Trolls Prequel Novel (4 page)

“Thanks, Cooper!” Harper calls, waving. Her head is down as she pores over the clipboard.

Cooper waves back before escorting the last of his critters out the door with a cheerful “See ya later!”

I slide back over to the table and tuck the tray of cupcakes beside my bag.

“What?” I ask when I see Harper's eyebrows shoot up. “They're for later, in case we get hungry. Don't give me that look—I got enough for you, too.”

Harper rolls her eyes, then pats the mushroom stool next to her and takes a deep breath. “Help!” she says.

“On it,” I reply. “Repeat after me: I'm hopeful, I'm optimistic, I'm one with the universe.”

“I'm hopeful, I'm optimistic, I'm one with the universe,” Harper echoes. Her voice isn't quite as steady as mine, but that's okay. Baby steps. My work here is just beginning.

I take another deep breath, motioning to Harper to do the same. “Okay, that's our mantra, and we're sticking to it. We've got this.”

I wait for Harper to nod before I open my mouth and yell, “Next!”

P
oppy is always fun to be around, but one of the more entertaining things about her is how big she can open her mouth when she wants to be heard. So when she drops her jaw and belts out, “Next!” I'm not the least bit surprised when it echoes through the rustling tree branches.

Not surprised, but definitely amused.

And yet…nothing happens.

I peek over Poppy's shoulder. “Where's the clipboard? Who's signed up for this time slot?”

She closes her mouth and squints at the sheet. “DJ Suki.”

“Oooooooh,”
we both say at once.

Makes sense.

“I'll bet she's right outside,” I tell Poppy. “I'll go get her.”

She nods. “I'd bet that DJ Suki is blasting a musical mash-up through her headphones.”

She's right about that.

Harper = art. DJ Suki = music. It's her life.

Suki can always be counted on to lay down a
beat
-tastic interlude on any appropriate occasion, which is basically
every
occasion in Troll Village.

Sure enough, when I poke my head out of the gallery to investigate, that's
exactly
what DJ Suki is doing. She's bopping around the clearing, totally absorbed in whatever tunes are surging through her yarn-wrapped headphones.

I wave my arms to get her attention but have no luck. After a few fruitless seconds of manic arm-flailing, I give up and pop out into the sunlight. I slip down the tree trunk to tap my friend on the shoulder from behind.

She jumps at least eleven feet into the air. Whoops!

Luckily, when she drops back down, she lands perfectly in my hair, which I've swished into a net, and I only a stumble backward a little bit, then use my locks to lower her gently to the ground.

DJ Suki nudges one ear free from the head-phones. “You scared the hair off me!”

Not true. She's definitely still got her orange-felt dreadlocks, which are swooped up into a beehive ponytail and held in place with a single purple band.

DJ Suki is nothing if not stylish. Her electric-pink skin is the perfect backdrop for wrists full of jangly bangle bracelets and a jeweled belly button, not to mention her funky crocheted crop top and cut-off pants. I highly approve of her whole look, which is happy and energetic, just like her beats.

I cringe. “Sorry, Suk. I
did
try to get your attention other ways first.”

She blinks up into my eyes. “No worries, Harper!”

“You're up, if you want to show us what you brought to display.”

I glance around the clearing a little more now, and I can't keep my forehead from wrinkling because I don't notice anything there other than, well, my friend. “You did bring something, right?” I ask.

DJ Suki pats her hair. “Everything I need is right here.”

I relax. I don't know what she's hiding in there, but I'm more than prepared to be wowed.

We enter the pod to find Poppy eagerly waiting. (Well, and also sneaking a snack or two from the tray of Cooper's treats she'd tucked aside for “later.” Technically speaking, it
is
later, I
guess.
)

“Hi, Suki!” she calls, and is greeted with a wide smile in return. “We can't wait to see what you have in store for us.”

DJ Suki smirks. “Well, we can't do that, exactly.”

I take my seat behind the table next to Poppy. “What do you mean? You said you had everything you need to show us your entry.”

Another smirk from DJ Suki. “I do have everything I need for my entry. But not for you to see. For you to
hear.
”

Poppy jumps up and claps her hands. “Ooh, yes! A new song—I can't wait. Can you wait, Harper? DJ Suki's songs are the best!”

“I— Well, yes, they are, but—”

I should have known to expect something musical from Suki.

She gets right to setting up her equipment, which consists primarily of two turntables on top of her Wooferbug. Poppy is back on the table, ready, feet positioned hip-width apart and knees bent slightly, just waiting to bounce to the grooves.

As a final step, DJ Suki pulls a disco ball from her hair and offers it to a waiting butterfly, who transports it to the ceiling and hovers it in place with rapidly flapping wings.

“Hit it!” DJ Suki says, and instantly the music begins—a mix of reggae and pop that melts into a summery jam not even the most lead-footed
ho-hum
-er would be able to resist.
I
definitely can't. My hands start tapping on my thighs to the rhythm.

“Yes! This!” squeals Poppy above the jam DJ Suki is mixing.

