The Geeks Shall Inherit the Earth - Alexandra Robbins [10]
Before cheer practice that afternoon, Whitney and Giselle claimed their gym lockers. It hardly mattered that they always took the lockers in the back corner of the last row. When the prep cheerleaders changed their clothes, the younger athletes waited until the preps were dressed and gone before going to their own lockers. Once, an underclassman tried to squeeze by and accidentally stepped on Whitney’s Ugg boot. “Jesus Christ! Seriously?!” Whitney yelled. The girl looked mortified, blurted out a meek “I’m sorry!”, and ran away.
As much as she loved being popular, Whitney wished other students understood that it wasn’t so easy. Preps were stereotyped like everyone else, she said. “A prep talks like a Valley Girl, thinks she’s better than everyone, is obsessed with looks, sleeps around, is usually a cheerleader, doesn’t eat, parties all the time, and gets away with murder. Basically, emos want us dead.”
Whitney insisted that the prep description didn’t fit the “real” Whitney. “I’m not snobby,” she said. “I have to be this way because it’s what my friends do. If I wasn’t like this, I wouldn’t have any friends.” She loathed the immediate judgments students made about her. She was a cheerleader; therefore she was a slut. She was a class officer; therefore she was stuck up. She wore expensive clothes; therefore she was spoiled. She said “like” too often; therefore she was flaky. She was a prep; therefore she was a bitch.
The funny thing was that if Whitney could have chosen any group at school to belong to, she wouldn’t have chosen the clique that intimidated other students with cruelty. She would have chosen to be in what she considered the most nonjudgmental, down-to-earth crew at school: the punks. But it didn’t matter. There was no changing groups. Once you were in a group, you were stuck there until graduation, no matter what. That was just the way high school was, Whitney was sure. So she didn’t tell a soul.
REGAN DAVIS, GEORGIA | THE WEIRD GIRL
Here we go again, Regan thought, opening the yellow double doors of James Johnson High School. She loved her classes, but the social scene and high school bureaucracy dampened her enthusiasm. She had never walked through these doors on the first day of school without feeling a sense of impending doom.
Regan headed straight for the first-day-of-school assembly. She looked around at her peers, many nervously speculating about the principal’s new rules. There had been rumors that the administration was going to enforce the dress code more stringently this year, partly to prevent students from exhibiting gang affiliations on school grounds. Regan usually wore innocuous sundresses and long necklaces, but she worried that the dress code would rein her in. Her long, often wild curly hair had been some permutation of every color in the rainbow since she was thirteen. She had removed her tongue piercing a few years ago, but had kept the orbital in her right ear. She would have to be extra careful this year not to expose her tattoos.
Regan merged into the crowd with some acquaintances, grateful to have her new, beautiful girlfriend, Crystal, at her side. Crystal had a calming effect on Regan. A hip-hop artist whose band seemed on the verge of hitting it big, Crystal had dropped out of school to pursue music. She was here this morning, only for the assembly, to give Regan moral support on her first day of school.
Crystal raised her hand as if to touch Regan’s face, then quickly retracted it. “Oh . . . never mind,” she said.
“What?” asked Regan.
“You . . . you have something on your face. I wanted to wipe it off for you, but I forgot we’re at school.”
Regan swiped her cheek and sighed. Is this what I have to look