Vigilante Green (#OnceUponNow)

Chapter 2

Today was the day the world would change.

At least, that's what Gracie silently hoped for when she woke up at six in the morning.

At sunrise, Gracie sat in front of her vanity mirror, glaring at a reflection she was determined to change.

Today the old Gracie Jones would take out her piercings, leave her dark red lipstick in its case, and wash the vigilante green streaks out of her hair.

Today Gracie would change, transform, conform into the image of the girl Sherwood High wanted to see.

The picture of perfection she hoped was good enough to impress her prince.

She could be different. Bold. Socially beautiful.

If only for a day.

Gracie strutted into the bathroom, heart set on spending the morning erasing all the eccentricities that made her, her and replacing them with royal parts.

She wiped away yesterday's eyeliner from under her lashes, scrubbed off the scribble of purple pencil from her eyebrows, and removed the blood-rose remnants of her lip stain.

Gracie watched the sink water run rainbow as it slid through her fingers.

This was the hardest part. The moments between masks when she'd talk herself out of looking at her bare face.

The last boy she'd loved left her because of her so-called plainness.

Two years ago.

Freshman year.

At least, that what he told everyone at school.

He broke things off because she didn't shine the way the royal girls did. She wasn't an all star athlete. She wasn't a social butterfly. So, he flew away from her.

It ended suddenly and publicly.

He walked up to Gracie in the middle of a crowded lunch room and walked out on their relationship by the time the bell rang. He'd promised her forever and took it back as soon as he got tired of the popular boys bullying him for dating somebody different.

Somebody who was a nobody.

Never mind the heartache.

Never mind the humiliation.

Never mind the rumors of him leaving Gracie for the kind of girl she'd never be.

All anyone remembered about that day was the goth girl who cried in the middle of the cafeteria and the less-than-popular boy who rose to prince status the minute he left her.

Gracie stopped believing in fairytales by fifth period that afternoon.

She hated the sight of her mascara-stained, teary-eyed and tragic reflection by sixth.

By the time three o'clock rolled round, there was no magic left in the world for Gracie.

"I'm Gracie the pumpkin girl," she thought. "Just too plain to be loved."

So she hid her face behind wildly rebellious make up ever since.

But this morning, it melted away.

This morning, she wasn't a pumpkin girl anymore.

***

Gracie turned on the radio and cranked up Top 40's Pop despite the fact that her heart ached for classic rock.

The polished princesses of Sherwood High didn't listen to ACDC first thing in the morning. They lost themselves in waves of mainstream music and mindless lyrics.

So Gracie did too.

She stumbled over the words to songs written by pop kings and queens she'd never listened to, but pretended she knew them by heart.

After all, everybody who's anybody knew that princesses were world class pretenders.

The regal girls she saw in the hallways everyday wore consistently flawless smiles. Their outfits were bright, colorful, coordinated. They spent hours upon hours cutting and pasting the pieces of perfection they saw in magazines onto themselves.

They were celebrity clones. Reflections of the rich and famous.

But Gracie didn't believe them, because their lies were so visibly skin deep. Because even in all their glamour, the royal girls still flaws. They just knew how to hide them.

And this morning, Gracie would too.

She'd put on a mask the same way they did--a careful piece at a time.

Gracie slathered herself in flowery lotion and slipped into her sister's room to steal her preppiest set of clothes and her fanciest perfume. She spritzed and sprayed away the scent of her little white lies, and dowsed every inch of her skin until she covered up the smell of old cigarettes and garage-band-grunge.

Within minutes and without the help of a fairy godmother, Gracie transformed into the spitting image of what she thought she'd never be--a girl who looked like Sherwood High School royalty.

White polo.

Pale blue Cardigan.

Skinny mini jeans.

The picture of a modern princess.

But her metamorphosis wasn't complete.

She hid her truths behind fresh-faced make-up and a flood of soft brown curls she usually kept hidden from everyone.

Gracie wasn't Gracie anymore.

And some part of that foreignness excited her.

She fluttered back to her room on dainty feet--aside from the black toenail polish of course. But nobody would spot that beneath her shimmery blue flats.

Fingers crossed.

A text message buzzed to life on her phone and tore Gracie's attention away from her transformation.

Text Message from Unknown at 7:00 AM:

Unknown: Meet me at your locker before morning assembly. I have something I wanna ask you ;) -Your Prince

Gracie's phone fell out of her fingers. Her pulse pounded, her face flushed, her whole body buzzed with the kind of excitement she only thought royal girls and boys knew. Today she was almost one of them. 

A poser in princesses' clothing. 

Gracie hopped off her bed and stared at the strange girl standing in front of her bedroom mirror. She tried to find something familiar in her reflection, but couldn't.

She didn't look like herself, she didn't feel like herself, but she swallowed the rising doubt in her chest and smiled through her all too plastic appearance like it would help her accept it. Like it would make her feel less like a liar and more like a real girl.

More like a royal.

Not all princesses were picture perfect to begin with.

Some of them rose to greatness from rags.

Others were liars.

But they got their happily ever afters all the same.

Whoever her prince was, maybe he'd still like her without all the magic.

Without all the make-up.

Fingers crossed.

(Continue to Chapter 3)