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Doug had always been fond of his brother. But only as they began to grow up, a missing thread to their relationship had become evident. As most did, the Weiss siblings teased each other like nobody’s business. The eldest tormenting the youngest, and the middle being left out of the loop. With a 2 year age gap, Doug and Derek had once been inseparable. However, the years that changed their dynamics would end up being the worst of his life.
Being the middle child was never something that Doug had gotten used to. He was six years old when Daisy was born. As the only girl, she of course got the “royal treatment.” She had the closest bond to their mother, Annabelle and was the star of the show despite her humble and shy nature. So as the middle child, things didn’t come so easy for him. Yet as ignored as he was, over time, Doug had grown to find his niche in his academics, specifically the sciences, as well as music and band.
Even before he found his niche, another pile of difficulties had been dumped on his plate when heroes were given the same status to attend Auradon Preparatory Academy. That was the first time he learned that the kids of heroes, like him and his siblings, weren't exactly on the same social platform as the Royals. So as he watched the glances and stares geared towards him as he walked inside of his third grade classroom for the first time, a boy about his height waved to him. He’d learn the next day that he was the son of King Beast and Belle. No wonder he had been so friendly.
After he came home from school, he brought the matter up to his fifth grade brother. Derek agreed that they weren’t treated the same and advised that the matter should not get to Doug’s head. It may have sounded easy for him, but Doug struggled to remember that.
As the years continued, Derek would stay on the taller side and continue to attract the eyes of many girls. Derek had always been Doug’s personal protector. No one really assumed that they were brothers as Doug took more after their father than Derek. With his watchful eye and natural leadership aura, Derek showed Doug the ropes of school and made it a fact that no one messed with his little brother.
As the young student Doug was, he was lanky, quirky and just a tad clumsy. In his elementary years, it wasn’t much of an issue, but it would pave the way for years to come. Beyond the watchful care of his brother, Doug would often hear the snickering that came with when he chose to read instead of participating in recess. His teachers worried about the boy who wasn’t much of a social child, often had his nose stuck in his work, and rarely participated in physical activity.
And as he grew older, that never changed. He’d pass every class with flying colors, ahead of even the next grade up. That prompted the Academy’s advising that he move up a grade. That had been a special moment that made both his parents and Derek proud. However, things were only good for a while.
Doug still felt insecure about his intelligence and often about himself. Compared to his older brother and the shadow he left on every grade Doug would follow him to, there was a stark difference. Derek was an overall great student, great athlete and was very sociable. He on the other hand, lacked in every department other than his other worldly intelligence.
When he was a sixth grader in a fifth grader’s body, Doug had been happy to have a bit more of an academic challenge, but as he sat in his desk and watched the other students arrive the first day, he nearly jumped out of his skin. He was now around the age when girls and boys began to grow crushes on each other. Doug, for the first time, had noticed how pretty one of the sixth grade girls was. She had tawny brown skin and the brightest smile he’d ever seen. As she sat down in her new pink ensemble she could feel his eyes on her.
“Hi! My name is Audrey Rose. This year, I hope Ben asks me to the sixth grade social. What’s your name?” The girl asked as she took out her pink pen.
“Doug,” was all he could manage to say. Audrey smiled and tapped the pen on the page.
“Great, Doug. Now see who your parents are on this list. Just sign your name and we can be friends,” She said sliding the sheet of paper his way. In a few seconds, he wasn’t able to find his father or mother’s name. Audrey looked up in confusion. Usually it didn’t take too long for people to check their names off.
“What’s wrong?” She leaned over to see the list, her scented lotion instantly making Doug gag. It smelled of cheap roses. He knew exactly that it was artificial, because it definitely didn’t smell like the flowers in his backyard or the ones his mom sold at the family resort.
“My parents aren’t on this list.”
Audrey chuckled. “Well, they should be. Who are they?”
“Annabelle and—and Dopey,” He barely whispered as Audrey’s eyes widened.
“Oh. Well. Um, I don’t really allow hero kids in my circles, so… I’m sorry. We can still be mutuals, though,” she said quickly. Audrey turned her desk around so she faced the other way. She began to chatter with another boy who had his hair parted to the side, similar to Doug’s. He wore a baby blue cashmere sweater and was showing off his monogrammed set of lined paper.
