One Last Barrier and One Big Karate Chop
By: Addison Labrum
Tags: High School, Coming Of Age, Short Story, Deep Thoughts On Life, Popularity

The noise in the cafeteria was enough to make your ears actually bleed. You could barely hear the person next to you when the assistant principal, my dad, spoke into a microphone at the front of the cafeteria announcing that voting had opened for homecoming royalty. You could put any name you wanted in the little glass bin. I, thinking I was funny, put my best friend’s name in maybe 20 times. She, not thinking I was so funny, put my name in more times to get me back. It was a full-on bidding war at this point. Finally, at the end of that day, the student council had counted the votes, and… “Maddie Miller!” was in the five nominees. Almost exactly 24 hours later I heard my name over the intercom following “top three nominees”. I was sitting in Mr. Hoon’s ceramics class. We were making pinch pots and my class was clapping for me in congratulations. I was less than thrilled because,

My friend had outbid me in a sense and my prank blew up right in my face

and

2. Now I had a chance to be homecoming queen.

Don’t get me wrong that was kind of cool, but mostly I hated the thought. I had always hated the popular crowd, they were arrogant and mean and homecoming queen seemed like the ultimate popularity label. After the last clap, everybody went back to pinching clay into little pots.

Fast forward to a few days later it was Friday, a cool September night. I was in the student section cheering for my team in the front row as I was a senior now and got that privilege. Twenty minutes before half time, my heart was pounding and it smelled of nachos as I went down to the bathroom to change into my dress. This was a frantic experience, my mom was helping me get ready, I had the most monster-like butterflies in my stomach but not because I was nervous I wouldn’t win, I couldn’t care less about that, I had to stand on the football field in front of the whole school and audience that came to watch. I was sure I would trip. Finally, I was ready and a little late but made it just in time to learn where to stand on the field. We started walking in a weird formation following the giant wolf mascot in front of us. The crowd was going crazy, but what was crazier is I couldn’t hear them. As if I was in a movie, I had a flashback type thought pop into my head.

I had become friends with one “popular girl” one summer, not knowing she was “popular”. I walked in on the first day of seventh grade in my Under Armour leggings, sweatshirt, and headband thinking there was no way somebody could be dressed flyer than me. I met up with my friend I’d made that summer and right behind her was her posse of girls dressed in crop tops, jeans, and bows. I was definitely not the best dressed. I sat with them at lunch shaking in my boots afraid that they would judge the way I sat or walked or ate or something. I wanted to be like them and did by no means feel like I could ever. They were SO cool in my mind, I put them on a pedestal and lived all of my middle school years in fear of what they were thinking of me.

I kept walking, a little prouder this time of where I was now. I took a deep breath and boom. Another thought. Ninth grade biology class.

“Maddie Miller and Simon Hatch you’ll be partners”. Of course. My stomach dropped a little, not only was Simon super hot but also the most popular boy in school. I lost the ability to speak when he came up to me and said, “hey”. We went over and I was back to shaking in my boots for the entire project we did together. I couldn’t help but be thinking about what he might be thinking of me the whole time. Probably the awkward shy girl is what went through my head.

Oh how far I had come. I took a couple more steps, looked into the crowd, and one last thought flooded my brain.

My friend group. How awesome they were and how many friends I had made just in the first few months of senior year. If I had to use stereotypical labels, they weren’t in the mean, arrogant popular group but like a step below that. They had allowed me to let go of the concept of labels more and more.

None of this really matters.

We stopped in the middle of the football field. They announced the princes and princesses over the intercom and now came the king and queen. My heart was pounding and I was shaking. The crowd was silent. “And you’re 2019 Homecoming Queen is…….. Maddie Miller”. The student section cheered and my friends in the crowd did too. I stepped forward and the feeling of the crown being placed on my head was more of a personal victory than anything else. I took the victory lap around the track and walked back up to the student section as they cheered, “Maddie, Maddie, Maddie”. I felt ultimately accepted and confidence flooded over me like a tidal wave. I walked over to my parents and a little girl told me I looked like a princess. I was warm inside as I hugged my mom. I could smell the crisp fall air which seemed to be crisper than ever. We took pictures and I don’t remember much after that. But this night changed my views and impacted me greatly but not because of the win.

This whole experience felt like I had karate chopped the last barrier of a constant inner conflict of caring what others thought. I knocked down the wall of labels and gained so much confidence through that. The win wasn’t a definition of popularity but a definition of how far I’d come over the years because maybe, just maybe, we are all a lot more “popular” than we think.