You Should See Me in a Crown

by Leah Johnson

When you already feel like everything about you makes you stand out, it just makes more sense to find as many ways to blend in as you can.

haven’t said much since the promposal at lunch—haven’t been able to shake that weird feeling of otherness that sometimes hits me in waves so strong they threaten to pull me under—but that doesn’t stop Gabi and Britt from trying to get me to chime in anyway.

“This isn’t the only place where you can be yourself, but it was the place where I figured out what it means to be who I am.

High school friend groups are something like an ensemble in that way. My friends are certified oddballs, the inkblots on an otherwise pure white page, and it’s why we work together so well. Because as long as they’re my people, as long as they’re the ones on my left and my right, sometimes I can forget that I don’t fit in anywhere else in this town.

The thing about anxiety is that it looks different for everyone. I mean, yeah, of course there are some threads that run through all of us that mark us as, you know, anxious people: being restless, exhausted, just plain fidgety. But it’s the nuances that change the game. It’s my stomach-churning, gazelles-dancing-gracefully-across-my-abdomen feeling that always gets me the most.

“You’re so right. We should save it all for charity.” She nods and wipes her hands on her apron. “I should have thought about that. Ugh, Liz, your mind.”

Robbie and G always say that I have a serious problem with falling hard for talent almost as hard as I fall for people (see: my intense, lifelong crush on Kittredge’s colead singer, Teela Conrad), but that’s not what this is. Definitely not. Not at all.

can’t believe people actually fight about stuff like this. I can’t believe that we’re actually going all Sharks versus Jets in the culinary-arts room.

I can barely tolerate Rachel in human size, but the face in front of me is enough to make a nun curse God and walk backward into hell.

People like us. And that feels sort of good in a way that surprises me. She’s right. High school is complicated, and the lines of demarcation that The Breakfast Club said divided us aren’t quite so clean-cut. The athletes are also the smart kids; the theater kids are also the presidents of the student council. But there’s still those outliers. The people who are everywhere but fit nowhere. People who are involved but not envied—present but imperfect—so the scrutiny pushes them out of the race.

There’s one clear winner, and for the first time in a long time, that winner is me.

But that’s just it, I’ve never tried to hide it. Not exactly. I just … never made it a thing. Being into girls has never been a huge point of contention for me or my friends. Hell, when I came out to my grandparents, the only thing Grandad asked me was, “So are we giving up them waffle fries at Chick-fil-A now? Because, I’ll tell you what, them things are the closest I’ve ever felt to Heaven.”

Silence and shame aren’t the same thing—not by a longshot. But sometimes silence is simpler.

I think about the spark that I could swear I felt at the Bake-Off as we cowered underneath that baking sheet.

What I remember is learning how to love the people who love me with everything I have.

remember knowing what it feels like to have someone be your entire world one second and them be gone the next.

“Well, apparently Quinn is Peyton Manning incarnate and currently shaping this ragtag bunch into a real team.” I shake my head.

After all, you don’t get the GPA I have by knowing all the answers. Half the battle is correctly interpreting context clues.

She smirks. “But on the bright side, I’ve never seen the freshmen so concerned. I heard one of them shout ‘Liz Lighty is stronger than the US Marines!’ on my way in here.” I can’t help but laugh. One day someone is going to do a documentary on the baby paparazzi of Campbell County prom, and it’s going to be a hit on all the streaming services.

“No way, I think they’re awesome!” She looks over at me quickly. “And if Princess Leia were a black girl from central Indiana with amazing taste in music and even better taste in shoes, I have to say, I think the franchise might actually then be worth all the sequels and prequels and reboots.”

“I get it. I totally get it. This isn’t the most tolerant place on Earth, for sure. And I bet it’s even harder for you because you’re not only queer but you’re also black, and I’ve been reading a lot of Kimberlé Crenshaw, so, like, intersectionality and all that definitely makes it harder. I mean, it’s not ideal, of course, but your safety—”

“Do you feel that?” Mack shouts over the music. Her hand slips into mine gently, bringing me closer. “Feel what?” I don’t know what she means, not exactly anyway, but I want to stand still and allow whatever is happening to completely wash over me. She pulls back to smile at me. “Everything.”

“I’m not a writer like my mom was. But musicians are the best storytellers in the world,” she says, talking quickly and waving her hands around like she’s conducting an erratic choir.

“Can I ask you something crazy?” She pulls back, and her hands are still on both my cheeks. She is smiling this heart-stopping smile, and I’m convinced that this is how I die. Kissing Amanda McCarthy on a sidewalk in front of a pizza place.

Rachel Collins never fails to both shock and disappoint.

Because in just three days, Rachel has managed to use her resources to convince everyone that she is somehow a magically good person even though she nearly concussed me not even four days prior.

“Looking good, Lighty!” Some guy with shaggy blond hair and a scraggly White Jesus beard that I’ve never spoken to but had one class with sophomore year walks by and holds his hand up for a high five. It’s so fast, I bring my hand up to his before I even know what’s happening. “Woo!” I look at his backpack as he walks away like that was a totally normal thing to do. A button with my face is right next to his Green Day patch.

I’m in Steak ’n Shake looking like exactly what I am: a pitiful heartbreakee in a pair of Jordan’s old Ray-Bans from his glove compartment.

“You look like you had a great night, and I look like I just finished an all-night bender at Club Monaco.” I grab his straw paper off the table and roll it into a ball between my thumb and forefinger. I’m exhausted in the worst way.

No matter how much time has passed, my body acutely remembers the shame that follows a panic attack that severe.

The whole conversation suddenly feels surreal and deeply personal, but somehow it makes sense for us to be having it. Me and Jordan may not be who we used to be, but we still fit together. Like Snoop Dogg and Martha Stewart: Freaky, but it works.

You needed to throw people off before rumors got out of hand and tanked your chances at winning.” Which, okay, absolutely sucks but is sort of reasonable in a twisted, catastrophically unethical way.

So I do what I always do when I’m afraid. I connect my phone to the Bluetooth speaker Robbie got me for my birthday last year, find my favorite playlist, and turn it up.