The Protagonist

A brief explanation

I don't write fanfic. I don't really write fiction at all. But I got a wild hare the other day and decided to follow it down its hole. This is the result. I know that there are platforms dedicated specifically to fanfic in various genres, but I don't see myself writing another anytime soon, so I'm just popping it on my general-purpose blog. 

The Protagonist : A Miss Fortune fanfic

I took a deep, calming breath as I pushed open the door to let myself out of the sheriff's department. I’d wakened to a pre-dawn scream from my neighbor, Ronald, and the day had only gone downhill from there. After getting Gertie to lure Godzilla from my backyard, we’d gone ahead with our planned fishing trip just a little earlier than usual - only to have Ida Bell snag her line on a human femur. Her surprised yell had startled Gertie who had immediately, well, gertied. To make a long story short, I was down yet another pair of running shoes, tank top, and yoga pants, and dealing with the statements and paperwork on the still-unidentified body had taken most of the afternoon. All I wanted at the moment was a shower, a frozen dinner, some of Allie’s brownies, and a long snooze in front of the television. And if Carter had time to stop by later in spite of the new case we’d landed oan his desk, I certainly wouldn’t complain.
Unfortunately, Celia Archaneaux had other plans for my evening.
“There she is!” she screeched as I stepped through the door, not into a quiet street but into an already gathering crowd. “The woman who is ruining Sinful!”
Celia herself was perched precariously on top of a bench, wearing one of her favorite puke-green dresses and a broad, tacky hat. Her face was already blotchy red from shouting - not to mention the Louisiana heat and humidity.
“Give it up, Celia!” shouted Ida Bell from where she’d been waiting for me to finish with Carter. “You’ve been complaining about Fortune from the day she arrived. And she still has more friends in this town than you do!”
“Don’t listen to her!” Celia demanded. “As long as that Yankee hussy is in this town, I’m telling you we’ll never have a day of peace.”
“Ida Bell is right,” someone in the front row of the spectators agreed. “You’ve been complaining about her for months, even after she solved the murder of your daughter and saved your life. Why should we start listening to you now?”
“Because,” Celia said, “Because... she’s a protagonist!”
“A what?” the same guy demanded.
“A protagonist! A heroine! A main character!” She reached into her horrible handbag and pulled out a couple of cheap paperbacks and what looked suspiciously like a textbook, which she waved at the crowd. ”I’ve just figured it out! And she’s not just any kind of protagonist. If she was just a romantic lead from one of those horrible bodice-rippers, we could tolerate it. But that’s not it at all. She’s a protagonist in a comedic cozy mystery series! As long as we allow her to stay, it’ll be chaos and mayhem in our town.”
She started ticking off points on her fingers. “The murder rate will go from one a decade to two a month. Bodies will turn up everywhere she goes. Terrorists will suddenly find a need to lie low in Sinful instead of running guns through NOLA. Drug dealers and traffickers will set up camp in our bayou. Corrupt fish and wildlife officials will threaten our children.” She looked pointedly at Gertie. “There will be mysterious explosions at all hours of the day and night. Alligators will stroll through our streets, and otherwise well behaved dogs will chase innocent citizens for the ‘crime’ of buying sausage from the butcher!”
A murmuring in the crowd suggested people were starting to listen. Heck, I was starting to listen. This was an entirely new tactic with Celia and I was curious as to where she was going with it.
“They,” continued Celia, turning on Gertie and Ida Bell, “are clearly her sidekicks. Not strong enough to cary the story on their own, but nosy and always eager to side with the ‘amateur sleuth’ to the detriment of their neighbors. And they’ll always get away with it, too, because they’re funny!” She spit the word as if it tasted bad.  
“Oh goodie!” squealed Gertie, bouncing a little. “I get to be a sidekick!”
Ignoring her, Celia forged ahead. “Deputy LeBlanc,” she said poisonously, “is obviously the romantic interest. Fortune will get away with murder as long as he’s there to cover for her.”
“If he’s the romantic interest and we’re the sidekicks,” demanded Ida Bell, “what does that make you?” She didn’t look as happy as Gertie did at being relegated to “sidekick.”
“I’m the villainous neighbor.” Celia mumbled.