Self-consciously, Doug looked down at his own blue zip-up sweater with a pale green t-shirt under it, matching his eyes. The shirt said “be like a proton and stay positive.” Hiding the cheesy line, he fiddled with his pencil and looked over to the door to see Ben who waved at him and took a seat next to him.
He exchanged a greeting with Audrey who squealed in delight with her friends. Doug couldn’t believe this would be his homeroom for the next three years. Making a mental note to never wear his proton shirt again, he opened his schedule to compare it with Ben. And to his disappointment, they only shared homeroom and gym . Eyeing the physical education course on his schedule that was listed for every other day, he knew this would be the hardest year he encountered so far.
Now in the eighth grade, by adding the recent growth of everyone but him, his constant voice cracks and his newest nickname of four-eyes, life was well… terrible. His glasses are what drew him to his wits end. From four-eyes to blind jokes, the names got worse as time went on. That is until his high school brother intervened. After purposefully breaking his glasses, Doug tried to take matters into his own hands.
“Doug, my man! How was school?” His brother called into the younger boy’s room, covered in Scout badges, science fair projects and academic awards. Just as he had broken the glasses in half, Derek popped his head in.
“Fine,” Doug replied, shoving the broken lenses in his desk drawer.
“What was that? Got some love letters to send to Audrey?” He teased. Doug shook his head, further hiding the evidence of the glasses. Derek squinted his eyes and looked at the few remnants in his brother’s hand. “Hey, are those your glasses?”
The now very muscular, 5’8” Swords and Shields player opened the drawer. “Someone broke your glasses?!” He asked, his anger rising. “Why can’t they just leave you alone! Just because you’re a lanky nerd, doesn’t mean you don’t—have—feelings,” Derek said, catching his words. As he slowly spoke the last of them, Doug turned away.
“Get out,” Doug said through his gritted teeth. It wasn’t a norm of his to show very much emotion. But his own brother even agreed with everyone else. “Get out!”
“Doug, I really didn’t mean it,” Derek said, now worried about his brother. “You broke those, didn’t you? Dad really paid those guys a bunch of money to custom make them. Money basically just grows in the mines, but still. Mom and Dad aren’t crazy spenders.”
Doug couldn’t speak. He knew what he had done and now regretted every minute of it. He pointed to the door and closed his brother out. As he flopped on his bed, his face in his pillow, he cried. For the first time since elementary, he finally broke down.
Eyeing the signet ring on his finger, he threw it across the room. It had been made for all of the descendants of heroes, sidekicks and royals alike and held a special meaning. Each one was to be given to someone who they promised to cherish forever. But what was the use? No one would ever accept him for who he was. Either he was too weird or not unique enough.
Why did it have to be this way?
As he lay on his bed, he wondered if high school would be any better. Answering his question aloud, he gave a “no” in the form of a huff. But what he didn’t know was that the Crown Prince of Auradon would soon change his life.
When he got to high school and his brother was a sophomore, they had grown apart since the glasses incident. No longer did Derek protect him like he used to. He became a part of the problem. No one at Auradon Prep even bothered to register that Derek and Doug were brothers. And that’s because of their lack of association and vast differences.
Over the summer, Doug had gotten a new pair of glasses and found his fashion style, gravitating toward smart suits and suspenders and the occasional fedora. With a new haircut similar to the princes in the magazines, Doug had seemingly become a new person. His late growth spurt from middle school kicked in and he was rivaling the height of his brother.
High school started out much better than middle school, and continued to get better by the month. He found other band geeks, he ran for student council and was elected chairman, a first for a freshman and pulled away from his brother’s shadow. Derek on the other hand had befriended some of the jocks that targeted Doug. He had let his grades slip and focused on Swords and Shields more than anything. He had even gotten a girlfriend, something Doug had struggled with. From breaking a girl's arm, to forgetting about a dinner date, Doug had failed in that realm. So he left it alone, sticking to the status quo.
But Doug would come to find that the status quo was due for a change. The day that would impact his life forever was the moment he came face to face with the most stunning girl in his life. Her long blue hair was wavy, her eyes were amber and sparkled in and out of the light. She had rosy lips and a picture perfect smile. Audrey no longer had a place in his mind of infatuation. Evie was the name that stuck to his heart like super glue.
Yet as the socially awkward guy he was, he blew it and acted as exactly what was in his blood. Dopey.
He’d get a second chance that was overshadowed by Cashmere Chad and another chance in which she just laughed in his face. But that fourth chance would be the turning point. He had an out of body experience when he stood up and defended the girl of his dreams. Yet then he failed again when he cowered to Chad’s requests and did not defend her on Family Day.
