La Na Land
By Rachel Condliffe




Chapter One
Sometimes, the stories seem more real than reality. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because the people who surround me in reality sometimes seem as two dimensional as a piece of paper. Maybe it’s because their problems aren’t important, when in stories it’s life or death situations or war.
None of the people in reality - at least, not the ones I know - have those types of real problems. It’s always “Oh, SHIT! My parents are going to kill me for getting an F in english.” Or, “Well, I think I like him, but I don’t know. I also kinda like Nat...”
God, people like that make me sick. Don’t they know that stuff doesn’t matter? Don’t they know no one cares if they’re grounded, except for the fact that they won’t be able to get new dirt on the person? Don’t they know that no one gives a fucking shit?
Apparently not, I thought, as my two “best friends,” Kaylie and Mara, chattered at me about some show they’d both watched the night before.
“...and it was so messed up. Because, like, Jake and Katie were, like, dating-” Kaylie started, and Mara cut her off to finish, like always. Mara get’s to say the dramatic finish, and Kaylie gets the start-ups, I thought. Goddess, they were giving me a headache.
“but Brett was sleeping with Katie!” Mara finished, breathlessly. I hoped they were actually done. It seemed they were, because they seemed to be waiting for my response.
So, like the good little actress I have to be, I said, “Oh my gawd! Really? I think I might actually have to watch that show.”
They smiled, mission accomplished, and I mentally sighed. I wonder what Roiben or Kaye would do in this situation, I mused, thinking about my current favorite book series, Tithe. It was about a faerie changeling. I felt a smile working it’s way onto my face, but stopped myself.
I was the silly goose Queen. The Ice Queen. I couldn’t be caught smiling, or my careful facade would be ruined.
I thought back to when I got those names...
I’d been labelled the Ice Queen first, when in second grade some girl had come up to me, asking to be my friend. I’d sneered at her, and said “I don’t befriend losers”. I was thinking You don’t want to be my friend. You want to share my secrets with the world, find out how I work. That’s not friendship. That’s a compromise: I get to leak your secrets, you get to leak mine.
I got the silly goose Queen title in eighth grade. I was a loner, but people were constantly flocking to me. Trying to get into the “Ice Queen’s” good graces. People only wanted to be near me because I was a mystery. a hot mystery, one of the guys who’d tried to hit on me said.
The girl came out of no where. She was running as fast as her puny little legs could carry her. Sixth grader, I thought. She ran right into me, the text books she was carrying flying out of her hands, and her glasses flying off her face.
“Watch where you’re going, freak,” I told her, getting up. I stepped on every book in my path, and finally, I stepped on her glasses. Her rich parents would just buy her another pair, and the text books weren’t even hers. They belonged to the school.
Everyone stared at me in awe. Thus, the silly goose Queen began to reign along with the Ice Queen...
I was brought sharply back to the present when the guy sitting next to me began to feel me up. I glared at him, my eyes narrowed, and flashing, promising evil. He gulped and quickly removed his hand from my leg. The guy behind him snickered, having seen the whole thing.
I knew he was laughing at the snubbed guy, not me, but I glared at him, too, taking out my frustration with my so-called “friends” on him. He gulped, too, and quickly stopped laughing, returning his attention to the finally-present teacher.
I’d been in her class for the last three months, and I still didn’t know her name. I’d never been called on. I regularly skipped her class. I never turned in homework, or class assignments. I was getting an A. Just like every other person on Earth, Heaven, or silly goose, I thought. All it takes is a little money thrown around to the right people and everyone sucks up to you.
I sighed. I knew it wasn’t really that way, but when you have the resident silly goose/ice queen/rich girl in your class, you’re not going to fail her, no matter what you do. At least, not when I was the resident silly goose/ice queen/rich girl. I was too powerful for my own good.
I stood up and walked out of class. “Ms. Reynolds, where are you going?” the teacher asked me in a stern voice. I looked at her, and she paled.
“I’m leaving. Everyone else has to stay.” The teacher mumbled an apology before resuming teaching whatever subject it was she was teaching.
I left the class quickly, eager to get back to my room where Roiben and Kaye were waiting for me.

