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Harold had just watched Courtney and Duncan share a kiss.
Let me rephrase this, Harold had just watched someone who had a passion for bullying him finally kiss the girl he was oh so obviously pinning on. I mean seriously, anyone could tell Duncan has googoo eyes for Courtney. GOSH.
He just watched Duncan, the bad boy who has no soft spot for anyone, gently held Courtney as they shared their first kiss. Harold couldn’t believe it.
Courtney wasn’t as mean as Duncan, in fact, she defended those who fell victim to Duncan’s bullying.
He remembered she was the only one who didn’t make fun of Tyler’s fear of chickens (though she did pressure DJ to get over his fear of snakes.) She’s a bossy pants, she always wants control over the situation. However she still didn’t tolerate bullying of others for the most part.
They were so different from one another, but that is why opposites attract work out so well. Duncan seemed to enjoy the whole “controlling thing” Courtney got going for herself. And Courtney liked the bad-boy (and unbeknownst to Harold, good-guy) persona Duncan had going for himself.
But back to the present issue: Harold knew that if his team lost the challenge, he’d be out.
They were all friends with each other: Geoff and Bridgette with a romance developing, the friendship between Courtney and Bridgette, and of course the kiss shared between Duncan and Courtney just now solidified their relationship.
You can’t forget that everyone loves DJ, and there's no way any of them would consider voting him out at this time.
So that left Harold standing out like a sore thumb to be voted.
—
As the next morning came, they did in fact lose the challenge.
Courtney couldn’t stop laughing and fell off the tree almost immediately and went to cuddle up with Duncan, and Geoff just couldn’t beat Gwen while hanging upside down.
Harold saw red. He wanted to make Duncan suffer in the worst way possible. He needed to do something mean, maybe as far as to mess with Duncan’s love life.
But messing with someone’s love life wouldn’t be any better.
Courtney has never done anything particularly rude to him besides laughing at the time he was nude on his bed floating in the lake.
Yeesh, that was embarrassing.
And if he had to justify it, everyone was laughing at him, not just Courtney. He thought about the things he could do before getting voted off. He could leave Duncan a surprise of dirty undies, or throw all of Duncan’s clothes away.
Or maybe… he could rig the votes and get Courtney off. Yet again, that would be sabotaging Duncan’s love relationship.
Here’s the thing, Courtney is a threat to the upcoming solo challenges. She’s good. She knows exactly what she’s doing and is as skilled with challenges as Heather is with manipulation. In fact, Courtney might be as skilled with manipulation if she focused less on complete control of the situation.
It would be logical to vote her out now rather than later. Yet also unfair. All contestants should be eliminated fairly without any special circumstances to it. Come on, of course Harold has his standard morals. Who do you think he is, GOSH?
Suddenly it clicked, he had the perfect idea for revenge. Something that would embarrass Duncan.
Nightfall came quicker than Harold imagined it. As it was time for elimination, everyone went into the confessionals to vote out who they wanted gone. The players staying were announced by Chris.
“Duncan.”
“DJ.”
“Bridgette.”
GOSH, did Chris take a long time saying their names for suspension or what. One by one each contestant got up and watched the remaining three in hopes that someone (Geoff and Courtney) were still in.
“Geoff.”
It remained just him and Courtney now. If you looked closely, you could see she was just as nervous. Courtney hasn’t tried to let her emotions out after the fear factor challenge, she has kept a poker face. If anything has scared her, no one would’ve noticed unless she stated it specifically. But she wasn’t that type of person to open up about her fears either, if the fear factor challenge was anything to work off of.
“And the final marshmallow goes too… “
Harold glanced at Courtney. Her smug nervously placed smile. She grinned at Duncan the entire time, who was giving her the same confident expression. If you looked closer, you could see she was crossing her fingers too.
“Courtney.”
She stood up and immediately ran to Duncan, giving him a hug and the most genuine smile Harold had seen from her in the entire show. Duncan looked like he could fly to the moon, his expression showed it all. That was the moment she let all her walls of emotions fall down, just for that douchebag.
“Harold, it’s the boat of losers for you!” Chris called out, leading Harold to the dock of shame.
