes, though this time he kept his glare on her in hopes she'd notice his rage and go complain to someone far away about it. As planned, she noticed. As unplanned, she smiled cheerfully and whipped her hand in his general direction.

Noah scowled and kept his stare steady, hoping whatever Beth was now whispering into her female friend's ear was somewhere along the lines of 'we should go to your room since Noah looks too mean to share a vicinity with.' What he got instead was the screech of giggles against his tender ears as the two muffled their wide smiles behind their hands. Lindsay rose up to full height and made a come-hither motion.

"Hey, Nate!" she called out. "Want to come over here and swim with us?"

"We were about to play Marco Poooolo~" Beth added, winking saucily as if that game was supposed to seal the deal.

Noah slid down further in his seat and frowned into his book. His stomach swelled with nausea at the ditzy girls smiling expectantly back at him. Well, not so much at Beth's smile – Noah had more or less come to reasonable terms with her when he first arrived at the latest Playa de Losers paradise – Lindsay's sweet smile was really what made his head burn and stomach hurt. What was she doing looking at him like he was the beacon of her world for?

Disgusted, Noah thrust himself off the chair he'd been reclining in and decided to go back inside the ship. Noah smirked; though he may have been eliminated first in Total Drama Musical, the cruise ship for the losers wasn't all that much of a punishment by any means. It would be more of a vacation if Lindsay hadn't gotten the boot second. Or if her and Tyler hadn't broken up the last day of TDA, he mused, then she'd be pining to kiss him instead of harassing Noah for whatever reasons.

He had only just opened the door to leave the deck when he felt a hot hand on his arm. Unease swept up his skin and Noah recoiled on instinct, cocking a brow at Lindsay's shy smile. "Yes?" He really hoped she didn't want to confront him about ignoring her and her offer, because that just couldn't end well. After a good thirty seconds of staring, Noah turned to leave. Again she grabbed his arm and he felt his inside clench in anticipation – anticipation of what? – when she didn't let go. Noah looked pointedly at her. "Is there any chance you could ease up on the grip, Sunshine? I'm made of sensitive stuff."

Lindsay went pink and she whipped her hand off of him. Noah considered this. Strange, he thought, that she'd act so guilty over something so stupid. Though he really shouldn't be too concerned with how she acts. It's not like they'll be buddy-buddy a week after TDM is over anyways.

"Did you hear me and Beth over at the pool?" she asked suddenly.

"No," Noah smoothly lied to avoid a possibly precarious situation. The stickiness of sweat he felt building on his skin got heavier as her smile faltered. He sighed, and told himself he really shouldn't tempt the fraying of nerves by doing this but…. "What was it I was supposed to hear exactly?"

Her face lit up. "Me and Beth –"

"Beth and I," he corrected absently, nodding at her to continue.

She frowned. "Beth and you what?"

If he wasn't holding his book in his hands, he would've face-palmed. "I was correcting your grammar, Lindsay, I never – oh, it's a lost cause. Just continue."

Lindsay gave him a confused look before she did as he asked. "We just asked if you wanted to hang out by the pool."

"No." She looked distressed again and Noah felt his stomach shift. He choked on the feeling and tried to make it go away by adding, "I mean, I can't." He shook his head, not thinking it sounded right. With some late resolve, he stared up into Lindsay's eyes and said firmly, "What I want to say is: I can, but I won't. I don't particularly enjoy the idea of paddling around with you and Beth. But you two feel free to just go as wet 'n' wild as you so please." There, honest answer out. With that he turned away from her and went through the door to bolt to his cabin. He wasn't thrilled being pushed around by Lindsay when she was seemingly unaware that she was making him do things to protect her feelings. What a desperate fool she made out of him.

And what a hesitant one at that. Whatever that wrenching feeling he had when he tried to reject her was, it had done more harm than good. Yet another thing Lindsay had done to annoy him today: make him all sympathetic when she didn't deserve it.

