The Princes of Tangleforest

by Vann, Dorlana

  He looked up when he heard his name being called. Julia and Ashley sat at the top of the blue paint-chipped bleachers.

  “You know,” he said once he reached them, “I don’t recall seeing any football players. Cheerleaders yes, but no one in a jersey or anything.”

  “Cancelled due to low participation,” Julia said.

  “Why am I not surprised?”

  “You remember, Ashley,” Julia said, nodding towards the other girl. She made air quotes as she said, “Former trendy girl.”

  “Since kindergarten,” Ashley said. “Until those nerds took over my school. No offense, Julia.”

  “Yeah, about that.” Tanner sat on a lower seat and faced the girls.

  “The Princes,” Ashley said. “That’s what they call themselves. They’ve actually hypnotized the entire school.”

  Tanner laughed. “Yeah right. That’s crazy.” He looked to Julia for confirmation that what he had just heard was ridiculous.

  “Unfortunately she’s pretty close to being right. This all started when speed-reader Zachary went searching for something to read in his dad’s library. He picked up this book that he thought was a novel: Frogs into Princes.”

  “A fairy tale?”

  “I’m guessing that’s what he thought, too. Turns out, it was about NLP—Neuro Linguistic Programming.”

  “I’ve heard of that. Mind control, right? That one English magician, Derren Brown, does that.”

  “Yeah that’s right,” Julia said. “Something like mind control, but more like suggestions and reading the way people think and even changing how one remembers the past. The book is actually used for psychiatry. I know that Zachary’s dad, Dr. Davis, used some of the same methods to help me and my dad deal with some stuff.”

  “My mom goes to him every Friday,” Ashley said like it annoyed her.

  “We all read the book and tried the little exercises. We eventually started trying them in the real world. The first thing we did—”

  “Wait a minute,” Tanner said. “You’re a part of all of this?”

  “Zachary’s her boyfriend.”

  “Was,” Julia said.

  “They’ve been a cute little nerdy item since junior high.”

  “Thanks, Ashley,” Julia said.

  “Sure.” Ashley smiled and flipped her hair.

  “Huh… I would have never pictured you two together.” Tanner stared at her for a second. She didn’t look like them. “Y’all seem so different.” He circled his finger indicating her hair, which was pink today, and her all-black clothes. “Is all this recent?”

  Julia pulled her arms in front of her body and whipped her head to the left away from his prodding. “Look. I thought you wanted information about the school. But if you want to waste time—”

  “No, sorry. I do want to know about the school. You were saying about the book… ”

  “She gets a little touchy when you start talking about Zachary.”

  “Ashley...”

  “Well, you do.”

  “I do not. That’s not the… anyway. The book. We started trying little things out of the book to get out of doing our homework. It was crazy; it actually worked. At the same time, the twins were having problems with some jerk jocks, and we figured out how to handle them. One thing lead to another and… well let’s say, it obviously got out of hand.”

  “What did y’all do? Hypnotize the entire school?”

  “NLP isn’t really hypnotizing; it’s different. And no, that’s the weird thing, after some of the popular kids started acting and dressing differently, other students began doing the same. Since being smart was the new cool, Zachary became the coolest.

  “Why doesn’t anyone tell someone?” Tanner asked. “An adult, a teacher?”

  “We’ve tried,” Ashley said.

  “This school has the number one test scores,” Julia said.

  “I’ve heard.”

  “All the parents and teachers were confused at first, but instead of trying to fix it, everyone took the credit. They think it’s a good thing: scholarship, school funds…”

  Ashley said, “And the nerds took my place at the popular table.”

  “So why are you chicks still normal while the rest of the school is all trippin’?”

  “Chicks? Tripping? Really?” Julia exhaled. “All right. You tell me what’s normal?”

  “You know what I mean. And how come, if you’re Zachary’s girlfriend—”

  “Was!”

  “… you’re not with him right now? And why didn’t the mind control work on the cheerleaders?”