I sighed as I entered my room - no, my sanctuary. The walls were painted flat black, like a black box theater. But no one who entered this room would have been able to see them for the huge floor to ceiling, custom made, bookshelves that covered every inch of wall space.
Every single book I owned was hardcover, and signed by the author. My parents insisted that I have only the best, and that meant that each book was first sent to the author from the warehouse, as fast as was humanly possible, then sent just as quickly back to me. But I didn’t care about that. I didn’t even notice the prices as I bought book after book from Borders, or Barns&Noble Online.
No, all I cared about was the stories. The wonderful stories filling every book with a new time, place, and world. I slowly walked around the huge room, greeting all my favorites.
There was Harry Potter, the bravest wizard in the world. And little Thumbelina, who in this story was a stolen princess trying to save her kingdom. And Zero, the hero of Yuki. Yuki’s an idiot, I thought as I paused, looking at my favorite vampire manga. She could have chosen Zero’s true love, but instead she chose Kaname’s forced feelings.
But she’d been forced to, another part of my mind argued. If she hadn’t Zero would have killed her and then himself. She did it to save both their lives. I sighed, annoyed at my inner logic.
I kept greeting my real friends. Dimitri and Christian, oh, I miss you two, I thought, remembering the last part of Vampire Academy. I promise, as soon as the next book comes out I’m buying it and reading your whole story over again. I continued.
There was Eragon Shadeslayer, the hero of Alagaesia. And Tamani, the wonderful, beautiful faerie who I thought might never get the girl of his dreams. Once again, I found myself thinking ill of the female protagonist in a story.
Finally, I came to the only spot on the wall not taken over by bookshelves. Instead, it had a black laptop, and a book on it. The book was titled Valiant, and it was by Holly Black. It was the sequel to Tithe, but I had so far failed to see the connection, apart from the type of faeries that were in it.
I’d only started it that morning, but I was more than three quarters of the way through. I thought I knew why Luis didn’t like Lolli, but I still wasn’t sure. I picked it up, greeting Val, “Luis”, Lolli, and Ruth. I ran my hand carefully over the pages in a caress, stuck my nose into it, and smelled the book. It still smelled new, despite having been out of the store for four days already, and being shipped halfway across the country and back.
I scanned the page, found my place easily, and felt myself disappear and become someone else as I began to read:

Luis pulled back from Lolli, and gave me/Val a lopsided grin. “Hey, when did you show up?”
“Do either of you have any Never?” I/Val blurted.
Luis shook his head and looked at Lolli. “No,” she said, “I dropped it. Did you get anything from Ravus?”
I/Val took a deep breath, trying not to panic. “He wasn’t there.”
“Did you see Dave on your way in?” Lolli asked.
I/Val shook my/her head.
“Let’s go down to the crash spot,” Luis said. “I think it’s dark enough to keep us hidden.”

I/Val continued to live out the story, finding the real Luis, and realizing that Ravus, the faerie I/Val was in love with, was in serious danger. I kept reading as I/Val saved his heart from the Unseelie Court’s clutches, returning it to his troll chest, and saving his life. In the epilogue, I/Val was back at school, and Ravus brought me/her a steel sword so that I would always be able to beat any faerie, as long as I was fighting in true hand to hand combat, and not with glamour.
That was the end of the book. I’d finally run into my favorite characters again, though. I/Val had met them when I/she’d challenged the Unseelie Court faerie who’d threatened Ravus’ life by stealing his heart.
Maybe they’ll be important in the next book, I thought.
I looked at the clock. It wasn’t even lunch time yet. Lunch would be soon, though, and I’d be expected to make another appearance. Why do I even bother going to school? I thought. No one there is nearly as real as the characters in these books. Plus, I thought If I go to lunch I’ll have to sit through Kaylie and Mara’s constant chatter, unless their boyfriends -or, Goddess forbid, only one of their boyfriends - come to sit at our table. Then I’ll be forced to sit there while they make out. And, if only one boyfriend comes, then I’ll be forced to sit there while they’re making out, while listening to the other one’s constant chatter.
It was then that I decided. I was not going into school for the rest of the day.
I went over to the bookshelf where Tithe was currently living, carefully pushed aside the books next to her, and placed Valiant lovingly back on her shelf, next to her sisters. I then pulled out one of her sisters, Ironside.
I went back over to my desk, sat down, and carefully opened Ironside to the Prologue. I caressed the page lightly, ever so lightly, before smelling this book, too. It also smelled new, but it had a slightly different scent than Valiant had had. Newer glue in the machine, I thought to myself.
If it were up to me, each book would be painstakingly put together by hand, each page glued and sewn into it’s place within the covers. The covers wooden and painted in such exquisite colors, with such detail, that the covers themselves would be as much art as the words that filled them. Then, each book would have a completely different smell, as each book would smell of the hands that had made it, as well as the different glue and thread that person used.
That would be something wonderful, I thought, before beginning to read. I slipped into the world of the Unseelie Court:

Despite her casting me/him down to this place, despite the fresh bruises on my/his skin and the blood under my/his nails, I/Roiben still loved Lady Silarial. Despite the hungry eyes of the Unseelie Court and the gruesome tasks its Queen Nicnevin set me/him. Despite the many ways I/he’d been humiliated and the things I/he wouldn’t let myself/himself think on while I/he stood stiffly behind her throne....

I finished the prologue, and was immediately jolted out of the story. I scowled at the book. Stupid perspective change, I thought. In some books, it was easy. They stayed with the same person the whole time. In others, though, it was harder. Tithe had had a lot of perspective changes, but Valiant had been better.
I plunged back, headfirst, into the story:

Human girls cry when they’re sad and laugh when they’re happy. They have a single fixed shape rather than shifting with their whims like windblown smoke. They have their very own parents, whom they love. They don’t go around stealing other girls’ mothers. At least that’s what I/Kaye thought human girls were like. I/She wouldn’t know. After all, I/she wasn’t human.

I/Kaye continued to live the story. Getting spurned by Roiben; being blackmailed to come to the Seelie Court. Meeting Luis. Seeing Roiben again, at the Seelie Court, after I/she was banned from seeing him. Stealing Roiben’s sister Ethine, keeping her hostage. Getting the real me/Kaye home to Ellen. Luis bargaining for his brother, Dave. He traded Dave’s body for Ethine. Becoming Roiben’s consort. Beating Silarial at her own duel. Roiben taking control of both the Seelie and Unseelie courts.
Dave’s funeral on New Year’s. Meeting Val and Ravus again. Corny and Luis becoming a couple. Making up with my/Kaye’s mother for not being her birth daughter. In the epilogue, Corny and I/Kaye were taking care of “Kate”, the real me/Kaye, since Ellen was performing a concert.
And that was the end of that story. I looked at the clock. It’d taken the rest of the school day to read Ironside. I closed her, and put her back on the bookshelf next to her sisters.
When that was done, I sighed. There were no new books to read, I’d read everything in here. Every single bookshelf full of books, and not one story was new to me. Not that that bothered me, exactly. More, it exasperated me.
All of the millions of fiction books in the world, I thought, and I’m stuck here without a single story.
I opened my computer to look at Manga Fox. I’d read everything on here, too, but maybe there was a new chapter of something. I looked at the alphabetized list hanging on my desk, and quickly looked for any manga that had the word “updated” next to it in green. None of them did, and as I’d scanned the list of all the manga on the site, I hadn’t see anything that said “new” in green lettering, either.
I had nothing to do. I loved re-reading my stories, but I forced myself to only re-read if a new book or chapter came out. If the book series was finished, re-reading it was seen as a last resort.
I didn’t even feel like re-reading something. I’d read every single fiction book that I could find, even some that my parents had found for me. I’d re-read every finished series in the room at least as many times as the series had books, and more.
I refused to watch TV, on principle. There was never anything on TV, it was all “reality” shows about people who had “dramatic” lives. Yeah, sure. The girls on those shows were slutty silly goose, and the guys were even worse. All they ever did was party and have sex with each other, then argue about it afterward.
I scowled. I began pacing the room, when a book caught my attention.