As he walked away from the crowd, he could still hear everyone cheering as the friend group of the Killer Bass stayed together. In the end, he was glad he didn’t rig the votes against Courtney. He had something worse up his sleeve anyway.
A pile of Duncan's scrapped love letters laid on Courtney’s bed. He’s really not as evil as he thought, but the embarrassment Duncan would face is something Harold wished he could experience.
While Harold was gloating in his loss, the boat turned the corner and suddenly faced a mansion Harold would’ve dreamed to see. As he looked closer, there stood some of the past contestants. Katie and Sadie were by the pool right now.
Maybe my elimination wasn't so bad.
–
“Hey Courtney, what’s that on your bed?”
Bridgette pointed out to a bunch of letters that were left on her bed, seeming like it was done in a rush. She shrugged her shoulders and walked towards them, gabbing the first one she could and picked it up to read.
"to courtney,
hi, im horrible at expressing myself honestly, you might as well know that by now, but i wanted to tell you that… "
She only needed to read the first sentence to know it all. Tears started streaming down her face. By the time she got to the end of the letter, it was almost covered in her tears.
“Whoa whoa Court, what’s wrong?” This was one of the most romantic things she read.
“Nothing Bridge, just that maybe he isn’t completely a bad boy as I thought.”
Later that night, Courtney found herself wandering to the boys side of the cabin before it was lights out. She could hear they were still awake, the talking through the walls gave it away.
Knocking on the door, the conversation pauses before a small amount of footsteps sound through and Geoff opens the door.
“Hey, can I steal Duncan from you?”
“Yeah, he’s all yours.” Geoff smirks.
Duncan stands up and walks to the door smirking. Before he leaves, Courtney hears Geoff say something to Duncan that sounds like a, “have fun.” He continues to smirk at them before the door shuts.
Once it's closed, Courtney grabs Duncan by the hand and drags him away with purpose. Before he (or she) realizes it, they’ve made it to the boardwalk.
You could see the stars shine brightly right now. Not a single cloud in the sky, it was truly a gorgeous night.
“Whoa Court, you’re not breaking up with me or anything right?”
“What? Why would you think that?” She responds.
“Well I… You kinda just dragged me all here without saying a word?”
“Oh. Sorry. I got lost in thought.”
A beat passes by before Courtney starts the conversation again.
“Sit with me,” she says. Courtney goes to sit down on the boardwalk and pats a spot next to her, signaling to Duncan that he should follow.
“So… what’s up?” Duncan says.
“I saw your letters.”
“What letters?”
Courtney digs into her pocket before pulling out a couple of love letters Duncan had scrapped. His eyes widened immediately, looking exasperated.
“How’d you get that?!”
“I found them on my bed.”
“Who did this? I thought I had hidden them so well! I swear to god whoever found these is gonna-”
“Do you truly mean it?” Courtney pauses him. When she sees he’s a bit confused by what she means, she continues. “The letters, do you mean what you wrote in them?”
Duncan’s eyes soften for a second before turning into a confident smile.
“Every word, princess.”
Courtney feels herself relax in that moment and leans into Duncan’s shoulder.
He truly cares, he truly cares about HER. She is bossy, she is controlling, she can be selfish. And yet, he still loves her.
Before she knows it, tears begin to fall down her face. She feels Duncan lean away from her only to wipe the tears from her face and look at her with one of the softest expressions she’s ever seen on a man.
“I love you, Courtney. Every single part of you. I love how confident you are. How you always try to be the leader in a group, and how you never seem to back down from a challenge. You’re fearless. And even with your personal fears, that’s what makes you… well, you.”
She looks up at him with her, a smile forming on her face.
“I love you too. I love how much of a bad-boy you are, but I love even more how soft you are, even if you pretend otherwise. I’ll keep that secret of yours safe for however long you’d like it.”
Duncan smiles in response and cups Courtney’s face before leaning in for a kiss. She reciprocates and finds one of her hands going to his shoulder.
A moment passes before they finally fall back. Courtney’s eyes glimmer as she looks back at Duncan. They turn back toward the lake, letting the silence speak for a moment.
Whatever happens next, they know they’ll have each other's backs.
They are so winning that $100k.