Sierra Burgess is a Sapphic Loser (hiatus)

ii.

When Veronica ripped the bottom portion off of Sierra's flyer, it was for the full intent of entertaining her horrible friends. 

Unlike Sierra, Veronica had a reputation to uphold. If she didn't, she might've become a loser like Veronica, or like her mother and younger sisters.

Unlike Sierra, Veronica didn't possess a support system. Even though Sierra was never a friend to her, Veronica had known (and on more than one occasion tormented) the girl since the tenth grade. Never friends, never in a million years, but Veronica knew her well enough to know that Dan and Sierra's two loving parents were her support system.

Maybe, in a way, Veronica was jealous. Although she would have never admitted it, she would love to have a friend like Dan instead of the two soul-sucking, socially self-absorbed girls she called her best friends. 

She'd never admit, mostly because she didn't want anyone to know about her home life, that she'd rather have the two loving parents Sierra had in place of her own mother: a mean, delusional, vicious dance mom.

Veronica would never wish to look like Sierra, she wouldn't wish that on her worse enemies. But she did sometimes wish she was in her place. No reputation to uphold, invisible to the popular kids, a healthy friendship, a true family.

But she did have a reputation to uphold. She wasn't invisible. She didn't have healthy friendships. Her family was incomplete. So to be a cold stone bitch was to cope, at least for Veronica. And that's what she did.

In addition to holding up her reputation, she also had to deal with the less than pleasant friends that came along with it. This included listening to Mackenzie, the worst of her friend group, drone on and on about her petty problems.

As she sat in between Mackenzie and Chrissy, she only half listened to the raven-haired girl go on as she paid most of her attention to the explanation of chromosomes.

"My English teacher is such a bitch. We have to write some stupid essay about some stupid experience," Mackenzie droned on. "And I made this really funny joke, and the teacher she just- ugh, I can't believe she talks to her students like that!"

"What did you say?" Veronica asked half-interested as she kept most of her attention on what the biology teacher wrote on the board.

Mackenzie smirked, leaning in close to Veronica so she could tell her joke in a hushed voice. "I told Sierra Burgess that she should write about her 'trans experience' for the essay."

"I know I stood up for you but that's like, totally transphobic, Kenz," Chrissy whispered. "Those kind of jokes aren't funny anymore."

Veronica was glad Chrissy had spoken up at that moment. She personally thought the joke was in bad taste as well, but just didn't have the motivation to get into an argument about it nor fake laugh for Mackenzie's sake. She actually felt... bad? That Mackenzie would say something like that, especially to Sierra's face.

She'd been feeling bad for the majority of the day, actually. In a spur of the moment decision after seeing Sierra in the bathroom at lunch and seeing no other open sinks to wash her hands, Veronica had flipped her ponytail behind her and shoved Sierra out of the way.

"Move it, Frodo," she'd sneered. "Before you break the mirror." She had expected for Sierra to just walk away, and she almost did. Almost.

Right at the last moment, Sierra had turned around, replying with, "Quasimodo."

Confused, Veronica put on her best bitch face and yanked a paper towel out of the dispenser, drying her hands as she stood up straighter in intimidation. "What did you say?" She'd questioned.

"Quasimodo. Frodo is from Lord of the Rings," Sierra elaborated. "You're thinking of Quasimodo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame. He's ridiculed for his appearance and represents a stratified class. Not unlike the structure of our own high school popularity."

Hushed giggles and a few camera shutters sounded throughout the restroom. This was happening in front of a few girls who would definitely be gossiping about this if Veronica let herself be bested by a loser.

"I meant looking at you makes me want to gouge my eyes out," Veronica replied with full intentions to hurt Sierra as she took a few threatening steps forward. It only angered and made her feel like an idiot when Sierra grinned and shrugged.

"I knew what you meant," was Sierra's only reply before she left the bathroom, leaving Veronica feeling humiliated and stupid, two things she hated more than anything. 

The blonde didn't bother to look back at the girls who were most definitely recording the whole interaction before she held her head up higher and exited the bathroom with the small portion of her pride that was still intact for the day.

As twisted as it was, being nasty to people she deemed inferior to her made Veronica feel better. Powerful. Being mean to someone didn't make her feel better this time. It just made her feel worse. 

The way Sierra gracefully danced around her insults with literary references reminded her of Spence, her college boyfriend who constantly outdid her with literary references that she didn't even understand a majority of the time. It also reminded Veronica of her mother who constantly undermined her academically, always suspecting that she was an airhead.

Veronica hated more than anything that Sierra had made her feel that way, which is what made it even harder to process the feeling of pity that she was feeling towards the girl at the moment. It was worse realizing that she even felt envious of Sierra, with her stupid literary references and invisibleness and family and... 

Veronica blinked, snapping herself out of her trance and not wanting to think about that anymore. She didn't want Sierra to think she'd won, she didn't want to give her that satisfaction. It would eat her inside and out.

So to feel better, she did what she does best. She set a glare that shot daggers on her face and turned in her seat to challenge Sierra, showing who was alpha in the situation.

When Sierra finally followed the feeling of eyes on her, she was frightened to find out it was Veronica glaring at her. Veronica observed Sierra's attempt to stand up to the glare, but she eventually looked away in cowardice, all confidence from lunch apparently having vanished. 

Satisfied with her win, Veronica turned back to the teacher smugly, feeling better already.