Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

9:30 PM, Tuesday night

Chuck drove downtown in the rain towards the late night record shop.

Long cruises were excitingly nerve-wracking, and he would always only like to disappear into his own world in his cabin listening to music.

The shop doors opened and he speedily ran in, intent on acquiring Wilson Phillips. The soothing wows of Wendy Wilson would distract him during the wild ride that is a cruiseship.

Chuck truly loved cruises though, partying through deep, aquatic-blue waves, instead of merely lying in bed, just like no one in particular with any particular last name did.

Chuck was always terrible at similes.

The ship would set sail at Wilson Point, a beautiful area in a beautiful province.

“Wilson?” muttered Chuck, driving faster, “Like Wilson Phillips?”

A coincidence indeed.

Wilson Point was a point enclosed in tall, lush trees, like anywhere else in the lumberwoods.

Henry David Thoreau couldn’t’ve written them if he tried, but he didn’t matter to anyone there, and his last name wasn’t Wilson. 

Chuck didn’t drive a car. Chuck drove a FedEx truck for the volleyball team at the local high school.

His daughters were on provincials in said volleyball team at the time, and they didn’t care about any type of cruise.

All they ever talked about was volleyball and badminton, to the point where they were failing chemistry.

They wouldn’t know what was to come for their poor dad, trucking volleyballs and badminton equipment to a boat. He figured it required some on-deck badminton, like he had seen in the movies.

The truck arrived and Chuck expected a luxurious cruise ship.

It wasn’t quite what he had expected.

The deck reminded him of a ping-pong table, like what his daughters used to practice badminton on, instead of a real deck.

It could’ve been built by a toilet repairman.

The cabins resembled fences with windows built in.

Chuck had already paid, so he carried his cardboard box filled with sports equipment and Wilson Phillips records to the boat.

Clearly, the ship was built by someone who could only build fences.

An inquiry revealed that the builder’s name was “Tim Allen”. 

Entering the boat, Chuck and all the crew were welcomed on by three familiar-looking owners, in poolside shoes and tropical clothing. Their hair was wavy and although one was blond and the other two were darker-haired, you could wonder if they were brothers. 

“And who are you?” asked Chuck, and he wondered as he noticed the blond’s broken nose, did they fight over the ownership of this boat?

A Dallas accent replied, “I’m Andrew Wilson. We’re the Wilson brothers.” 

The Dallas wowboys seemed to pronounce their last name, Wilson, like Wulsin. 

“Luke Wilson.” “Owen Wilson.” Three handshakes later, Chuck was shown to his cabin.

The name of the cruise ship, which was really only several fences super-glued to a canoe, was the Wolsin.

The Wilsons wanted to name it Wilson , but when they told Tim, who had never been in any 214 area, he obviously heard Wolsin , and labeled the ship so.

The captain of the Wolsin, who seemed to have know-how on boats, life, and the universe itself, was always behind the fenced-in steering room, the crew would never see him.

Chuck didn’t know if he was shy or just mysterious. 

The crew was pretty big, and the names were pretty big too.

Who is Chuck Noland, a FedEx driver, compared to literally OWEN, LUKE, and ANDREW WILSON?

Then again, who knows if any of them would actually survive this? Sailing through the middle of nowhere in something a repairman who blows up dishwashers built.

“Oh come on now,” said the Captain. “There’s a built-in ballpit!”

Sure enough, there was, and half the crew were diving in with a “Cowabunga!”.

Chuck was only shaking his head that Tim spent more time on building a ballpit than even leak-proofing the boat.

Chuck’s path was crossed by a pre-teen fangirl in a diving suit, chasing after the brothers.

“OWIE! LUKIE! ANDIE!” she squealed.

Chuck decided that having never watched a Wilson brothers movie ever in his life was for the best, considered that this loony tune must have watched all of them.

The girl was now on the boat patio, doing Luke’s hair. 

“Oh wow, I never knew that!” a Wilson wowed in the distance.

On the opposite side of the boat, Owen was conversing with a newcomer that Chuck had seen before, many times.

He wore a white labcoat and glasses, looking like a textbook professor, and very professional.

