So… somehow I managed to complete this chapter earlier than planned! Huzzah! Lol. XD But, for real, somehow I managed to get a good chunk of free time between the hell vortex of insanity that is my life as a healthcare professional trying to find my first house during a pandemic. But, at least I have my dog, video chatting with family and friends… and of course my beloved hobby as a 25 year old woman writing fanfiction that literally saves my sanity. Haha. Seriously, this fanfiction journey with this story has been some of the best fun I've had in a long time during these trying times and the fact that I have you guys taking this journey with me and telling me how much enjoyment it brings to your day… it never fails to make me touched. So thank you all so much for all the support and kind words. It means so much. Enough blubbering, on with the story! This chapter begins 2 days after the party. Heather has returned to her parent's house in suburban Toronto and José is just about to sit down to breakfast. This is one of the first chapters I've written in a while that has no POV, but I did this intentionally to help keep the mystery of 'things to come'. You'll see. ;) Hope you all enjoy!
2 days later
({No POV})
It was morning and José walked into the dining room like usual where their cook Isobel had already set out his breakfast.
But, he was also surprised to see another place setting right next to him with eggs, toast, and a slice of ham with a piping hot cup of black coffee on the side. He thought for a moment about who it was for since usually he was always the first one to eat breakfast since Alejandro usually went jogging before breakfast and his father didn't join him until the paper was delivered.
Eventually, José just shrugged and sat down and looked like he was about to start eating without a second thought until he heard, "Buenas días, mijo. Oh, how marvelous. Isobel already has breakfast ready for the both of us."
José whipped his head to the archway leading into the dining room to see his father standing there and then take the extra place set out next to his son and started cutting his slice of ham into pieces.
All the while, José was giving his father a confused look.
Gerardo caught this as he started, "What? I felt in the mood for a proper breakfast this morning. Besides, I feel like I hardly get to see you lately. Everything going well?"
José still gave his father a suspicious look as he took a bite of his eggs and responded, "Classes are fine." "I have no doubt. You've always been a good student. But, if you don't mind my asking, I'm more curious to know about your… personal affairs. Anything interesting?"
José continued to give his father a suspicious look before responding opaquely, "Just the usual."
Gerardo took a sip of his coffee before elaborating, "Son, I know you have always been a studious young man and I have never doubted your intelligence; however… I think you are misunderstanding my meaning. Or is it time we have a talk again?"
José immediately rolled his eyes and started, knowing exactly where his father was steering the conversation, "For the last time, father. I am not interested in having a girlfriend, relationship, or otherwise. From my perspective, it is a waste of time, money, and effort. I'm doing just fine on my own."
"Oh, I'm well aware of your... flings, son. But, perhaps before ridiculing the idea this time, you can at least give it a fair trial for once, sí?" Gerardo responded instantly, sounding almost matter of fact.
"I said, I'm fine. I've never been interested in anything serious and don't plan on having anything serious. Besides, why would I want one when I am capable of having my pick?" José responded with a sly smirk, an aire of arrogance radiating off him as he expressed his opinion on his usual dealings with women.
Gerardo, while still remaining calm somehow, snapped slightly in bitterness at his middle son's typical attitude toward women, "Only because you don't look for the right qualities, perhaps? And before you countermand me again, since when have you ever tried to date a young lady seriously? In fact, I certainly can't think of a time you have ever brought 'your pick' to meet your mother and I or even accompany you to a function of some sort. One instance doesn't seem to come to mind, does it?"
José opened his mouth and stood up to protest at his father's bluntness, looking on the verge of fuming in frustrated rage at his father.
Gerardo; however, stood up and started, "Now son, I do not wish to make a thing of this. I am only asking you to try and listen to what I have to say. And who knows? You may find what I have to propose more interesting than you thought and perhaps change your 'outlook' so to speak."
Though clearly despising the entire conversation, José knew for many different reasons that he was stuck… partially due to financial and housing related reasons.