Derek had yet to find out the girl his brother had been so captivated by. And surprisingly was unbothered when he realized it was the Evil Queen’s daughter. Let alone the girl that sprayed Chad Charming.
“Hey, Doug?” Derek said approaching him after the four VKs walked away. Doug rose a brow, expecting to hear how dopey he had been. Instead he was surprised when his brother patted him on the back. “You did fine for your first conflict. Next time, always side with your girl,” he advised before catching up with Lil’ Shang, Lonnie’s older brother. As Doug returned to where Lonnie sat at a picnic table, she got up and followed him back to the dorms. She stopped him from rambling about how much Evie probably hated him.
“She apologized and said she understood. The whole thing was stupid anyway. Tomorrow night, after Ben’s coronation, just apologize. She’s in Goodness 101 so she knows all about having to make stupid decisions by now,” Lonnie said, patting his shoulder.
“Thanks. I guess she does,” Doug chuckled. He was grateful that Lonnie had always been a good friend to him even though she was in Audrey’s circle now, along with Jane. They’d never really hung out much considering Audrey’s sometimey stance on sidekicks, but she still made an effort with Ben and Jane to hang out with him when she could.
A day later, it turned out that they both had been right. Evie accepted his apology and they agreed to get to know one another. They took it slow, and that was just fine for Doug. Slow and steady always wins the race. Plus at this rate, he’d end up with less mistakes. It even made him feel better about whatever he and Evie agreed to, when she admitted to never having a boyfriend. Not that they were really quite of the such yet.
With the passing of a year and now as a junior, Doug had befriended the other VKs and gained friends in Jay and Carlos. Evie had become more affectionate toward him and he didn’t know what this meant. He thought he loved her, but wasn’t too sure if he really did so soon. But each time they hung out, his feelings for her grew. Everything felt so new. No longer did he feel like a loner, a loser, a nobody. People began to see Doug as a clean slate. Not just as the homework guy, but as he was.
That same year, Derek was a senior. It was bittersweet for Doug. His relationship with his brother had been getting better since Family Day, but both of them seemed to have changed. He knew he was going to miss his brother being around and occasionally dropping in to ask how he was doing, but he found that with a few good friends by his side he no longer wished for his brother’s constant watch.
After meeting up with his family who visited campus on a Friday night, Doug went to find Evie. Even though it was only a day before Cotillion, he thought he’d ask her to be his date. Running into Carlos and Jay, he explained that he couldn’t find Evie anywhere. In response, the boys straight out lied. Doug knew she would never have gone camping.
His insecurities and doubts circled his mind. If this was true, Evie sure had changed, but his gut said it wasn’t. I mean where would she plug up her hair dryer?
With a blow to his self-esteem, Doug immediately concluded that Evie had moved on to someone else. He had texted her ‘how was she doing’ and ‘good morning’ yesterday, only for there to be no response. He decided not to push her and allowed her to have space. But then she would go to not be around that day as well. She had to be avoiding his texts because of someone else. His mind had gone to the extreme and drastic conclusion as that’s what drove him to ask her. He decided he would rather just deal with it upfront and get over with.
But when she denied it and even went so far as to assure him she would never leave him, followed by a kiss, a spark hit Doug. In that moment, he realized they both like-liked each other.
At his brother’s graduation in the next few months, Doug would realize that he and his brother were officially parting ways. Derek had taken the offer to play Swords and Shields professionally far off from Auradon City. In another city, Sherwood.
When his own senior year crawled up on him, it was a whirlwind of a blur. He was accepted into MIT, the most prestigious University in Auradon which was only a few miles from the starter castle, he helped Evie to purchase. The castle he had calculated they would have enough to buy in their junior year.
He had grown just a smidge more, another spurt occurring that also seemed to have affected his hair. He even took Jay and Carlos up on an offer to learn a few drills, not because of societal pressure, but because he really wanted to.
And following his graduation, that summer, with a little bit of pixie dust and true love, he finally got what his middle school self would never have imagined. Someone now wore his signet ring. Someone accepted him for everything that he was.
That’s what made Doug happy. The fact that he was able to make someone else happy and finally get to be who he wanted to be, without the prejudgements and standards.
No longer was he just a dopey band nerd, he was just Douglas Weiss.