art by : cotossum on instagram
Not-So Happy Campers: Part One
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In all honesty, you thought that your best friend, Vincent, was joking around with you when he wanted you to audition with him for some reality competition show. You did it, obviously, but you seriously didn't expect for your very unserious and very unprofessional videos to actually get accepted.
Then, all of a sudden, there you were, stuck on a boat in the middle of Lake Wawanakwa after spending an hour or two going over your contracts and signing away your freedom.
It felt like a damn fever dream.
"I hate you so much right now."
Vincent coolly leaned against the railing of the boat and slightly tilted his head with a lazy smirk. "Don't worry, I'll get over it."
You've been best friends with him for practically your entire life, but you were seriously questioning whether or not to throw him overboard at that moment.
With a roll of your eyes, you diverted your attention towards the lake. The calming breeze and the gentle waves helped soothe your nerves a tinge, but the grueling reality spiked your anxiousness when you saw the island gradually coming into view.
"What if we just get murdered?"
Vincent grinned. "Nah, won't happen," he replied before humming in thought for a second. "Well, I mean... if it does, you'll be the only one to die because I'll use you as a shield."
"Hey. Fuck you."
"Now there's something that'll never happen."
You groaned and mentally prayed to Creator to give you an opening so you could throw him off of the damn boat, but his remarks did help lighten your nervousness by replacing it with annoyance, so you had to give him a little credit.
As the island was coming closer into view, you could definitely begin to see that it was not the resort that was promised on the website. Instead, you saw cabins and a fire pit with tree stumps and a pitiful looking beach.
Vincent nudged you. "Do you remember that camp we went to when we were like eight? This reminds me of it."
"Oh, yeah, I remember," you nodded. "I also remember you getting sent home because you had lice."
He laughed. "I don't know why you're talking because you got sent home too. You're the one that gave them to me, after all."
"Yeah, whatever, Buggy."
The boat docked and from the large group of people currently staring at you, you could tell that you had to be one of the last ones to arrive. The host, Chris McLean, grinned widely at the two of you.
"Vincent and [Name]!" he introduced. "Welcome to the island. Everyone, these two are childhood friends to lovers-?"
You cut the host off immediately, giving him a small glare. "We're not lovers. Don't ever disrespect me like that again."
Vincent snickered as he grabbed both of your luggages. Chris merely shrugged, holding out his hand to help you down from the boat. "Could've fooled me."
With a slight eye roll, you accepted the host's aid and stepped onto the dock. You were quick to notice how unstable and shaky it felt under your weight, but you brushed it off.
Your best friend went to throw your luggage in with everyone else's, so you walked up to the closest person and stood next to them—which happened to be one of the most gorgeous girls you've ever laid your eyes on.
She greeted you quickly, giving you a warm smile as she tilted her head slightly to the side and waved at you. "Hi!" she beamed, her voice laced with honey. "I'm Lindsay. You're, like, super gorg!"
You blinked, stunned by her bluntness. "Oh, thank you. You are too."
"I get that a lot," she hummed with a small nod.
You obviously believed her, but decided to not press any further on the topic. "I'm [Name], by the way."
She gasped in delight, her piercing blue eyes sparkling. "Oh my gosh! I have a sister named that.. or was it my cousin? Maybe it was my friend." She placed her finger on her cheek, seemingly in deep thought. "Actually, I think you're the only person I know who's named [Name]."
You turned around to see that Vincent was already mingling with a few of the other guys, so you directed your attention back to Lindsay. She noticed who you were looking at and smiled brightly.
"Oh my gosh. Is that, like, your boyfriend?"
"No," you immediately denied, wondering how she already forgot that you corrected the host when he made that same mistake. "He's just my friend."
"I have a guy friend back home too, his name is—"
Next thing you knew, she began chattering about a plethora of frivolous things. Namely, her friends back home. You didn't stop or interrupt her, just nodding your head along as you listened. She took the lead on the conversation and didn't force you to remark if you didn't want to, which you greatly appreciated.
Within such a short amount of time, you'd come to learn quite a few things about her. You noticed that she wasn't the.. brightest. You had to correct her when she misused or mispronounced a word and you helped her out when she was struggling to properly articulate something, but she was such an easy person to get along with that you felt lucky you met her first.
Finally, the last contestant arrived on a boat. An eccentric, red-headed girl was excitedly waving at everyone with a wide smile.
"Everyone," Chris captured everyone's attention, "it's Izzy!"
"Hi, Chris!" Izzy shouted, running towards the railing of the boat. "Hi, everyone! Hi! Hi!"
Before the boat could fully come to a spot, Izzy jumped off of it and fell straight in the water, but not before bashing her head against the dock. All of you flinched, but the only person who ran to help her was a brunette.
"Oh," a brown-haired guy snickered, "that was bad."