The disco ball above sends a kaleidoscope of light rays bouncing around the pod and sparkling across the cushy felt floor.

And now my hips are swaying.

A curious Troll with a mischievous smile peeks into the opening of the pod, and Poppy notices him instantly. She gestures for him to join in, and he turns and motions to someone behind him. Four more Trolls bop into the pod in a wiggling, snaking conga line. I can't help smiling at their moves as the one in front flings his hair back to form a bridge for the last one to climb across. In seconds the line has a new leader, and they just keep cycling through that way. Hair back, dance across, hair back, dance across.

DJ Suki conducts a symphony of sounds that mix to create a buzzing tempo, and the crowd, small as it is, goes crazy.

When Trolls hear music, they're drawn to it like Poppy is to Cooper's cupcakes, so it's not at all surprising when whole squads of Trolls wander into the pod to join the dance celebration. In the span of five minutes, the pod's floor is thumping from the stomping feet of frenetically bopping Trolls, arms flung to the disco-balled ceiling and torsos wiggling to DJ Suki's animated beats.

Poppy crowd-surfs overhead—her body stretched flat and passed effortlessly along by waves of Troll hair—and when she calls down, “I AWARD THIRTY RAINBOW STICKERS TO DJ SUKI,” my chest thumps from something other than the epic bass that DJ Suki drops.

As long as I'm not absorbed in a new painting—which usually means I'm tuning out anything and everything around me—I'm all for joining in on a dance party. I love the pounding pulse of a new tune just as much as the next Troll, and DJ Suki can always be counted on to bring it and bring it hard.

But although it's fun to shake to the tunes, the fact remains that music, while most
definitely
an art form of its own, won't cover the blank walls surrounding us. Sure, it can fill the space, but in an entirely different way than I had pictured. I think, anyway. It's still fuzzy in my head, but the gallery opening I have in mind has something for people to look at, something that will last beyond that first night. Something
tangible
and…visible.

Oh, I don't even know anymore. DJ Suki's music is so good and Cooper's treats were so tasty…maybe
I'm
just envisioning this all wrong. Is that a possibility?

T
here are no signs of this impromptu dance party stopping, even though it's been A LOT of songs so far. The morning is fading fast, and time is ticking away for us to pick an exhibit.

The only thing winding down at the moment is the disco ball DJ Suki hung above the gallery, and even that's just temporary, because I can see a whole fresh batch of butterflies getting ready to put new wings on the task of holding it in place.

It seems like Suki's notes are sending coded messages throughout the village, beckoning more and more Trolls to join in the dance fest. The pod is filled to capacity, and outside there are even more Trolls waiting for their turn to come in.

I should be thrilled for all the publicity the gallery is getting, and part of me is, but a bigger part of me is feeling restless to move things along. I still have tons of entries to see and only one day to do that.

Or
we
do,
I should say, because my trusted friend Poppy is supposed to be helping out—but where is she?

“Poppy!” I call, but my words get swallowed up by the noise of the party.

I pop up onto my tiptoes to try to see over a sea of waving hair. No luck. I've got to talk to her. I shimmy my way through the swarm of dancing Trolls, hugging and fist-bumping my way into the center. All the while I'm searching among the sea of Troll colors for Poppy's telltale shades of pink and her blue flowered headband.

Finally, I spot her in the middle of a circle of Trolls who have their hands linked. They're chanting, “Go, Poppy. Go, Poppy. Go, go, go, Poppy!”

I may be stressed, but that doesn't stop me from smiling as I shake my head. Why am I not surprised to find her here, in the center of the party? I nudge my way through the crowd and pop up in the center next to my friend, who is upside down and executing a perfect spin on the ends of her hair. It's classic Poppy.

“Hey, Harper,” she calls to me from the ground. “You look very whirly!”

“Whirly?” I have to yell so she can hear me over the thumping music.

“Yes. Probably because I'm rotating so quickly.” She stops suddenly, arches her back, and flings her legs to land perfectly on her feet, right-side up again.

“Better,” she says. She bows when we all applaud her.

But then she squints at me and leans close to speak directly into my ear. “When I was upside down, it looked like you were smiling, but now that I'm one-hundred-eighty degrees vertical, I see it's entirely the opposite. What's with the frowny face?”

I turn my face to talk into
her
ear. “I just think we need—”

I'm interrupted when I am jostled from behind, but Poppy's eyes get all bright, like a lightbulb just went off inside her brain.

“You're SO right, Harp! Why didn't I think of it before?”

Wait, what?

She reaches into her hair and extracts a…

“COWBELL!” she screams, banging on it once, resulting in a chorus of cheers.

Poppy is a whole lot of fantastic things, and one of them is ridiculously gifted with a cowbell.

I didn't think I was about to say anything remotely related to cowbells. But what can I do? This is Poppy, and she makes it impossible to be annoyed with her.

She's lifted into the air by the circle of Trolls, and she squeals with happiness as she clangs away. She's bopped along a sea of hairstyles, and then she yells down to her adoring audience, “What does this party need?”

“MORE COWBELL!” they all reply, adding cheers.

I take a deep breath and exhale slowly.