He was Mr. Wilson. The Noland daughters’ chemistry teacher.

The very one they told that their favorite chemical equation was “Mikasa”.

An average day in Mr. Wilson’s class (when the provincials weren’t on) included everyone working except for a certain two girls who were only practicing volleyball with anything remotely like a volleyball that they could find.

Chuck noticed him, ran and hid in his cabin before the word “disappointments” would be thrown around - like a volleyball. 

Inside of his cabin, he nearly served the Wilson Phillips record across the room.

Why was everyone’s last name Wilson all of a sudden?

Chuck was sick of it.

He closed his eyes and tried to cruise along with the boat, but all he could see was the last name Wilson.

Wilson, as in Wilson Phillips.

Wilson on the Wilson Point sign.

Wilson on the volleyballs.

Wilson on the badminton rackets.

Wilson, like the brothers who literally get paid a trillion dollars for saying the word wow.

Wilson, like his daughters’ chemistry teacher, a reminder that the future holds only volleyball trophies and not diplomas.

Wilson as in the first female President, a symbol of girl power, except to Chuck it just made him remember that no daughter of his would ever be the second.

Wilson. 

In counterpoint to his exasperation with this whole entire trip, the waves became equally choppy.

A fenced-in canoe with way more passengers than it could handle would never last in these conditions.

“WE’RE GOING DOWN!” Chuck screamed. “WE’RE GOING DOWN HARDER THAN A PARATROOPER WITH A POTATO-SACK OF BRICKS!”

Hoping the captain heard him, he screamed it louder and louder, running upstairs to the main deck.

The rest of the crew were in a panic, as well.

A muffled wow was heard and the fangirl Chuck ran into an hour ago was now holding onto Andrew, the tallest Wilson, for dear life. 

“Tell Jennifer Aniston I love her!” said Owen, followed by his brothers’ wows of laughter, and several passengers’ shouts of “Wennifer Williston!”  

Another wave flooded the Wolsin and the captain turned to the crew with some news that would change their current viewpoint of doom.

Looking through his telescope, he declared,

“Now, don’t worry, people, I have discovered this uninhabited island in the middle of the Transcendentalist area. If we can swim with enough speed, we will be saved! Like the stories I read once of castaways on tropical islands, escaping pirate ships and such. Except here off of Wilson Point, we’ll be the New Brunswick version!” 

Owen took this message well. “I’m Lightning McQueen,” he responded, “so I am speed , if you know what I mean.”

Chuck, who had never seen the movie, misinterpreted his sentence entirely.

“What’s a ‘speedith’?” asked Chuck. “Is that the 28th president if you put her in a racecar?”

Luke gave him a look, indicating that he wouldn’t last long on the island if he didn’t even know what “Kachow” meant. 

The unfortunate Wolsin steered closer and closer to the island, until finally it was swept away by the tides.

And no one really knew what happened next. 

Chapter Text

4 AM, Wednesday

A miracle.

This was a miracle.

Everything turned to sunlight and shone proving, yes, Chuck had survived!

The drenched trucker slowly awakened to his surroundings, feeling the ground underneath him, opening his eyes. Was this all a dream?

It wasn’t. 

Instead of his Memphis home, he woke up soaking wet in St. Lawrence water, on a medium-sized island.

“Where am I, Mozambique?” he shouted incredulously. 

The sound of Dallas charm responded “Wow, you never know, do you? Life is a highway.”

A sense of joy that he wasn’t the only one there reassured the now castaway Chuck, stranded on an island with a star.

This must’ve been the island that the Captain was talking about.

Chuck looked around, seeing if there was food, shelter, anything else they needed to survive.

“Owie?” Chuck called. “Don’t call me that.” said Owen.

Owen was sitting underneath a tree, watching the waves come in. His blond hair was wet and reminiscent of him surfing in The Big Bounce. It always worked well with his crooked nose.

He was wondering all the same stuff that Chuck was in the moment.

Washed up in the sand was a volleyball labeled Wilson.

Next to it was a badminton racket with the all-familiar W printed there. Its handle read Wilson.

Who would be the first person with a sports-equipment companion?

Chuck and Owen turned around, and in the woods was the Captain.