"Ouch," Lindsay commented, but her expression remained neutral. "Did she die?"
"I hope not," you replied.
"Guys!" the brunette scolded as she reached into the water to help Izzy onto the dock. "She could be seriously hurt!"
Izzy was on all fours and shook the water off of her as if she was a dog. "That felt so..." she hopped to her feet, "good! Except for hitting my chin. This is summer camp? That is so cool! Do you have papier-mâché here? Are we having lunch soon?!"
A blonde dude pointed at her, excitement teeming in his voice. "That is a good question!"
Chris ignored all of her questions. "First things first, we need a group photo for the promos. Everyone on the edge of the dock."
Lindsay grabbed ahold of your arm and began pulling you along with her. "You have to stand next to me. We're going to look so cute in these pictures."
Chris hopped up on the boat Izzy fell off of as everyone got situated. You and Vincent were standing on opposite sides of each other, mainly because Lindsay wanted you to stand next to her and he most likely didn't want to interfere with your newfound friendship with her. He stood in between a blonde dude wearing a cowboy hat and a girl with long, black hair.
Lindsay wrapped her arm around you and smiled brightly. You awkwardly shuffled into a more comfortable position next to her and gave the camera a timid grin.
"Okay," Chris exclaimed, getting ready to take the picture, "One.. two.. three! Oops. Okay, I forgot the lens cap. Let's try this again, hold that pose! One.. two—Oh no, wait. Card's full."
A few of the contestants let out groans of annoyance as Chris had to reload the camera with a different card. Your small smile fell into a frown as you scoffed.
"Come on, man! My face is starting to freeze!"
"Got it!" Chris announced. "Okay! Everyone say, "Wawanakwa"!"
"Wawanakwa—!"
Everyone froze at the sound of the docks cracking underneath your feet. In a split second, it collapsed and all you heard were screams before you plummeted into the very cold waters below. Lindsay, having her arm wrapped around you, held you tightly and dragged you further under the water with her, no matter how much you thrashed to get her off of you.
You quickly realized that Lindsay had no intention of letting you go, so you pulled her along with you to the surface. When the two of you were finally able to breath, you grabbed onto a piece of floating debris from the broken dock.
"Let go of me and hold onto this," you told her and she did as you instructed.
You could hear Chris laughing at all of you. "All right. Everyone, enough horsing around. Dry off and meet at the campfire pit in ten minutes." The boat then sailed away, but not before he snapped one more picture of all of you floating in the water.
Lindsay moved her wet hair away from her face and sheepishly smiled at you. "I don't really know how to swim," she admitted.
"Oh, so that's why you were practically strangling me under the water," you chuckled.
She gasped. "I'm so sorry! I didn't meant to strangle you."
You shook your head, a small smile on your lips. "No, don't worry, you weren't actually strangling me."
You took ahold of the debris she was holding onto and began tugging her along with you towards shore. Many of the others were already there—probably because they didn't have someone latched onto them underneath the water and were able to quickly swim there.
Lindsay and you crawled onto the pitiful beach and you were seconds away from just laying down in the sand and staying there for however long, but Vincent walked over and kneeled down right next to you.
"You were right. We might get murdered here," he stated, with a stoic expression. Water was dripping down his face and his wet clothes uncomfortably stuck to his body.
"Go fuck yourself," you quipped back.
He stood back up and reached his hands out, helping both you and Lindsay to your feet. The blonde giggled. "Thank you, [Name]'s boyfriend." Then, she turned to you and not-so subtly whispered in your ear. "He's super cute, but you're cuter. He's so lucky!"
You deadpanned. "Lindsay, he's not my boyfriend."
"She wishes," Vincent quipped back with a smirk.
"Six feet," you glared before pushing him away from you.
The three of you walked together towards the camp. It wasn't an awkward walk, since Vincent was a sociable person and was chatting with Lindsay about random things while you just listened.
When everyone made it to the campfire pit, you heard the blonde dude wearing the cowboy hat call Vincent's name. You looked and saw him waving your best friend over.
"Already made a friend?" you commented.
He shrugged, pointing to Lindsay. "So did you."
"[Name] and I are best friends," Lindsay nodded happily as she hugged your arm.
Vincent snickered. "Replaced me already?"
"Sure did."
He grinned. It was obvious that he was happy about you stepping out of your comfort zone, so he decided not to interfere with your newfound friendship. "I'll go stand by Geoff, then."
With that, he walked away from the two of you and towards the blonde dude—whose name was apparently Geoff.
You and Lindsay took your seats on two of the stumps. Izzy sat on stump next to you. There were limited stumps available, so a few people had to resort to standing, which they didn't seem to mind.
