Crush Control by Jennifer Jabaley Page B

the audience to be very still, very quiet; then I had the volunteers close their eyes. I took a deep breath. I knew the words. I knew the sequence. I didn’t have the audio of the soft ocean waves to play, but I prayed it would work anyway. “I want you to take a deep breath, focus on my voice, and I’ll guide you through,” I said calmly.
    For the next three minutes, with complete silence behind me, I found myself just falling into the routine, saying the words I heard my mom say so many times before. I didn’t have time to be nervous anymore. I was invested in the process. “From this point on you will hear what I say, feel what I ask you to feel, visualize what I ask you to visualize.” The five volunteers slumped in the chairs, heads limp to the side, some resting on the shoulder of the person next to them.
    I turned back around to the audience and smiled. “Ready?” I asked. “You can make noise now.”
    And they did.
    â€œOkay!” I said, imagining how in our show the pulsing music would start to play. I had the volunteers open their eyes. I walked over to the guy wearing a Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets T-shirt. “Uh-oh,” I said to him. “You just got stung by a yellow jacket.” For some reason this sent the crowd into a huge uproar. Burly jocks stood up and screamed things about football and rivals. I knew the response wasn’t exactly because of me, but still, it gave me a little dose of confidence to know everyone was so enthusiastic. I turned back to the Yellow Jacket guy. “Your tongue is swelling up to twice its normal size. You have no trouble breathing, but it’s difficult to talk.”
    â€œOh no.” Yellow Jacket Guy grabbed at his mouth. “My thongue!”
    There was more hooting and hollering from the crowd. I stared at the Yellow Jacket guy for a moment, watching as he poked his lips with his fingers. I had done it. Hypnotized. Excitement swirled in my stomach.
    I turned to a petite girl in a pink sundress. “On the count of three,” I told her, “you will become Grammy-winning entertainer of the year, pop sensation Taylor Swift!”
    â€œWoo-hoo!” The crowd applauded.
    â€œOne, two, three!”
    Pink Sundress Girl popped up off her chair and sashayed toward the edge of the patio, a fake microphone in her hand, and began to sing loudly. The crowd went wild.
    I stared into the audience of my new classmates and felt flushed with exhilaration. This was working. I was entertaining them. Then, at the very left side of the crowd, I saw Max and Minnie sitting so close to each other their arms looked zipped together. Minnie leaned over and kissed Max’s cheek. And he looked lovingly at her. I was onstage but he was looking at her.
    Pink Sundress was singing “Mine,” but I had an inspiration. I tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey Taylor,” I whispered. “Why don’t you sing that song about the girl who secretly loves her best friend.”
    Pink Sundress nodded eagerly and started to sing “You Belong with Me.”
    I turned back toward the other volunteers sitting on their chairs. Yellow Jacket guy continued to poke at his mouth. I pointed to a girl with honey-streaked hair. “Can you put your hands in a fist? Good. Perfect. For the remainder of the show, your hands are stuck that way, okay? You can’t seem to pull them apart, but just keep trying.”
    She began to struggle to separate her hands. At the edge of the patio, Pink Sundress sang, “Dreaming of the day when you wake up and find that what you’re looking for has been here the whole time.”
    I looked over my shoulder. Max was looking at me now. My heart rocketed into my ribs. Keep his attention. Show him how much fun you are. Make him realize he wants to be with you.
    I turned back to the girl with the pretend fused fists. “Oh, and for no apparent reason you’ve completely forgotten what