  “I guess since they’re really not followers, that made them kind of immune. And before we got to them, we decided to go ahead and leave Ashley and a few other group leaders alone to make them suffer for all the years they made us suffer.” Julia gave Ashley an indignant smile. “We wanted them to watch the students, their friends, turn against them. We wanted them to feel the sting of being the out crowd.”

  “Yeah, thanks for that,” Ashley said. “Good one. But I’m still glad you didn’t mess with me, because I would not look good in those nerdy glasses and shoes. O.M.G.… did you see what Sabrina wore today?”

  Julia shot Ashley an impatient look. “And now I’m stuck with them.”

  Tanner asked, “Why’d you change sides?”

  “They started doing things that I thought pushed the limits. They left the basics of the book and began researching it to see how they could perfect it. They became addicted and the challenges became bigger. But what really freaked me out were the mind games they began to play on one another, and they got really dangerous. Like life threatening. I begged them to just stop it all. I thought we had done enough. I stupidly thought we would let everything get back to normal after a few days. You know. When I threatened to go to Principal Perry, Zachary told me that if I didn’t like it,” she shook her head, “I could make like an atom and split.”

  Tanner spit out a laugh. “Wow.”

  “There’s the bell,” Ashley said. “Some of us don’t get any mind altering help with our grades. Try explaining to your mom why you are the only one to fail in the entire school.” She carefully walked down the bleacher, her honey-colored hair bouncing behind her.

  Tanner tried to see the geek hidden beneath Julia’s take-no-bull disposition. She looked and acted unlike any “smart girl” he had ever known. “They asked me to sit with them.”

  “Don’t do it. You’re like a new toy. We don’t get many new students. Last year we had two, and they snatched them up before I had a chance to even talk to them. You know how it is; most kids are just searching for a place to belong, so they’re easily influenced.” She stood up and walked to the aisle of the bleachers. “Don’t let them touch you. Don’t talk to them longer than hello.”

  “And the girl that was at the table with them?” Tanner asked as he followed Julia’s stomps down the stairs.

  “Darla?”

  “Yeah—I talked to her yesterday, and I’m fine.”

  “She’s not one you really need to watch out for. She’s more of a puppet. Just because someone reads the book doesn’t guarantee they’ll be able to perform the techniques. You have to have enough confidence, a photographic memory, and the ability to read people.” She jumped from the lower step to the ground, turning to face him. “The one you really have to watch out for is Zachary.”

  “I’m sure I can avoid the scary Prince Zachary.” Even though he tried to use a sarcastic tone, inside, everything she had said began to fester.

  “Don’t underestimate him.”

  Tanner stepped in front of Julia and opened the gate. They began their short walk back to the school building.

  “Do you think they’ll try to hypnotize me and turn me into a geek?”

  “Too late,” she said.

  He opened the door for her. “Oh, so you do have a sense of humor buried beneath the attitude.”

  She quickened her pace and walked on ahead of him but turned her hea
d and smiled before mixing into the sea of argyle and suit coats. He liked her, but the thought jumped out at him that if he had come to the school before all the wackiness, he probably would’ve thought of her differently, if at all. No matter what she looked like, if she hung out with the smart kids, he would have written her off. It just seemed easier to size people up by association when entering a new school. The last thing he wanted was to be put in the category he had worked so hard to leave years ago.

  Since his family chronically changed addresses, he’d been able to reinvent himself several times. He took aspects from different kids who he had seen as cool: his long hair from one place, his clothes and music from another. He had even taught himself how to skateboard from reading articles on websites and lots of practice. After all of this, and a little “mind control” of his own, the new—and what he thought, normal—Tanner emerged. He kept the old part of his personality well hidden. He stopped raising his hand to answer questions in the classroom, he only did enough school work to get by, he quit band, and even though he hadn’t trashed his comic book collection and still carried them wherever he moved, he never unpacked them.

