There once was a girl who wanted nothing more than to fit in. She always felt and looked like the odd one out. All the girls had blonde, dead straight, one length hair and wore cherry lip gloss and ultra length mascara. Out of school they all wore skinny jeans and tight hot pink singlets. Their shoes were stilettos, black of course, and their nails always shone a fabulous pink. They wore large gold hoop earrings and hundreds of bracelet up their left arm. And with their uniform at school they all wore big black bows in their hair and their skirts were far too short. All their shoes matched too, all with a slight heal and black laces with a pink tip. This girl, Alice, however, had curly black hair, didn't wear makeup and slopped around in whatever she could find. Her ears weren't pierced and she never wore nail polish and she hated the colour pink. At school Alice wore her uniform way too big, and added nothing extra. It was because of all these facts that she never had a partner in class, she sat alone at lunchtime and she was picked last for sport (even though she was a super athlete.) She constantly heard girls talking about her and saw smirks on their faces every time she dared look one in the eye. As soon as the teacher turned her back, out cam the cell phones, and every single girl sat with a hand under the desk texting. All except Alice, who didn't have a phone.
One day as Alice sat alone in her room after school, finished her homework and now with nothing to do, she decided enough was enough. Tomorrow was a mufti day, and she knew all the girls would be wearing what they always wore, and she would stick out even more. She told her mum she was going to get some school supplies from the store, which she was, but that was all she would do. After buying the eraser she needed, she walked into the most popular girls clothing store in town and used all her savings to buy several tight hot pink singlets and several skinny jeans. She went to the shoe store and got a few pairs of stilettos and new school shoes. Finally she went and got a hat, mascara, lip gloss in cherry, bracelet, a few black bows, a hair straightner, a cell phone and some nail polish. That was the shopping done. As she walked past some girls with smirks on their faces she smiled to herself as that would be one of the last times she would get that look, she was sure. Now she went and got her ears pierced with a special request to get large gold hoops (it wasn't the first time they'd been asked.) She wiped her face clear of the tears that had come with her pain, and made her last stop, the hairdressers. Not just any hairdressers, but the one where all the girls got their hair done, so they would know exactly what to do. She asked for "the blonde girls look" (which would be a challenge because of her dark hair) and in a few hours she looked like a different person. She payed and went home with hat on head she knew her mum would not be pleased. She lay in bed that night with her alarm set extra early, she knew it would take time to look good.
After hours of struggling she finally headed out the door, a hat on which would be taken off as soon as she was far enough away from the house. She walked out quickly with her head down as she didn't want her mum to see her face or clothes. She shouted bye, and the same word came in response, and she ran (well, walked funny in her heels as she tried to not fall over) and once down the street let out her hair. She walked in the school gates with five minutes to spare as she had planned, so she could make some friend. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and opened them to see... brown. All the girls had curly brown hair, blue dresses, flats, glasses, blue eye shadow and nail polish and clear lip gloss. Alice thought she must be seeing things, but it became clear she wasn't as she got smirks from every single girl. She felt like crying as she wondered what had happened. The girls she saw in town yesterday had looked like she did now. To her surprise one girl walked over to her, and said just this; "Your look is sooo yesterday, don't you follow the trends in magazines?"
Morale of the story: Be yourself and don't try to be who you're not, it simply won't work.