Some people engaged in small talk as they waited for the host to arrive, and soon the silence was immediately filled with lively chatter amongst everyone. Lindsay turned to talk to the black-haired boy sitting beside her and you were forced to humor the red-head next to you who talked nonstop.
She reminded you of Lindsay, in the sense that they can both talk for so long without taking a break.
"Oh, and then I was arrested again! Can you believe that?!" she asked you, but it appeared to be a rhetorical question because before you were even able to answer, she began talking about an entirely new subject. You were hardly even able to keep up with her pace.
Finally, when Chris came to shut down the mindless chatter, she silenced herself. But not before poking you in the shoulder and saying, "I like you!"
You gave her a small smile in return, not even bothering to question her statement and instead focused your attention on the host.
"This is Camp Wawanakwa!" he introduced in a cheerful manner. "Your home for the next eight weeks. The campers sitting around you will be your cabin mates, your competition, and maybe even your friends. You dig? The camper that manages to stay on Total Drama Island the longest without getting voted off will win the 100,000 dollars!"
A guy with a green mohawk and navy blue eyes walked to the front of the group, standing a little ways in front of a girl with long, greyish-black hair and matching eyes.
"Excuse me, what will the sleeping arrangements be? Because I'd like too request a bunk under her," he tauntingly pointed at the aforementioned girl, who was very pretty, you were inclined to admit.
You watched as she uncomfortably shuffled closer to the girl sitting on a stump next to her. "They're not co-ed, are they?" she said, slight worry lacing her tone, but it was filled with disgust more than anything else.
"No," Chris chuckled. "Girls get one side of each cabin and dudes get the other."
Lindsay raised her hand, causing you to quirk an eyebrow. "Excuse me, Kyle? Can me and [Name] have the cabin with the lake view since we're, like, both the prettiest?" she questioned innocently, causing your eyes to widen. You don't know whether or not you'd become used to her shamelessness.
Izzy excitedly nodded her head. "Yeah, yeah! I want a cabin with her, too!" she pointed at you.
Chris tilted his head. "Okay, first of all, It's Chris," he recoiled with a frown, "and secondly, that's not how it's going to work around here."
Two girls in the front with matching black hairstyles and outfits grabbed each other's hands. "I have to live with Sadie, or I'll die."
"And I'll break out in hives, it's true!"
The girl with short, black and blue hair in front of you groaned. "This cannot be happening," she mumbled. You tuned out the rest of the conversation after an energetic blonde guy grabbed her head and the brown-haired guy's head to bring them in for a hug.
Lindsay turned to you with a frown. "Aw, [Name]! I hope we get to be in the same cabin," she said.
You nodded, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry about it, Lindsay," you smiled before the host directed everyone's attention back to him.
"Here's the deal, we're gonna split you up into two teams," Chris explained.
Vincent raised his hand. "I have to be on [Name]'s team or I'd die." It was clear he was mocking the other set of friends.
"I don't even know him like that," you replied.
He shrugged in response. "Fine, split us up."
"Woah, let's not get too hasty now," you frowned.
Chris ignored both of you and pulled a list out from his pocket. "If I call your name out, go stand over there: Gwen, Trent, Heather, Cody, Lindsay, [Name], Beth, Katie, Owen, Leshawna, Justin, and Noah."
Lindsay squeaked excitedly as she grabbed your hands and pulled you along with her. Everyone who was called went to the respective spot, formed a large group and awaited for further instructions. Your new friend didn't want to let go of your hands, but you didn't make any attempt to remove them yourself.
"From this moment on, you are officially known as..." Chris threw a large, green banner in your direction. The blonde guy from earlier was the one caught it. "The Screaming Gophers!"
He unraveled the banner and stared happily at its design. "Yeah!" he cheered. "I'm a Gopher! Woo!"
While Katie worried for her friend, Chris informed everyone else to stand on the other side. After some complications with the two best friends who refused to be on opposite teams, he introduced the other team as the Killer Bass before throwing a red banner at a ginger dude. He unraveled it and stared at it in awe.
You looked over at Vincent, who was currently giving high-fives to three guys: Geoff, the guy with the green Mohawk, and a guy wearing a white durag.
Surprise, surprise. We're on different teams.
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[Author's Note] — I'm actually really happier writing this story like this: Where one episode doesn't equal one chapter, you know? I want to include off-camera interactions and give more depth to some characters. Since this is just the introductory chapter, the next one should be longer... maybe. Don't hold your breath lol.
Also, Vincent is not a love interest nor will he be anyone else's love interest. He's MC's best friend, simple.
Finally, the elimination order will not follow the show's. Since MC and Vincent are added, obviously it's going to change things. Doesn't it suck when people create reader inserts yet DON'T change anything? Hell, sometimes they don't even create their own dialogue for the MC and just steal a different character's sentences. I stop reading whenever a story does that tbh.
- love, cupid xo