  Now he fit in wherever he went and made friends quickly. He hadn’t thought about the old Tanner in a couple of years… and he sure as hell was going to steer clear of anyone who threatened to let him out.

  Chapter 5

  Tanner did a wheelslide coming to a complete stop right in front of his house but stared across the street. The house really stuck out, kind of spooky, like a new neighborhood had been built around it. It had a sinister personality: angry hedges and an obviously scarred past. The lawn seemed long forgotten, weeds up to the window sills. Quotes his mom liked to repeat came to mind, “You can’t judge a book by its cover,” and “Beauty is more than skin deep.” The girl was like a rose in a thicket of thorns.

  The window the girl had appeared in the night before was closed, the curtains drawn. He’d kept an eye out for her all during the day at school, but didn’t see anyone who matched. There were several possibilities: she had already graduated from high school, looked older than her junior high age, was home schooled, a ghost, or perhaps even a figment of his imagination. “Wishful thinking,” he said as he walked up the steps of his porch. In the daylight, the house didn’t even seem lived in.

  Tanner had missed lunch to talk to Julia, so as soon as he walked through his front door, he went straight to the kitchen. He rounded the corner and came to an abrupt stop; all three of the Princes, plus Darla sat around the breakfast table with Tanner’s mom. The boys looked ridiculous, like they had stepped out of the movie, “Men in Black,” but so much less cool. More like, “Nerds in Navy Blue.”

  His mom said, “There he is. Hi, Tan.”

  “We came looking for you,” Zachary said, “and Joanne invited us in for cookies.”

  “We love cookies,” Johnny said.

  He wondered if they had already brainwashed her and turned her against him. He studied his mom for a second, searching for signs of geekiness, finally deciding that it would be too difficult to distinguish; she was from the 80s. “What are y’all doing here?”

  Zachary replied, “I hope you don’t mind. We wanted to welcome you to our friendly community and to our school. ”

  Joanne’s head was cocked to one side, and she wore a slight frown. “I’ll go do some unpacking. I’ll let you kids talk.” When she walked past Tanner she whispered, “Be nice.”

  Great, she thought he was just being rude to the little nerds.

  Tanner kept his distance, remembering what Julia had said. “Don’t let them touch you...” He waited until he thought his mom was out of range and said, “I do mind. Leave now and we won’t have any problems.”

  “Don’t worry.” Zachary smiled. “We’re not going to play our game on you, yet. We know Jules has taken you into her confidence.”

  “Yeah, confidence,” Darla said coyly.

  “Shut up, Darla,” Zachary said. “You’re crusin’ for a bruisin’.”

  “You shut up,” Darla said.

  Tanner wondered why they made him so nervous when they were so dang lame.

  “I guess she gave you an earful. But that’s okay. We actually have a deal for you. We want you to join us.”

  “Yeah,” Tanner laughed. “Right.”

  “We’ve read your transcripts. We know you’ve got jets.”

  “My transcripts? I didn’t even know… how? Oh. I see, I guess you have access to everything in the office.”

  “You’re GT, a smart kid… one of us.”

  “No… not one of you.”

  “Don’t be so quick to put us down. Look at our position of power and notoriety. We are the Princes of the school. We rule. Just think how happy Joanne will be when you have scholarships out the wazoo.”

  “That’s Mrs. Dobbs to you,” Tanner said through his teeth.

  Zachary continued talking, “We don’t have to worry about bullies. We don’t have to build ourselves up from being rejected by girls—we don’t get rejected. We have it all, and we are offering it all to you.”

  “We don’t do that very often,” round faced Sean said. “Feel lucky, Punk.”

  “Thanks, but I do all right. I think I’ll just hang out with Julia and the hot cheerleaders.”

  “We can have any girl we want,” Johnny said standing up quickly, knocking the chair over as he did.

  “Cool your jets,” Zachary said. “Maybe you and Jules deserve one another. We can arrange it to where y’all are all alone. And we’ll take the cheerleaders.”

