What A Brave Girl~~~

Author: Ashres~

She examines her own reflection in the polished wood floor with some anxiety. The glare of the yellow lights above her head cast an unnatural shadow beneath her eyebrows, hiding her eyes from view, but that cannot be remedied now and therefore she endures it without complaint. Her cheeks are sagging from the weight of enough powders and creams to erase every blemish, every imperfection from her skin. Her face, unnaturally burdened by the square, tasseled cap, appears small and pale and more than a little afraid. She discreetly stamps on it with a heel, high and black and shiny with assurance and the face cracks a hideous smile.

Blinking away the image, she takes a deep breath and looks up at the podium, brilliantly illuminated and looming high atop the stage. The auditorium buzzes and hums with activity. Behind her sits a murmuring crowd of assorted personages, all expecting great things, she knows. The thought of their presence brings a pang of nausea to her stomach. It is good that they cannot see her eyes—she decides, after a few moments of thought—for that, at least, provided some sort of a protective barricade for her to hide herself behind, until she is ready.

Her skin prickles as tremors from the microphone reverberate through the auditorium. A man is standing behind the podium now, she notices with some surprise, and after a few tentative clearings of the throat he begins to speak of “important things”. She finds herself drifting away like a wrinkled leaf on a river of dancing light, until she becomes aware of her mind reviewing the speech once more, absently adding trills and embellishments that probably will make no difference either way. There is also doubt, and briefly she lets them carry her away. The crowd will be difficult to please, she is sure. And what if, after countless mental debates, sleepless nights, arguments of questionable validity, uncertainty—after all that and much, much more, she fails to deliver what she has tried so hard to bring to fruition?

But all that is irrelevant now. Now is not the time for petty pleasantries meant to please; now is the time for WAR in all senses of the word. She is finally free to wage this war, after four long years of enduring wordlessly, and she finds herself beginning to tremble with excitement.

The sound of her name ringing out wakes her from her reverie. She starts and blinks a little, embarrassed by her own glamorous fantasies of vengeance. The man at the podium meets her eyes and beckons her to come forth. She stands up on unsteady legs and begins the walk to the stage, all the while repeating mechanically the opening lines of her manifesto of cruelty under her breath, over and over again. She arrives at the podium without incident, feeling her skin crawl away on all fours as the audience hushes in waiting for something profound and beautiful to shock it into remembrance.

She breaks into an impossibly wide, sadistic smile. A murmur ripples through the audience. Heads turn as personages of varying importance converse and inquire amongst themselves regarding the nature and cause of her entirely inappropriate glee. For a moment a vision appears before her eyes, of stern frowns and acute disappointment and myriad fat fingers wagging in unison, and her blood is sparked by fire, barely contained. Not now, not yet.

She begins her speech with the utmost care, cordially addressing officials, parents, and classmates with all due respect and devotion. Control, she whispers silently, control yourself. Now is not the time, not yet—she finishes her acknowledgements with grace, thanking all who have been involved in her life in any way, shape, or form, for is the fact that she stands here, now, bathed in glory, in itself, not proof of her excellence?

Then, taking a deep breath as a prelude to madness, she plunges into the tirade.

The vision trembles for a moment, then shatters with devastating finality. Her hands find their way to the edges of the podium and latch on with desperate force, a last attempt anchoring her to the shores of sanity. Then they spasm and fall away, and she is lost. She grabs the collar of her gown with a firm hand and, with one angry swing, pulls it over her head. She casts the material to the floor, where it lands in a dark heap, a monument and witness to her triumph over imaginary foes. And she is on a proverbial roll. Her face shakes free of its benevolent mask and becomes ugly, genuine, filled with disdain and hatred. All the while her lips are moving with a furious passion, listing every conceivable injustice she possibly could have suffered at the hands of the audience, now awed into deathly silence. She stands brandishing symbols of her shame, her subversion, she knows, a point of contention regarding her perceived compliance to their laws, their rules, their dominance, which she has so cleverly, so quietly overthrown.

She displays them with almost childish pride, embraced by a glowing aura of smug satisfaction, her mind blinded and reeling from the exhilarating rush.

A moment of silence hovers, then the crowd erupts into chaos. She looks around herself, chest heaving, resigned, already falling down from the impossible heights; she cannot decide whether to laugh or cry now, when it is over and done, so she contents herself with standing in silence until a pair of solid, authoritarian arms finally drags her from the spotlight and off the stage.

Author: It’s a girl giving her graduation speech and freaking out halfway through, if you can't tell XD~~

说到graduation。。就送给大家一首奥斯卡大奖，经典的“斯卡博罗集市”（Scarborough Fair).~~~