“The what? Speak up!” insisted Ida Bell.
“All right, I admit it!” Celia shouted, waving her books and turning even redder if possible. “I’m the comic relief in the person of a recurring minor antagonist. Specifically a villainous neighbor.”
Laughter broke out across the crowd as they took that in.
“That’s got you nailed!” shouted someone from the back. “But I’m not sure why we should care! Seems like you’ve got a problem and we don’t!”
“Look, do you think I Like being the butt of every joke?” demanded Celia. “Find it amusing to climb lampposts to escape rampaging alligators? Enjoy flashing my underwear in public?” The laughs were growing in volume. Celia’s voice dropped and grew serious. “Think it’s funny when my daughter and even my worthless ex-husband are murdered just to give her a crime to solve?”
Suddenly the crowd was still.  
“Because that’s the question you should be asking yourselves,” Celia continued. “It started with me, but I’m out of family members. I lost the mayoral election, even though I know they cheated. I’m nothing but comic relief now. And Fortune’s inner circle is perfectly safe too. They’ll attract their share of trouble, but nothing permanently bad will ever happen to them. But you! You all need to think about what sort of skeletons you have hiding in your closets that you don’t mind her digging up. What sordid affairs your no-good husbands are carrying on behind your backs. What your estranged daughters, sons, and in-laws are getting up to. Whether you really don’t mind if your father’s third cousin on his mother’s side is revealed as a con man, or your no-account nephew is murdered by his drug-dealing wife. Because no secret is safe as long as she’s here, and no minor character can ever be guaranteed to survive!” Celia stabbed a finger viciously in my direction. “Every week a new crime or tragedy, each more extreme and less plausible than the last. Your loved ones are at risk. Our town is at risk. The Northerner floozy must go!”
I was starting to wonder if I needed to stand up for myself. I mean, this was unhinged even for Celia. Certainly no-one could be taking her seriously, could they? Of course Carter and I had discussed the apparent uptick in crime and violence that had started with the discovery of Harvey’s bones in my backyard the day I’d arrived in Sinful, but we figured the darkness had always been churning under the surface. We just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time when it finally broke loose - or the right place at the right time, if you believed in fate, anyway. Right?
But the decision was taken from me. At some point during Celia’s rant, Sheriff Lee had woken up from his afternoon nap and continued his patrol through downtown Sinful. He’d directed his ancient horse towards the disturbance (which Carter had, either wisely or cravenly decided to ignore himself, the jury was still out) and was nearly to Celia’s park bench when, wildly gesticulating, she lost her grip on one of her books. It flew into the poor horse’s face and hit him right between the ears. Old as he was, he managed to shy violently into the bench Celia was standing on. Losing her balance, she fell right across the poor creature’s back, dress flipping up to her waist and enormous white panties flashing everyone unfortunate enough to be watching. Understandably the horse took off at the fastest trot he could manage, trying to dislodge his unwelcome passenger who, for her part, clung like a limpet to his mane. As they receded from the street, Sheriff Lee could be heard shouting “Gol durn it, woman, get off my horse! He’s too old to carry both of us! And pull your dress down!”
The mood broken, the crowd began to disperse, mostly laughing and definitely not pulling out any pitchforks.
“C’mon, we’ll grab dinner at Francine’s,” said Gertie, grabbing my arm. “I’ve got that last part on video: we’ll upload it using her WiFi!”
“Don’t let Celia get to you,” agreed Ida Bell, falling into step beside us. “She’s just a sad, angry old woman. No-one listens to her except her cronies, and that’s only because they’re scared not to.”
Sighing, I followed them, feeling a little more thoughtful than Celia usually left me. As we went, I stooped and picked up the book that had caused all the ruckus. “Writing Your Cozy Mystery, a Practical Handbook by Rachel Ward,” it read. I tucked it into my own purse before continuing. It was probably nothing. But if it wasn’t, maybe at least it would give me a few clues when it came to solving the mystery of the body we’d just pulled out of the bayou!
 

Credit for characters and settings in this fanfic belongs to Jana Deleon