“Surprise!” he called out to the island, popping up out of nowhere. “Fancy seeing you here, new neighbours.”

The Captain certainly was equipped with all the survival skills that they all needed.

“Captain?” Chuck felt more and more saved. 

“Captain of what exactly?” answered the former Captain of the ill-fated Wolsin. He made a very good point.

“Please, now that we’re neighbours, just call me Wilson.”

Chuck would’ve mashed his face down into his own desk, if he had had a desk on the island. “Your name is WILSON?!”

“Yes, Wilson Wilson Wilson. You can call me Wilson.” 

“I don’t think I willson.”

”I’m not your son.”

”Obviously. ‘Wilson Wilson Wilson’ must have some real creative parents.”

Imagine parents who are that much excited that their last name is Wilson, Chuck thought.

While Chuck became fed up with the name ‘Wilson’ again, Owen stared wide-eyedly at Wilson, impressed that the ship sunk and the Captain didn’t. 

“Wow.”

His wow was heard through the island winds, and like cowboys riding on home, the sunlight reflected the other two-thirds of his trinity  following to him.

“My brother!” Andrew and Luke cried with tears of happiness. “My brother! Wow……”

No Wilson lost in the shipwreck, they reunited with wows of brotherly love.

Chuck just stood there. He was an only child. And his last name wasn’t You-Know-What.

Three brothers stranded on an island is all right for them. Well, if they happen to be the type of brothers who get along. 

However, a transporter for FedEx who never really sees his family in his normal life, has no place stranded on an island without them.

His company replaced by award-winners and items that he should’ve sold to the Fredericton Canadian Tire.

Nothing to eat except leaves.

No daughters serving volleyballs.

Alone. 

“ ‘Til Now………….”

Like an earthquake, the land shook with this mysterious sound.

Not a wow.

Not a ka-chow.

A ‘til now.

“Wow! A mermaid!” wowed Luke.

”I don’t think so, Luke.” answered Wilson. “I believe that is Ann Wilson. She was scheduled to perform on our cruise, remember? You should, you’re the ones who booked her.”

“Oh wow, right.” said Owen.

“We’re never going to get anything done here with these clueless brothers….” mumbled Chuck, trying to build a tent with lush New Brunswick foliage.

Studying the foliage was who else but Mr. Wilson.

On one hand, a scientist would help during a shipwreck. On the other hand, it was the scientist whom Chuck had avoided since his daughters’ first report card.

If Chuck had noticed him, he would’ve tried to find a whole new island.

Chuck was currently chatting with a castaway veterinarian who claimed to have been in the cabin next to his.

She seemed like a typical crazy cat lady, with neatened black hair and red lipstick. Her name was Liz. Dr. Liz Wilson.

“Now even your last name’s Wilson? This must be some kind of sick joke.” said Chuck, whose last name continued to not be Wilson.

”The moral of the story, kids, is that if you don’t have the last name Wilson, you’ll drown in a boating accident.” 

She managed to carry many boxes of lasagna onto the island, which she was going to serve for the crew on board.

“We’re eating lasagna tonight!” she stated almost heroically.

“Wilson here will build a fire, I’ll cook the lasagna, Chuck, you get some leaves for some type of salad.”

Plucking leaves, deeper into the island’s woods, he realized someone else had the same idea.

Chuck did a double take.

”Is that DWIGHT?” he screamed. “DWIGHT SCHRUTE?!”

Why were all these celebrities shipwrecked with him? What were they doing on the boat?

Why would the Wilson brothers spend their Academy Award nominee money on a fake cruiseship and call up all their Hollywood friends, like “Hey! Let’s get stranded on a desert island!” 

Chuck was actually surprised that anything could surprise him now.

And he loved Dwight Schrute’s shenanigans on TV, when he laughed and jumped on desks. Dwight was nothing but Dwight to him. 

Dwight turned to Chuck and introduced himself. “My name isn’t actually Dwight. It’s Rainn.”

”Rainn Schrute?”

To Chuck, that sounded like a rain chute, like on a house to prevent flooding. Which made him laugh, and then remember the actual possibility of flooding, and spring into survival mode again.