José sat back down and started, taking another bite of his eggs, as he said, "Very well… what is it?"
Gerardo smirked and started, "There's no need to be bitter, son. In fact, I think you may actually be more interested than you thought. Now, during your mother and I's party, I happened to find out that Heather has an older sister your age. Need I mention she's single?"
José's eyes immediately went wide before his eyebrows furrowed in rage before spitting in displeasure, "I would rather have my insides chewed out by rats than go anywhere near anyone related to that loca little…"
At that moment, Gerardo smirked and pulled out his phone before pulling something up and turning it toward his son. José immediately went silent, his mouth slightly agape, and progressively became wide eyed as he stared at what his father was showing him on his phone.
The egg on José's fork fell into his lap as he kept staring at the screen, not even seeming remotely bothered to care.
Gerardo continued to respond knowingly, "What was that you were saying again, mijo?"
José was still hardly even responsive as he looked at a picture of Kelsey on her personal business networking profile on the same site he worked off of for his business internships in grad school.
Eventually José finally snapped out of his trance as he said, suddenly 'changing his tune' as he started thinking from another perspective once he saw Kelsey's picture, "I'm listening."
Even though it was just a standard professional headshot image, José didn't need anymore to see that Kelsey was a very attractive young woman… though now he was getting other ideas about wanting to see more of Kelsey in his mind.
Gerardo, now seeming a bit more satisfied, started, "This is Heather's older sister, Kelsey. And I think you'll find that you both have quite a bit in common. From what I've gathered, she's educated in business just like you, mijo. Lives downtown, works as a junior executive for a large distribution company, and not to mention seems to be a nice looking young lady as you've realized by now surely? Though, it's up to you though. After all you're a grown man and I could also see why you would be unwilling to date a young woman at my suggestion. Which is a pity, I was even going to offer you my car to take her out and impress her properly on a date, but since you don't seem to be…"
"Do you happen to have her number by any chance?" José interjected, now looking even more interested than before.
Well at least seeming obviously physically interested in Kelsey… as well as feeling more motivated at the suggestion of his father finally giving him permission to borrow his sports car.
Gerardo grinned in satisfaction, clearly seeing he was finally getting somewhere with his middle son for once.
Later that day in downtown Ottawa
Elena walked back into her office after a meeting with a new distributor to help extend their products to South America.
Since it was a lunch meeting that even ended early on top of it, Elena for once had a bit of free time in her daily itinerary. She sat down at her desk and looked as if she was about to work ahead until her line of sight eventually fell on something that she actually looks at every single day.
It was a family portrait of her with her husband and her sons from about 5 years ago.
Elena grinned slightly for a moment as she almost affectionately and in a very motherly way smoothed her thumb over the picture frame and had a clear look of pride as she looked at her sons in particular, especially once her line of sight settled on Alejandro.
She smiled at him for a few moments until something else looked as if it crossed her mind.
Even though Elena had always been beyond perplexed to say the least when it came to her youngest son's attraction toward a particular young lady.
And it was especially on her mind now more than ever after her and her husband's anniversary party.
Elena looked as if she was thinking and mulling over something quite seriously.
Eventually Elena set down the picture and went to her laptop on her desk and quickly pulled up her web browser and typed while saying to herself, "Let's see exactly what you're about, young lady."
Heather Wilson.
As soon as she finished typing the name of her 'person of interest', Elena hit the search button and saw quite a plethora of results.
She scrolled down, seeing mostly things related to Heather's time on Total Drama… until she saw something that she personally hadn't seen before. It was a video from more than 5 years ago.
"Total Drama Audition Tape: Heather Wilson"
Elena quirked up an eyebrow in intrigue as she clicked the link and brought up the video only to see Heather immediately and quite confidently walk right in front of the camera in nothing but a towel in her bathroom and sounding extremely sure of herself in more ways than one.