I don't have a lot of hope that this will actually achieve anything, but I climb onto the top of a pyramid of Trolls. I have other talents, too.

I stick two fingers into my mouth.

“THWEEEEE­EEEEE­T!”

The music cuts off with an abrupt record scratch.

All is perfectly silent.

Whoa. That worked better than I expected. And now every Troll in the pod is staring at me.

“Ahem,”
I say, suddenly nervous to have all eyes on me. “Um, thank you for your attention.”

There is not a single noise in the pod, or from the clearing outside. In fact, it's awkwardly quiet for several beats longer than I am comfortable with.

“Uh, yes. Well,” I say. I've never been much for public speaking. That's one other thing that will have to change if I'm going to be running my own gallery, but I can't even think about that now.

I muster some courage and cough lightly. “See, the thing is, as much fun as this has been—and it
has
been fun, DJ Suki…”

I pause and smile at my friend because she really has rocked the house and it's not
her
fault things got a little out of hand with her concert. She pushes the headphones off her ears momentarily and nods a happy acknowledgment.

I continue. “It's just that, well, if we continue to dance all day—”

I'm interrupted by more than a few cheers in support of this idea. The cowbell sounds, but I shoot a look at Poppy and she quickly cups it in her hand to silence it mid-gong.

She cringes and smiles apologetically. “Sorry. Sometimes it's like the cowbell controls me, and not the other way around. You were saying?”

Ugh, I really hate being the one to throw a wet blanket on things when everyone is having so much fun. But Poppy and I have a serious job to do today, and serious jobs require serious attention.

Seriously.

“We're engaged in judging very important entries, and it's only fair that everyone who wants a chance to be the opening exhibit has their fair amount of time to present his or her concept to us. I hope you all understand we need to close this party out and move things along. And, of course, each and every one of you is invited back next week for the grand-opening gala.”

Poppy jumps up on the table, looking regal and authoritative, like the princess she is. She doesn't seem nervous about talking to a crowd at all. Sigh. I wish I could be like that.

“She's right!” Poppy says. “The Troll talents are so wide and varied, we have to take time to see them all. Sorry I forgot that for a second, Harp. Now everyone…clear out!
Er,
with peace and love, of course. I adore you all. Smooches! Hugs! Keep on keepin' on!”

“No sweat, Poppy!” says one Troll.

“Catch you later,” says another.

The Trolls begin dropping out of the pod, using their hair to swing their way down the tree branches, already chattering about their own entertaining plans for the afternoon. No one seems upset, and I'm relieved.

Eventually, only DJ Suki is left. She hops off her Wooferbug and meets us over by the judging area. I swear that at one point during the dance fest I saw the table being used as the launching point for some stage-diving, but luckily, the tray of cupcakes got trapped underneath one of the chairs and is still mostly intact. If you aren't too picky about melted frosting, that is. (For the record, I'm not.)

The butterfly holding the disco ball flutters down to join us.

“That was
kick-
tastic, guys,” DJ Suki says. “Thanks for letting me drop my beats.”

“No, thank
you,
” Poppy says, giving me a hand in putting the table back in place. “I haven't had that much fun since yesterday.”

I hope Suki knows I didn't pull the plug on things because I didn't love what she was doing. I quickly add, “I needed to move after all those cupcakes I ate earlier. This was really great. Thanks. We'll be in touch by the end of the day, okay?”

She nods, adjusts her headphones again, and tucks the disco ball back into her hair. The last of the butterflies fly out the opening alongside her. She calls, “Cool. Check you then.”

Poppy turns to me, her eyes sparkling and twinkly. “How amazing was
that
?”

“Amazing. Look, I know we're behind schedule, but do you think we should take some time to discuss her entry before we bring in the next Troll? Which is—” I peek around for the schedule, which seems to have gone missing. “Runaway clipboard alert,” I say.

“Oh, in the name of hair. I spent forever gluing the shiniest jewels on that clipboard—I should be able to spot it anywhere!” Poppy exclaims.

“It has to be around here.”

We both bend to peek under the table and promptly bump heads.

“Oww!” we say together. Then we add a quick “Jinx!” then “Double jinx!” then “Jinx times infinity!” Our voices are in perfect sync every time, and we drop to the floor in giggles.

“Hey, thanks for keeping me laughing on what I feared was going to be the most stressful day ever,” I say, giving Poppy a quick one-armed hug from our side-by-side position under the table.

Poppy laughs with me.

“How are we supposed to know who goes next without the schedule?” I ask, and my eyes get wide at the expression on Poppy's face.

“What is it?” I ask, but Poppy shushes me.

“Do you hear that?” she whispers.

We both freeze, our ears pricked, and our confused eyes locked on each other. We hear far-off laughs and critters chirping just outside the opening, and also—

We cock our heads in opposite directions.

“Is that…crying?” I whisper.

Poppy nods and we scramble out from under the table, searching for the origin of the sound.

It would be impossible for any Troll to miss the source of the tears. Especially because his name is about as perfect a description for him as you could ever find.

“Biggie?” Poppy calls gently.