Rapunzel - 2 of 3

"15 September Little Zachy broke his nose today! He was at preschool and he tripped on a toy on the floor and dove face first onto the corner of a little table. He looks so pitiful with the splint and tape all over his cute little face. The amazing thing is that it seems to have pulled Mom out of her funk. Who knows if it will last, but she actually went to get him and got him some ice cream on the way home from the doctor. That’s a pretty big deal for someone who has held the couch down for months. (See why this blog has to be top secret?) She even baked his favorite dessert and did dinner all on her own today! I’m excited that this may be the turning point for her. Not that I mind doing a lot of it, but it would be nice to just be me.
“Speaking of just being me, an equally anonymous friend that I’ll call A, keeps trying to get me to go out with this new guy in her Biology class. The last date she set me up on was a complete disaster, so forgive me if I’m not all that eager to try again. I’ll go because she’s so excited about it, but I’m not promising anything. Wow, I can’t believe I’m typing about that. I guess the lack in the comments department has made me braver! I think I actually have succeeded in being anonymous.
“I found the most beautiful song the other day. Usually I just sing the songs I find and save them on my computer so I can redo them a hundred times and just enjoy them. So, keeping in mind that I am an amateur that just really loves to sing, I just had to put this up because the words speak right to me.”

Her words were followed by a link that read: “Baby Girl.” Will popped the ear phone jack out of is iPod and clicked it into the slot on the campus computer. He clicked on the link strangely excited to hear Rapunzel’s voice. The tones that came through the cord and into his ears took his breath from him. It started on a strong, high note and continued on with a keyboard piano playing in the background. It was a song about being Daddy’s little girl and never being anybody else’s baby. Her passionate voice revealed her longing to find a love of her own, while still remaining loyal to her father. Will would have loved to have a strong voice like hers in his garage band in high school. She sounded amazing. His piano keyboarding skills couldn’t touch her obvious natural talent.
Accessing his private storage account, Will easily found the program he was looking for. In order for her to access it, he’d have to put it up on the web. The articles he read about the Napster swam through his mind as he decided what to do with the program he’d worked so hard to write. It was an identity protection program that, while running, would hide a person’s IP address by making it appear as a different number each time it was looked up. In some ways, it was illegal, but he envisioned its use for people just like Rapunzel who had online stalkers. It was kind of like a witness relocation program to allow people to hide from online predators.
Swallowing the thought that he might be giving away a goldmine, he had to reach out to her and help her if he could. He clicked on the comments section of her blog and began typing. After several false starts, he wrote what came to him, keeping it real and honest.

“Rapunzel, I stumbled on your blog the other day and I hope you don’t mind my reading thoughts you may never have meant to be read. I am drawn to your spirited way of writing and ‘dealing’. And your voice, it’s… well, I don’t have just the right word to describe the way your song made me feel. Amazing. Please forgive me for intruding on your most personal thoughts and please don’t stop on account of me. In fact, if I make you uncomfortable, you give the word and I will never click near here again. The reason I even got up the guts to write to you is that I can help you keep yourself safe from stalkers, the online variety anyway. I am just a guy studying Computer Science at a Rocky Mountain university and I wrote a program that can make your computer signature appear different every time you use it. I made a special page on my webpage that will allow you to download the program. As it installs, it will walk you through what to do, but if you have questions, email me and I’ll help any way I can. By the way, Hotmail offers great free email addresses, in order to stay anonymous to me, too. All I ask is that you don’t share the program with anyone else until my patent comes through.  No, I’m not sure it’s that good, but it will help.
You have been the bright spot in my week this week and I am at your service.
Your humble servant,
W

Will must have read the post 5 times before he finally sent it with a little prayer that she would not reject his help. As soon as he clicked Send, regret flip flopped through his mind back and forth with hope. What was done was done and he left the computer lab that day fully expecting never to hear from or read about Rapunzel ever again.
The next day, getting his big assignment in on time, which for Will meant by the skin of his teeth, felt really good. He was walking on air as he stopped by the library computer lab to check his email. One from his Mom and about 7 spam messages. As he clicked the spam to the trash, he stopped, mid-click over an email from thankyou@hotmail.com with a subject line that read, “Anti-stalker program.” Will’s heart skipped as he clicked it open and read a message from his fairytale blogger.

“Dear W,
“Thank you for your concerned email. I can’t say I wasn’t nervous at first that someone out there was actually reading what I wrote. Thank you for your kind words and you are, of course, welcome to keep reading if you like.
“I showed the website to my Dad. I hope you don’t mind that I made it seem like something I just found. ;) Your website is so professional! He said it looked good and I’m actually writing from home this time! Thanks so much! You’re a Prince! 
Yours Truly,
Rapunzel

Will grinned, lacing his fingers behind his head and stretching back. Good deed, good karma. There was a link at the end of her email to her blog and he didn’t even think twice.

“16 September You know that scene in Aladdin when he’s fighting the evil wizard Jafar? Jafar has got Jasmine trapped inside an hourglass with sand rushing in. She can see out and everyone can see her, but she is trapped, separated from the world by a layer of glass. The suffocating sand is rushing around her and she can’t do anything. Then, the Princely Aladdin smashes the walls around her and pulls her gasping from the sand. Safe in his arms, she is safe in the knowledge of who he is and what he has done for her. Though I don’t know who you are, I am much safer after what you have done for me.”

Will blinked. He felt his cheeks get warm and he glanced around the lab to see if anyone had noticed him blushing. Big guys of the six foot 2 variety don’t usually blush, especially when compared to cartoon characters. He cleared his throat and tried to decide what to do. He couldn’t just reply with a lame “you’re welcome” after a thanks like that. Words are not always strengths for computer guys, but Will was not an average computer guy. After all, he was wrapped up in the blog of someone he’d never met before in an emotional way he’d never experienced before. He cracked his knuckles, took a deep breath and began typing.

Once upon a time, there was this average guy named Will. One day he was walking through the forest when he came upon a tall tower. He heard the most angelic voice emanating from the tower that he had ever heard. Anyone who could be imprisoned like that and still have something to sing about was very intriguing to him. Bill himself was the kind of guy who was good at fixing things for other people, without paying too much attention to himself. The voice in the tower made him feel like he had something to fight for.

Will couldn’t go on. This was all so surreal and personal and he felt strange typing things he would never say to a real person. But this real person was different than any other human being he knew. She was real at the same time as being poetic and she brought that out in him, too.

The story doesn’t end here, it is just beginning. As the woman behind the voice used her words to open the curtains on the window of her soul, they formed a lifeline stretching down and around the tower toward Will. He, in turn reached upwards to her and they formed a connection. The nature of the connection remains to be seen, but at that moment, in that forest, it was what they both needed.

Will quickly hit Send and uploaded his parable to her comments section before he chickened out. It was kind of a rush to be so completely honest and to express himself in such a freeing, articulate way. His conscience whispered, would you be able to say these things to the girl if she were right here standing in front of you? I would want to, he pondered back. If I had the guts and could come up with the words on the fly, I would love to make her feel as I hope these words I have sent to her make her feel.