Heather: "Will I be nervous if I'm chosen to be on the show? *Scoff* No, why should I be? I am extremely comfortable being on national television. I know I look good. Some girls may have issues with their bodies, but maybe they just aren't as pretty as I am?... Pick me and I promise high ratings."
Elena's look of agitated disdain returned in full force for Heather as she rolled her eyes.
Although Elena could also think of a great many words she could use to describe her youngest son's now girlfriend at the moment as well.
She kept going down the line of videos and links on the search engine, also getting increasingly more annoyed at seeing quite a lot of Heather's results also having to do with Alejandro. Especially seeing the shots of them being in particularly close proximity from when her son got on the show in his first season where he met Heather in the first place.
Elena was almost breezing through pages in rapid succession until she got to some more lesser known results of Heather's.
Particularly, Elena went from being annoyed to intrigued as she saw quite a few results for Heather from when she won awards for various high school sports, being on the honor roll at Boyd Fines High School where she graduated from.
Also, she happened to find A LOT of results for the Huntington Country Club having Heather's name attached as well as a young man by the name of 'Shane Watson'.
Curiously, Elena clicked on the first link only to go wide eyed in intrigue.
Several hours later in suburban Toronto
After hearing from Gerardo that José was on board, Heather was now putting her end of the plan into action as she called her sister.
Heather heard the dial tone go for about 2 rings until she heard the call pick up as Kelsey immediately spat in malice with annoyed disdain radiating through her tone, "What do you want?!"
"Hey sis, how are things?" Heather teasingly taunted with a smirk.
"Oh, don't give me any of that crap, Heather! Because of somebody and her stupid boy toy, I had to get my building manager to hire a carpet cleaner for my apartment to get rid of that stupid egg stain. So thanks a lot." Kelsey retorted in annoyance and anger at her little sister.
Heather smirked for a second in satisfaction before replying sadistically playful, "Well, look at it this way, at least now you have really clean carpet?"
"Hey, I had to take a day off just for that whole crap parade, you little bitch! UGH! Don't you have anything better to do than ruin my life?!" Kelsey spat again through the receiver.
Heather just kept smirking in satisfaction as she said, "But, you haven't even heard what I'm going to say. Especially since I'm about to do you a favor."
"I'd sooner chew broken glass than accept any favor from YOU!" Kelsey growled, sounding the epitome of pissed off.
"Okay, I was going to set you up with a really hot guy, but…" Heather started until Kelsey cut in with, "Heather... you single handedly destroyed my last year of high school, you dented my car, and then you and your twisted Latin Lover fucked up my living room carpet, so if you're planning on screwing me over again… then you might as well just burn down my fucking apartment."
Heather ignored her sister's tirade as she just casually texted a picture of José on a business networking site she found to her sister.
Since she wanted to make sure she was 'promoting José' as best as possible to make sure her sister agreed. Even though she knew a picture of José wearing a suit and tie from his business networking profile was all she needed.
Immediately Kelsey stopped talking and then complained as she received the text, "Ugh, what the hell did you just…"
Kelsey went dead silent until finally she said, now sounding intrigued and interested, "Um… who is this?"
Heather smirked again, knowing Kelsey was finally 'taking the bait' like she planned and totally knew she would.
Even though Heather despised José and thought he was a complete and total skeez, she had to begrudgingly admit that José was an extremely attractive guy, just like Alejandro and Carlos… and everyone else it seemed in their family much to Heather's annoyance.
"That is Alejandro's brother, José. He only lives 25 minutes from Ottawa. But since someone doesn't seem to want...," Heather lured as Kelsey abruptly cut in, "Wait!"
It was quiet for a few seconds before Kelsey replied, now sounding incredibly suspicious, "Okay, hold on a second here… What's wrong with him?"
"Um, what?" Heather retorted.
