THE LAST CHRISTMAS HERO
A Total Drama fanfiction by Pearl the Barrister
You can't really do a good summary in 250-odd characters, so here goes: After the dramatic climax of Total Drama World Tour, Bridgette stumbles upon Geoff and Heather making out. She's appalled, even more so when Geoff breaks up with her, placing all the blame on her because of what has become known as 'The Alejandro Incident.' She falls apart, spilling all her secrets to her reflection. Unfortunately, she doesn't know that the mirror hides a secret camera. Chris plans to air all her secrets as part of the World Tour finale; however, Noah, who secretly loves her (and has ever since the second season), overhears him and Geoff talking about it and knows he has to tell Bridgette. This starts a crazed adventure through the greater Toronto of Christmastime as the two of them follow Chris, Chef and a bunch of mysterious interns to try and get the tape before it's too late and Bridgette is humiliated in front of a(n inter?)national audience. And sure enough, there may be romance . . .
Rated T, generally, unless otherwise noted. Noah/Bridgette main pairing, others to be indicated at the start of each chapter.
Disclaimer I: I do not own the Total Drama series or any other song, book, television show, holiday, religious group, cult, product, or copyrighted item in this story. This disclaimer holds for every chapter in this story, The Last Christmas Hero, including ones not posted yet, which so far is all of them.
Disclaimer II: The plans for this story were drawn up shortly after the airing of the TDWT episode Anything Yukon Do, I Can Do Better (which, in fact, sparked the idea of an N/B pairing . . . yeah, I'm unimaginative). What happens after that episode will probably not be in alignment with what happened in the series here (in fact, almost certainly not), so yeah, sorry-I guess this is an alternate universe or something. But if the final 2 are Noah and Lindsay, I predicted it first! :)
Chapter One (Bridgette) [EDITED 7/24/2010]
And the Winner Is... (Not Me)
December 21, 2009
7:45 PM
"And the season three Total Drama winner . . . is . . ."
Chris's voice tingles with the usual mix of excitement and sadism I have grown used to in the past three seasons, but with a different, deliberately woven note of tension that fills the room, swallows us up.
"Lindsay!"
She jumps up from her seat, screaming with happiness. Cheers erupt from the rest of the contestants—well, most of them, anyway. Noah looks stunned, and I can tell what he's thinking: something along the lines of I lost to LINDSAY? This makes me smile—sometimes people can surprise you.
Chris is saying something but no one can hear, and even if they could they probably wouldn't care. Beth and some other people pick up Lindsay and put her in the winner's chair, and I suddenly wonder where I was at the end of last season.
Oh, yeah. Making out with Geoff.
Chris swiftly wraps up the season with a loud, overblown "Total . . . Drama . . . World Tour!" Then the cameras shut off and Chris sags, clearly down for whatever reason. Hah, I think, smiling. You'll get what you deserve soon enough, b—
I'm cut off mid-profanity by Courtney, who looks appalled. "Can you believe it? He lost to Lindsiot! Wow. I mean, I knew Noah was pretty worthless, competition-wise, but this is . . . wow. Lindsay!"
I am so not in the mood for Courtney right now, and I have no idea why. I mean, it's not like I lost. What gives you the right to be depressive? I ask myself. I mean, what would Courtney say? Probably something like No! Stop it! You're pathetic! Followed, of course, by a plethora of slapping, if that confessional I saw from Season One is any indication. I fill my brain with thoughts of Geoff to prepare myself for a long conversation with Courtney. Sure enough, it works, relaxing me instantly. "You were saying?"
I look down at my watch. "Oh, it's that time already? Sorry, Court, gotta go." I don't even know how long it's been. I just can't stand her talking anymore—one of those I love you but get the hell out of my face affairs.
"It's okay," she says. "I have to call my lawyers anyway."
Hah. Courtney and I part, and I head over to the bathroom. I've needed to go for a while, but you wouldn't believe how much Courtney can just talk, especially when she's pissed about something.
As I sit, doing my business, I think about the episode. I'm actually really excited about how it went. The part with the oranges was just pure brilliance. The thought of it fills me with love for Geoff and his madcap ingenuity (yes, I said 'Geoff' and 'ingenuity' in the same sentence—I know. Geoff. Still, he can be rather clever when he wants to be), and I feel myself swelling up inside with happiness. He feels like a drug, and though I read enough Twilight fanfiction back in ninth grade to know that codependency in a relationship is never a good thing, it kind of feels nice to have yourself so wrapped up in a person. I think about what happened earlier in the season with Alejandro and shudder. I am so glad Geoff and I managed to clear that up. I don't know what I was thinking. Wait, I do. It's just . . . not appropriate for an under-18 audience, is all.
This is the part where, if I was Courtney, I would slap myself and say No, stop it, you're pathetic, burst into tears, and then go back to being my perfect Mary Sue self, Fleckman, Fleckman, Cohen and Strauss always by my side (well, as long as a twenty-percent commission is headed their way). But I'm not Courtney. I don't operate like that. I like people, and I like having friends . . . and a boyfriend. So I just finish up my business, wash my hands, and head over to the reel room to watch the episode.
Which is where I find it.
Them.
I can literally feel my jaw dropping. I always thought that was just a figure of speech, but I think mine's touching the floor.