  “Zachary!” Darla said.

  Tanner smiled. A little crack in their construction could only be good.

  “Don’t look so satisfied there.” Zachary stood up. “You’ve got a long way to go before you could ever destroy this monarchy. We’ll give you some time to think about it. You have two days. If you don’t come begging to join us by then, it’s your own grave.”

  “Funeral.” Tanner shook his head.

  “Exactly.”

  Tanner wanted it to be over. He wanted them to leave him alone. “You can take your two days and shove them up your—”

  “Stop!” Zachary pointed at Tanner. “Not in front of the lady.” He draped his arm around Darla. “You have not chosen wisely.” He and Darla walked out of the kitchen and the rest of them followed.

  When he heard the front door shut, he sat down at the table and put his face in his hands. Other than his heart racing a bit, he didn’t feel any different.

  “So,” his mom said walking into the kitchen. “I’m glad to see you’re making friends at school.”

  “Sure.”

  She walked to the refrigerator and started taking out food. “You know, I really like it here. Small town atmosphere with everything needed at your fingertips. I told the lady at H.E.B. that we had just moved in, and she said how lucky we were. It seems the houses don’t go up for lease very often. I guess we were at the right place at the right time. You know, this house even has an option to buy.”

  “Really?”

  “I know you would love it if we stopped living the nomad lifestyle, settled down, bought a house. You could finish high school at the same place, and I might be able to move up the corporate ladder and make more money…”

  Tanner sat with his mouth wide open thinking that maybe the Princes had gotten to her.

  “Well, what do you think?’ She smiled happily.

  He shook his head. What was he worried about? She did this practically everywhere they moved. Still new to her. Soon it would be old, and they would be packing. His mom could never settle down. He had nothing to worry about. “Sure, Mom, that would be great.”

  After dinner, Tanner peered out his bedroom window at the dark, quiet night; no sign of his girl. His bedside alarm clock read 9:10 p.m., and he remembered it had been pretty late the last time he had seen her. He decided to text Chris and see what was up in the real world.

  Around 9:30 p.m. Chris had to go becaus
e his new girlfriend had texted him about something. Tanner glanced back outside, letting out a long breath before he logged in, half-heartedly, into his game, World of Warcraft, to work on his latest quest.

  Absorbed in his game, Tanner almost missed the flicker of light. He managed to pull himself away from the fantasy world and slowly back into reality by sitting back and looking away from the computer. “She’s there!” he said and stumbled out of his chair. As he stood in front of the window, he realized it was way too late to hide.

  Instead of gazing up at the stars, the girl seemed to be staring at him. He gave a little wave, hoping he didn’t seem too much of a dork. To his surprise, she waved back. They stood, the dark distance between them, and stared at one another.

  “This is crazy,” he whispered after a few minutes, his heart thumping madly in his chest. He wanted to hear her voice. He wanted to know the color of her eyes. He put up his hand to indicate for her to wait and ran down the stairs, through the front door and across the street.

  As he walked across her front lawn, he saw her standing at her window. The closer to her he came, the more nervous he felt. What if she thought he was some weirdo? Suddenly, he wished he would’ve just stayed in his room and made a sign with his phone number on it or something. But no. For some reason, he had gone insane and had rushed across the yard like some lovesick puppy. Still, he didn’t stop walking until he stood directly under her window, looking up at her as she seemed to radiate light down on him.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Who’s there?” she whispered.

  “Tanner. I live across the street.” He walked out a little bit and into the light so she could see him.

  She put her hand over her mouth and seemed to be giggling.

  “I’ve been wait…” Idiot. “I just moved in, across the street, and wanted to say hi.”

  “Hi,” she said, the moonlight chasing shadows from her face.

  Tanner’s nervousness grew as he realized she looked even prettier than she had from a distance: huge light eyes, full pink lips, and fair skin. He actually felt a little sick to his stomach and couldn’t seem to remember any words.