“No, silly! Rainn Wilson.” 

Dwight’s last name was Wilson.

Dwight’s. Last. Name. Was. Wilson.

Chuck’s vision of a real-life The Office episode came crashing down when Rainn’s truth was revealed.

He again turned into the only survivor without the last name Wilson.

“Your last name is WHAT?” Chuck suddenly snapped at a confused Rainn.

”Wilson.”

“I-“

“What, you’ve never heard of the last name ‘Wilson’?”

”If only!”

The first day on a desert island, and Chuck was already going insane.

Running in circles, pointing at everyone else, going “Wilson! Wilson! Wilson! Wilson! Wilson! Wilson!”

“Everyone’s last name is literally Wilson! What is this, a family reunion?”

Chapter Text

Chuck was a trucker. He was used to skipping lunch. He figured everyone else was starving, though.

Even for one experienced in trucking - spending half the day unconscious, washed up on a desert island, isn’t the healthiest routine in the world.

All through the afternoon, work was put in to build 9 separate tents that could withstand anything the island could send their ways. 

Well, it was supposed to be 9, until the Wilson brothers teamed up and decided to just build a big tent for all 3 of them. 

“We could call it The Wilson Tent!” Luke added, imagining that name in lights, shining through the shores skyline at night.

“Did you three drop out of preschool and only learn the word ‘wow’, or something?” blurted the Dwight next door. “All of our last names are Wilson!” 

Chuck, who was setting up camp to the right of Rainn, was now staring him down like an owl.

“Except him.” 

“Finally!” Chuck sighed, after his world had turned Wilson-centric.

The tenting arrangement was plotted out by Wilson, who everyone else suspected must’ve been stranded more than once.

The order of the tents was: 

“Mr. Wilson, the- this is serious, boys, do I really need to call you this? - ‘The Broskis’, Dwight - I mean, Rainn, Chuck Noland, yours truly, Ann, and Dr. Liz.” 

“These will be our tents for the night, or, as it may be, nights. Do any of you have any more questions or statements?” 

Owen immediately raised his hand. Wilson expected that to happen.

”We should’ve gone with ‘The Dallas Wowboys’.” Owen stated.

Wilson could tell that, well, it wasn’t a race, obviously, but if it was, he would most likely last longer than Owen, Luke, and Andrew combined into a superwilson.

Deep down though, he had this knowledge of what it’s like to be three brothers, as if he’d been there before, right in his own backyard. 

Over the garden fence, three young brothers launching toy rocketships and calling each other “Poophead!”, it must be fun to have 2 else of you.

Chuck almost flipped out when the first name called was “Mr. Wilson”. 

His mind was rapid-firing:

“MR. WILSON IS HERE?! THIS IS TOTALLY WHAT I NEEDED! WHO INVITED MR. WILSON?! Wait, WHO IS MR. WILSON? It could be anyone! WAS THIS A PARTY FOR RANDOM PEOPLE WITH THE LAST NAME WILSON ONLY?! WHY DID I SIGN UP FOR THIS?” 

He looked around the room, except, of course, it wasn’t a room, it was an island.

It was Mr. Wilson, the chemistry teacher.

“Oh no it is ol’ Professor Poopypants.” 

Wilson was chopping up firewood. 

The brothers were tripling the size of the leaves and sticks, finishing up their tent. 

Everyone else was either just about done with their tent, or trying to cook.

“Wow, it’s like a palace…..” wowed Luke.  

“The Dallas Palace!” Andrew noted.

“The Dallas Palace!” wowed all the Wilson brothers in unison, entering their new home.

While the trio rebuilt the city of Dallas on a desert island in tent form, Wilson was stirring the salad and Dr. Liz was baking the lasagna. 

Chuck had walled himself into his own tent with the volleyball and the badminton racket.

The chemistry professor was off in the woods, identifying birds. An important rule when stranded on an unknown island, he thought, was to identify the nature surrounding you. 

A medium-sized owl was blended in with a brown tree.

Meanwhile, on the island’s shore, the lasagna was served.

Everyone dug in except for Mr. Wilson, who was still trying to discover the natural world.

Night fell.