"What . . . the. . ." I utter a word that is not exactly suitable for everyday conversation, but which suits this situation perfectly. It's enough to get their attention, and they unwrap themselves from each other, turning towards me, shocked expressions blooming on their faces.
"Bridge?" Geoff says, something in his voice I can't quite place but that I'm sure I have never heard before, not even during the apex of his Captain Hollywood phase back last season. No such strangeness from Heather. She just looks . . . normal. Smug. Almost proud.
"I can't—" I utter the word again, several times, as a matter of fact. "I just can't believe it." My voice doesn't sound familiar either. It's hoarse, tense, almost a whisper. "What . . . what the hell is going on?"
Silence—short, awkward, terrible. I might cry. I might die. I might just get a gun and kill someone—probably Heather, but no guarantees. Then, words finally spill out of Geoff's mouth, the mouth that only moments before was on Heather's—oh, God. I never understood why my grandma used to use the word 'necking'—she still does, as a matter of fact, embarrassing me to no end each and every time the dreaded word passes through her lips—but now, staring at the light purplish mark adorning Heather's possibly-soon-to-be-strangled-by-me neck, the true meaning hits me. My first thought: wow, they gave hickeys even back then? My second: Someone gonna die . . . and it might just be me.
"Excuse me, could you repeat that?" I say weakly. "I didn't hear." Heather snorts, and I shoot her an I Swear, One Wrong Move And I'll Kill You, Dammit look. Surprisingly, she shuts up.
I'm expecting something like It's not what it looks like or Please, Bridge, I can explain, but Geoff says nothing. It was probably bull anyway, I tell myself, but that doesn't help.
I can't speak for a second as I slide to the ground, back to the wall. I put my head in my hands and sigh, Courtney's personal mantra coming back to me: No, stop it, you're pathetic. Somehow, I gather enough strength to ask, head still buried in my hands, "How long has this been going on?"
"A while," Geoff says weakly after a short, piercing silence.
"How long?" I roar.
Heather smirks. "Since before Season Two ended. After the third episode."
My jaw falls again, and I swear I hear a loud clang as if my jaw is actually audibly hitting the floor. "That . . . long?"
Somehow, this sparks Geoff back to life, and his vivacity kind of startles me a bit. "Well, Bridgette, what do you expect? I mean, you kept getting mad at me for taking my job seriously." I start to say something but he ignores me completely. "And then you make it into season three without me, and you kiss Alejandro—"
"I told you I was—that was—I'm sorry." I even sang a damn song.
"Yeah, Bridgette. I get that. But it was never the same after that. Not for me." I have never seen Geoff this mad. Not even during the Alejandro fiasco. Defensiveness can do strange things to a person. Who said that? My grandma, I think, although who knows who she stole it from.
"I . . . I just can't believe it."
Seemingly unaware that for her, the wisest course of action would to be to Shut The Hell Up, Heather cuts in, an odd note of pride in her voice that kind of makes me want to kill her (more than I already do, anyway, which trust me is a lot): "Well, Bridgette, you should be able to. After all, I am 'the hottest chick on the show.'" I remember Geoff saying this in the first TDA Aftermath episode and yet another wave of revulsion and homicidal mania rises up in me, this one directed mostly at him (though there's still some left for Heather, of course). Still, I can't say anything. Some small part of me thinks maybe I won't ever be able to.
It all happens so fast.
Geoff: I don't think we're compatible anymore, Bridgette. (Not Bridge, Bridgette, so that I might die.)
Me: . . .
Geoff: It's just . . . after you kissed Alejandro, I felt maybe we weren't meant to be with each other.
Me: But . . . it was . . .
Geoff: Yeah, I know. Before. But still.
But still. I never knew those two words could sound so cold, so evil.
So . . . empty.
Somewhere during Geoff's breakup speech, Heather slips her arm around his shoulders, rests her head on his left one.
He says nothing.
In that moment, I stop believing in love. It sounds dramatic, but it's true.
And then it is all over, and Geoff is walking out of the door, his final Goodbye, Bridge uttered in a cold, plain voice that does not sound like the Geoff I know, Heather following him, no air left in the room, and I cannot breathe for a second. In that second it is like everything I ever was is gone.
My life, crashing down. The pieces falling, but I can't hold them, can't try to put them back together—each time I try, they pierce my hand, sliding right through as if I am made of nothing but air; each time I try, they continue to fall, falling, falling, falling, until I can't see them anymore, until any chance of them coming back to one is gone.
I utter these words into the mirror, my voice empty. I look at the girl in the mirror, who looks exactly like me, but strangely enough, less beaten, less worn, like she does not know what I know. She looks like the girl I used to be, enthusiastic and fun and full of hope for the future. Full of love, which I no longer believe exists.
I look at her, and then I talk. I tell her stories of Geoff and me, stories I swore to myself I'd never tell, stories about the good times and the bad times and the times where I felt he was the only thing that mattered, ever. I tell her stories of all the times Geoff and I were one, and the times we were two, and the times we were one and a half. I tell her of the times we were one, literally, if you know what I mean, and I tell her of the times we were not us, but a French maid and a police officer during a drug raid. I tell her these stories, hoping that maybe that if I tell them all, one day I can forget.
And then I see the strange, metallic glint in the other girl's eye, the gleam that I've grown to know all too well. Is that a camera?
Nah, I decide. My luck couldn't be that bad.