"Wa-wait!" Against better judgment, Noah slowed himself to face Lindsay coming in to stride next to him. "We don't have to swim if you don't want to. We can do something else! Like… umm… well, I don't know, what do you want to do?"

"Nothing," Noah answered flatly. "I'd like to go into my room and just sit alone in the middle of the floor for hours doing absolutely nothing."

He half expected Lindsay to look sorry for him and half expected her to look a bit freaked out. What he hadn't been expecting was for her to start nodding and beaming at him. "Oh, I do nothing all the time! My mom always thought that I was really good at that." She seemed to seriously consider his 'hobby' before nodding to herself. "Yeah, that's totally something we can do together! I mean I usually read a magazine or do my nails in the middle of my floor so I don't get too bored, but it doesn't matter to me. You can do… um, nothing, and I'll just do… whatever. But it's fine, because we'll at least be together, right?"

Noah stopped dead in the hallway to properly point and laugh at the buxom bombshell. Lindsay seemed more and more confused the longer he laughed, but he couldn't stop himself.

"Lindsay," he said, mellowing himself out as he neared his cabin with her still walking next to him like a lost puppy. "I'm not interested in doing anything or nothing with you, alright? I'm not about to sacrifice any time or brain cells to chum it up with you and Beth."

"But you don't have to sacrifice anything to be my-our friends," Lindsay advertised to him fretfully. "I think we're good friends to have! And we're friends with everyone except for Heather so maybe we could even get you some friends other than Evian, Cory, or Iggy!"Noah couldn't open his door fast enough at the idea of having more annoying people to stalk him around. "Who knows," she continued, oblivious to his aggravation, as a rosy stain blossomed in her cheeks, "maybe we could end up being best female slash male friends forever –"

"Oh no," Noah interrupted in a blind panic. "Just… no. No no no no no. I am not about to be closely associated with anyone else here. And especially not you of all people."

Lindsay looked desperately at him as he stepped into his cabin. "B-but everyone likes being my friend! I don't know why you wouldn't want to be friends with me." She worried her lip and anxiously wondered, "Is there something wrong with me?"

"Besides the fact that you're a complete blonde?" Noah replied in a bored tone, "Let me get back to you on that." With that he stalked into his room and shut his door, locking it in case she felt bold again. Hopefully this time the girl could take a hint.

Four hours after he decided to barricade himself in his room, Noah had lost any and all ability to read. Trying to concentrate on anything that wasn't Lindsay or Lindsay-related was damn near impossible. It wasn't something he was proud of, but it was to the point where he decided he'd be mentally ill if he would deny such an obvious fact to himself.

Not that he wasn't ill anyway. He still felt sick, his hands were still somewhat sweaty, all his thoughts boomeranged back to her, the symptoms were endless. The question now though was why. Why did he care about her so much –

Wait. Wait.

Why did he care about her so much? Since when did he really care about her at all?

He tried to remind himself why he didn't like her. Why her bright personality and good looks got on his nerves in the first place. That it was popular people like her that he wanted to prove couldn't win against strategists like him. He didn't like her because she was pretty. He didn't like her because she was popular. He liked her because she was honest. She was fun. Because he always secretly wanted to be as social and carefree like she was. How he envied her, just her, for how she trusted her emotions –

Wait. Wait.

"This is getting ridiculous," Noah muttered to himself as he pushed himself off his bed and out his room. "Completely absurd." He was going to go apologize to Lindsay and just avoid her like the plague for the rest of TDM. Then he could stuff his conscience somewhere far away from his hormones so he could get his boring life back in order. Then Lindsay could go back to being annoying and he could go back to being unattached to her. Simple as that.

As much as Noah had anticipated his plan to go smoothly, he realized it might be a bit trickier than expected when he saw Beth running down Lindsay's hall like a mad woman.

"Beth, is Lindsay in her –"

"You can't go in there!" the farm girl shouted hysterically. With a guilty blush she set back off down the hall screaming something about 'help,' 'fashion emergency,' and 'Katie and Sadie.'

