Cheerio

“Oh, Evie?” Santana walked by my locker, bouncing a little on her toes. I couldn’t help but notice that she must have been in a really good mood. “Coach Sylvester wants to have a word with you.”

“What about?” I questioned as I pulled my Chem book out of my locker, slamming the door shut.

“Dunno. She wouldn’t say.” It didn’t take a lie detector to hear the falseness in her voice. “But you should probably see her as soon as possible.”

Muttering to myself, I made my way down the hallway to Coach Sylvester’s office. “Hello?” I called, careful not to step inside without the okay. “You asked for me?”

Coach Sylvester spun around in her chair, her hands clasped together. I was getting a total Godfather vibe, and it was freaking me the hell out. “Goldilocks. Take a seat.” She nodded toward the seat in front of her desk.

Starting to get a little nervous, (which I refused to show) I sat down and put my bag at my feet.

“Now, a few little birdies named Brittany, Santana, and Quinn told me that you were now a part of the Glee Club, and that’s why you were late to practice yesterday. Is that true?”

Wasn’t saying that ‘a little birdy’ told someone something supposed to keep things confidential? Apparently not to Coach Sylvester. “Um, yeah. Kind of.”

“I was afraid of that.” Coach Sylvester leaned forward in her chair and smashed a fist against her desk, making me jump about a foot in the air. “Goldilocks, I’m going to need your uniform.”

“What?” The breath left my lungs in a gust, and I hugged my middle, as if I was afraid my uniform would get a mind of its own and walk away. “You can’t kick me off Cheerios! I’m one of the best! And you don’t understand. I have to be in the Glee Club because I need the extra credit for Spanish! Mr. Schue is going to fail me if I don’t!”

She didn’t look interested. “Are you going to make me repeat myself?”

“It isn’t fair!” I screamed, getting to my feet. In that second, I noticed that the door was open to the hallway, so everybody in the school could hear the exchange, but I didn’t care. “Santana, Brittany, and Quinn get to do both! Why is it that because I’m now being forced to be a part of Glee Club, you’re kicking me off?! They do it willingly!”

“There’s a difference between the three of them and you,” Coach Sylvester said slowly and harshly.

“And what’s that?” I snapped. I was shocked at my behavior, really. I had an attitude with everyone in the school system, basically, but not usually with my coach.

“They’re naturals, flawless. To put it in a way that your simple, childlike mind can understand: They. Are. Irreplaceable. And you don’t matter enough. You’re a throwaway.”

My stomach tightened, and I was positive that I was going to puke. Never had I heard such cruel words about me before. I never expected to hear them, either. Not after all the long, hard hours I put into improving, being a better Cheerio.

“I’m great.” Although my voice was supposed to sound strong, like I was sure of myself, it didn’t. I sounded like a weak little girl on the brink of bursting into tears, just like I was underneath my cold exterior all the time.

“No, you’re not. You and I both know that.” Coach Sylvester sat back, putting her legs on top of the desk, very satisfied with herself. “Now I’m going to need your uniform back.”

Fighting the tears in my eyes, I stormed out of the office. Her words kept replaying in my head, her stinging words, and I couldn’t walk quickly enough, couldn’t get my uniform off quickly enough. It was almost as if it was burning right through my skin, incinerating my bones.

I ripped my clothes that I would have changed into after Cheerios practice and burst into the girls’ bathroom.

There were a couple of freshman, gossiping and putting on makeup, laughing. “Get the fuck out of here!” I screamed at them.

They looked scared out of their minds as they gathered up their makeup and darted from the room. Changing into my clothes took, shockingly, only a minute or two because I was itching so furiously to get out of my uniform.

After ripping out my ponytail, letting my naturally pin-straight hair fall to its natural resting place, to the bottom of my shoulder blades, I crumpled the uniform into a ball so it got as wrinkled as possible.

Then, in the most immature way possible, I chucked the ball into Coach Sylvester’s office, knocking over a plant.

It occurred to me that Coach Sylvester was probably the last person I wanted to have on my enemy list, but I didn’t care. I felt a swelling (good swelling) in my chest from causing a little destruction in her office.

Thankfully, I hadn’t actually cried, so I didn’t look like that much of a wreck. Unfortunately, everyone knew that something was wrong from the fact that I wasn’t wearing my Cheerios uniform with pride, I wasn’t strutting up and down the hallways like I owned the school. No, like I owned the world.

With my Cheerio status stripped from me, I just kind of felt lost. Where did I fall now?

The idea dawned on me that I was now a fucking Glee kid. There was no way. I had to find another clique to fit into.

But I knew in my heart of hearts that I wasn’t going to find a new one that day. I just felt too exhausted and heartbroken. My whole future, my whole plan, had been stripped from me. I wasn’t going to be able to put that last Cheerio National title on my college applications. I was just going to put that I had been on the Cheerios for my first two years. That would make me look undedicated, like I decided to get going when the going got tough. How would colleges know that I sacrificed taking Home Ec in order to practice my dancing more?

“Payback’s a bitch, isn’t it?” Santana smirked as she walked by. Brittany giggled beside her.

“Payback for what?” I hissed. I didn’t do anything wrong! I mean, sure, I was a bitch sometimes. But certainly no bitchier than the other Cheerios. They weren’t being tossed out on the side of the street like yesterday’s trash.

And from that comment from Santana, my fate was sealed: I was no longer a Cheerio. I wasn’t allowed to associate with Cheerios unless necessary.

I was at the bottom of the entire social chain, a nobody.

That was certainly going to suck in the long run.