"Oh cut the crap, Heather! You're just expecting me to believe that you're setting me up with a total smokeshow like him with no strings attached? What sort of idiot do you take me for?! Now what's wrong with him?! He's gotta be some kind of psycho or a serial killer that preys on women and hides their bodies in his basement or something, right?"
As much as most people would dismiss Kelsey's accusation as completely ridiculous, to Heather… it was sort of understandable to a degree. After all, Kelsey wasn't wrong to think that Heather had some sort of 'ulterior motive' behind just setting her up with a guy as good looking as José without there being something more to it.
But, Heather wasn't about to let her sister know that was the case.
Instead, Heather straightened up her vocal composure as she lied smoothly, "Okay look, he was the one that asked me after he saw a picture of you, so I'm really doing him a favor. Even though I don't know why anyone would want to date you."
Immediately Kelsey retaliated, "Oh, really?! Well suck it, Heather! And why wouldn't any guy want to date me? I mean, can you blame him? Obviously your stupid casanova's brother knows something good when he sees it. Give that Jorge guy my number."
"José." Heather countered.
"Whatever, just give him my number and tell him I'm available Friday. And if I don't hear from him, then I'll know you're full of it and I'll personally drive down to mom and dad's and ensure something even worse than Bruiser's litter box is dumped over your head for wasting my time. Got it?"
"Oh, don't worry. He'll definitely hit you up. I'll pass it along." Heather replied with a smirk as she heard Kelsey reply, "You better." The call immediately dropped as Kelsey hung up.
Slowly Heather put her phone down as a deviously satisfied expression crossed her face while she said to herself, "Hope you enjoy your 'date'… Sucker."
So… a lot of open ends and scheming all around in this chapter. I know this was a bit of a tease, but I needed a bridge chapter to help make sense of things for the future. Because trust me, for those of you who are drama seekers… do NOT worry. To misquote "GoT"… 'drama is coming'. Lol. XD But, I mainly wanted to elaborate more on the kind of characters I'm building both Kelsey and José as. Since all we got was about barely 3 minutes of seeing José as character in the show, this left A LOT of room for me to try and build a characterization for him with what little I had. But, as I have said, in that short amount of time, I just saw José as just being this conceited, arrogant douchebag who gets himself off on Alejandro's misery. Then as an extension, due to that personality… I could also see José being this 'womanizer' who mostly sees women as 'sexual objects' since he only really goes after girls who are 'looking for a good time' and doesn't even attempt to date seriously. Nothing wrong with being a sexually driven person! It's just the way that José goes about it that makes him a bit of a, well… douche who is mostly just interested in woman for sex alone in his past dealings. And now for Kelsey… yeah, she's just 'lovely' isn't she? Lol. XD Since all we got was a very vague description in the show during season 2 when Heather thought she was dying and started writing up her will and she said she had plural 'brothers and sisters' who she thought were 'lazy slackers'. So with the exception of Damien, I had to make up my own siblings that I could envision Heather having. So in Kelsey's case… I just wanted to show one of the many reasons why Heather is 'the way she is'. Sure while I will concede that Heather was probably always a stubborn, mean and borderline twisted sociopath to a degree… Heather was also realistically pushed in my mind into being the villainess we all know her by people like her sister Kelsey constantly destroying her self-esteem (here's where the flashback in chapter 10 comes into play). Kelsey, while she may not be quite a twisted borderline sociopath like Heather, is NOT a good person by any stretch. Actually she's a mean, hypocritical bitch who blames other people for things that happen to her even though she's just getting what Karma owes her. But, that's all the information I'll give on Kelsey for now since I don't want to give anything away. Stay tuned. ;) What will happen on Kelsey and José's date? What exactly will Elena find on Heather? And when will Aleheather return? All will start to be answered/returned in the next chapter. As always many thanks for taking the time to read and constructive feedback is always appreciated. I'll try to post again on Friday or Saturday if my schedule is still open. I'll keep you all posted!
Stay classy, healthy, and safe all!
Dexter1995