If that wasn't a sign from above to turn around now, he didn't know what was.

But just as his feet shifted, so did Lindsay's cabin door. She looked the same she had in the morning when he last saw her, the only change being that she had a towel carefully wrapped around her hair. Upon seeing Noah, the blonde gasped and let her eyes dart around. "Oh, um, Noel, hi! What, uh… what did you come here for?"

"To see you," he answered plainly. "I just wanted to apologize."

"Apologize?" she repeated. She didn't seem as nervous now. "What for?"

He shrugged, suddenly feeling very aware of her watching him. "Oh, you know, for sayin- oh my God, woman, what happened to your hair?"

Lindsay's hands fisted against the towel as she tried to bring it down further. She slunk backwards into her room, her eyes watching him with prayers that he would just go away. "Nothing happened, I swear! I didn't do anything, honest!"

Noah sighed and checked the hallway before following Lindsay into her room. She stood fearfully in the middle of her cabin as he came up to her in a few simple strides and grabbed the top of her towel. Giving up before she even put up much of a fight, Lindsay stood defeated as he took the towel off to reveal what should have been glossy blonde hair.

What he saw instead was patches of pale red and mousy brown.

"You said you didn't like blondes," Lindsay said defensively as Noah started to chuckle at her. "And I didn't really know if you liked redheads or brunettes more so Beth said I should try both. And Katie and Sadie said that there were some dyes in the salon onboard, but I didn't want anyone to see, and now," her eyes welled with tears, "now my hair's ruined. It's so ugly."

"Yeah," Noah agreed, still laughing. "I've seen my sisters do better dye jobs on their dolls using markers when they were kids."

Lindsay sniffed. She was so caught up in how hurt she was that she was missing the endearing faces Noah was making at her. She tried to change for him to make him happy and he laughed at her. Lindsay must be so annoyed with him; he could've laughed again at how ironic this felt.

Feeling like honesty was a good policy to adapt to, Noah told her truthfully, "But I still like it."

Lindsay's face went blank. "You like brunettes and red heads mixed together?"

"Not particularly, no." With a cynical smile, he leaned in and whispered, "I think I like blondes best."

Lindsay was ready to yell at him, she really was. She had just dyed her hair and made it look awful because her crush didn't like her blondes, and now he says he does? What a dumb guy.

Any thoughts of him being a dumb guy ended the second he kissed the roots of her hair gently, leaning back to look at her as he played with her loose strands. She could always dye it back to its original color, he told her, if she was so bothered by it. He went on saying a lot of things, but she wasn't paying much attention anymore. With a thrill Noah had been denying her, Lindsay leaned over to place her lips on his and show him how to properly make her feel better.

She thought of all the reasons she liked Noah as he slowly responded. How he was independent and funny, and seemed to notice things no one else could. How he talked to her differently than other people did. How he was a lot cooler than he gave himself credit for. How he was confident in himself, if not a bit cocky (she always did have a weakness for cocky guys though). So what if he was dumb sometimes and said really confusing things? She liked him, and that really was all there was to it.

Actually, there was one thing…

"Noah," she cooed as she pulled back and watched him with flirty eyes as he stared helplessly at her lips. "Since I dyed my hair for you, I only think it's fair you do something for me."

"You want me to dye my hair?" He asked, wondering if his hair wasn't already turning blonde with how light and bubbly he felt.

"No," she giggled, kissing his nose. "There just one thing I think you need to work on in order for us to ever make it as a couple."

He leaned in and let out a frustrated sigh when she teasingly pulled away with a charming smirk. He swallowed. "That would be…?"

She poked his stomach, giving him a mocking smile he was all too familiar with. "You're going to need to get some abs."

I hope everyone enjoyed the latest contribution to the ever-growing fluff pile that are my one-shots. My mind's just permanently stuck in the gutter of romance whenever TDI's involved. Sad, but oh so very true.