This was the first night on the island, and no one knew what to expect. The sunset was like a painting of an island paradise.

A heatwave had swept the St. Lawrence. 

And, as anyone who is familiar with the haikus of Ida Celestia Pond knows, heatwaves in the night can do some pretty insane stuff.

A familiar young fangirl, holding a stick as a flotation device, pulled herself towards the shoreline, panting for her life.

She wore a makeshift dress out of fronds and leaves, that she designed herself. 

“Wow, are you okay?” Owen asked her as she repositioned herself on land. 

She immediately stood up, flipped her hair, posed dramatically and announced, “I am 28th President Edith Wilson!”

All the other castaways stopped and stared.

The poor conditions of the stranding, and the heat, had made her delusional and she thought she was indeed the 28th president.

They needed Wilsonianism.

Real Wilsonianism, though.

“Oh woooow.” wowed Luke.

“What was it like to sign the 19th amendment?” questioned Wilson.

”It! Was! EPIC!!” squealed the mini-dith.

A new castaway and they didn’t have a tent for her and she was koo koo for cocoa puffs. Wow.

”Who are you?” asked Chuck, who immediately regretted the question a split second after he said it. He already knew what she was going to say.

”Don’t make me repeat myself! I am the 28th President of this island!” she declared to him. “If ‘Mrs. President’ is too long for you, you can call me ‘Dithy’.” 

This was an uninhabited island, Chuck pondered. Who were the other 27 presidents of this place? How could she be the 28th president of anything?

She must’ve just read the words “28th President” in a textbook on Wilsonianism, he concluded. Heatwaves and textbooks do not mix, especially when in New Brunswick. 

President Wilson was a role model for girls everywhere. It was easy to connect the dots.

“I’ll adopt her!” chimed in Ann. “That is, in the tenting world.” 

“I LOVE ANN WILSON’S MUSIC!” the Wilsonian squealed again. “THIS IS THE GIRL POWER TENT!”

Sooner or later, all the girls - Ann, Edith, and Liz - resounded “Girl Power Tent! Girl Power Tent! Girl Power Tent!” even though Liz already had her own tent.

And no one knew if Edith’s name was Edith.

Chapter Text

Day 2, Stranded on this Island, Tents: Worked

Island Population: 9 and random sports equipment

Conditions: Pretty okay chance of survival, although moderate heatwaves

Surnames of castaways: Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, Wilson, and Not Wilson.

“Say it! Say ‘who put my stapler in Jell-O?’ again!”

“Who put my stapler in Jell-O?” 

Chuck and the Wilson boys were having fun with Rainn. 

Ann had awakened to a certain preteen excitedly telling her everything she knew about the Fourteen Points.

For all Ann knew, they were called the Pourteen Doints. All she knew about Wilsonianism before she met Dithy was that a girl was president once and they had the same last name, Wilson. 

Was this girl’s last name even Wilson?

She didn’t have an ID card or anything similar. Just a pondweed dress, a ponytail, and her mind lost and replaced with her essay on WW1.

Sure, Dithy was a Wilsonian mess. She was like a daughter though, like a sister, like someone Ann needed after that falling out with Nancy. It could’ve been destiny that the two were stranded on an island.

Mr. Wilson seemed quite excited as he strolled back into view past the shoreline. 

Chuck immediately ducked into his tent and into a deep conversation with his volleyball, as if that would convince his daughters' professor that their family was worthy of graduation.

The scientist was holding something.....something brownish and white. At a distance Wilson, peeking behind his tent in a neighborly way, thought it was a cool mushroom.

Mr. Wilson called over the castaways, with "important news" that wasn't that important, though it was in his eyes.

"We are not alone! This island is home of the Wilson's plover!" He held up his discovered plover. 

Chuck sighed. Why did the birds on this island have the last name Wilson as well? 

"Charadria wilsonia." pointed out a well-educated Wilson, who seemed to be the only person on the same wavelength as Mr. Wilson. "A medium-sized shorebird, brown above and white below. Named after naturalist Alexander Wilson."

"Yes indeed." responded Mr. Wilson, and he neatly petted and fit the plover into his labcoat pocket.