Homecoming Queen Quotes

I've been so worried about strange men following you around that I forgot how dangerous Homecoming Queens can be.

What's agitating about solitude is the inner voice telling you that you should be mated to somebody, that solitude is a mistake. The inner voice doesn't care about who you find. It just keeps pestering you, tormenting you--if you happen to be me--with homecoming queens first, then girls next door, and finally anybody who might be pleased to see you now and then at the dinner table and in bed on occasion. You look up from reading the newspaper and realize that no one loves you, and no one burns for you.

But things had changed, and now she sat in her car outside her childhood residence staring at an open gate with a fifteen-inch Bowie knife in her lap, thinking. 

Anika nodded, reflecting on her situation as the sirens grew louder. She had some time, but cops, hurricanes, and jealous women weren’t the party favors she’d expected for her homecoming parade.

Stepping back, Anika smiled at her prisoners and clicked open the Zippo. Its flame hopped to life. Wasting no time, she underhand-tossed the lighter through the air. It hit the middle of its target, and the banner exploded into flames. 

Consider it this way: what would you say if a blond homecoming queen fell in love with a short Japanese businessman? He treats her cruelly, then goes home for three years, during which time she prays to his picture and turns down marriage from a young Kennedy. Then, when she learns he has remarried, she kills herself. Now I believe you should consider this girl to be a deranged idiot, correct? But because it's an Oriental who kills herself for a Westerner–ah!–you find it beautiful.

She reached the door to the forbidden room. The door with the light escaping through the cracks. Her hands shook. Her eyes watered from the pull. She panted, her chest visibly moving in and out. Her teeth clenched. She switched off the flashlight, turned the knob, and pushed. 

She sat in the grass, legs folded, serenely watching the president of the Pine Grove Betterment Society lob a knife at the Homecoming Queen.

Ascending the creaky steps, she heard the old timers discussing the weather. But this wasn’t the usual small talk. They ranked Texas storms. Not by category, wind speed, or monetary damage, but by casualties—body count. 

Anika walked to the workbench, which was flanked by two metal cabinets. She opened the cabinet on the left and spotted sundry items—nails, paint, and whatnot—that one expected to see. Even the rat poison with skull and crossbones on the bag made sense. She also saw, however, several boxes wrapped in white and labeled, “Explosive Plastic Comp-4 (C-4).” Paralyzed, she tried not to panic or stare. 

Pasty old men on the porch played Texas hold ’em using Old West playing cards without numbers. They sipped joe and flashed toothless smiles as Anika and Sam marched toward the Alamo entrance. Though their smiles appeared genuine, even endearing, these weren’t the innocent grandpas from central casting. 

Infinite Darlene doesn’t have it easy. Being both star quarterback and homecoming queen has its conflicts.

She remembered what her old priest had said: a half-truth masquerading as a whole truth was nothing but an untruth. But half-truths were horseplay in Miranda, where big lies came quick and easy. And they were about to come a lot easier.

A good bra is fine, but a great bra is life changing. It gives you the confidence of a homecoming queen. It’s a tiara for your ta-tas.

Gunfire doesn’t startle real Texans, particularly those from rural towns. Miranda’s children mastered pistols, shotguns, and rifles like magicians master top hats, rabbits, and playing cards. Texas bravado aside, however, fully automatic gunfire wasn’t kosher. Not even close. Mirandites cowered at the ominous sounds of hoodlums firing M-16s and AK-47s from train cars barreling through the town’s arteries on largely secluded tracks. 

Being a failed teenager is not a crime, but a predicament and a secret crucible. It is a fun-house mirror where distortion and mystification led to the bitter reflection that sometimes ripens into self knowledge. Time is the only ally of the humiliated teenager, who eventually discovers the golden boy of the senior class is a bloated, bald drunk at the twentieth reunion, and that the homecoming queen married a wife-beater and philanderer and died in a drug rehabilitation center before she was thirty. The prince of acne rallied in college and is now head of neurology, and the homeliest girl blossoms in her twenties, marries the chief financial officer of a national bank, and attends her reunion as president of the Junior League. But since a teenager is denied a crystal ball that will predict the future, there is a forced march quality to this unspeakable rite of passage. It is an unforgivable crime for teenagers not to be able to absolve themselves for being ridiculous creatures at the most hazardous time of their lives.

IT WAS EASIER FOR PEOPLE to be good at something when more of us lived in small, rural communities. Someone could be homecoming queen. Someone else could be spelling-bee champ, math whiz or basketball star. There were only one or two mechanics and a couple of teachers. In each of their domains, these local heroes had the opportunity to enjoy the serotonin-fuelled confidence of the victor. It may be for that reason that people who were born in small towns are statistically overrepresented among the eminent.68 If

GIRL'S STORY #7: THE HARD-TO-PLEASE MOMMA Momma, I got a B, the daughter said. Who got an A? Momma answered. Momma, I showed in the track meet. Who placed? Momma answered. Momma, I placed in the track meet. Who won? Momma answered. The daughter was chosen Homecoming Queen, the daughter ran all the way home, Momma, Momma, the most wonderful thing happened, I was chosen attendant to the Homecoming Queen. Who's Queen? Momma answered. I am, said the daughter.

Her being the first Black homecoming queen really had me walking around thinking we had accomplished something great. But representation isn’t enough. It isn’t the liberation I thought it was. The homecoming elections policy, the racial quotas, it’s all another form of performative activism. It doesn’t really fix the issue if the same oppressive systems remain.

You might look like a princess, Isabelle Reagan, but if I had my way tonight, you’d also be a queen.

Smiled like a homecoming queen, Pit Bull Terrier with a new collar, actress on the Letterman show.

What? You think vampires are messy?” I scoffed as I passed him. “Try tangling with the homecoming queen.

And then I did something I hadn’t done in so long: I cried…hard. It was like the damn to my tear ducts had broken and they were just overflowing.” -The Homecoming Queen, S.T. Jones

Miss me?" she asks with her usual wryness, tossing her backpack on the floor and dropping down on the bed beside me like she comes over all the time. "I feel like a rebel just knowing you. Everyone keeps asking me if you really lit Brooklyn on fire." I arch a brow. "On fire?" Catherine pumps up a pillow beneath her head. "The actual event has gotten a bit exaggerated." Her lips twitch. "Maybe I had something to do with that." "Nice. Thanks." "No problem." "So I guess I'm pretty much done for at school." For the first time, it matters to me. If I'm to stay here and make a go of it, it wouldn't hurt to have a few friends. To not be a social outcast. Especially since it seems pretty important for Tamra's success at school, too. "Are you kidding? You're a hero." Her lips twist with a smile. "I think you've got a shot at homecoming queen next fall." I give a short laugh, and then her words sink. Next fall. Might I be here then? With Will? It's almost too sweet to believe. "So," Catherine beings, picking at the loose paper edging my spiral. "Rutledge was absent today." "Yeah?" I try for nonchalance. "Yeah." She stretches the word, her blue-green eyes cutting meaningfully into mine. "And his cousins were around, so he's not off somewhere with them. I wonder..." She cocks her head, her long, choppy bangs, sliding low across her forehead. "Wherever could he have been?" I shrug and pick at the flaking tip of my pencil. She continues, "I know where Xander thinks he was." My gaze swings back to her face. "Xander talked to you?" "I know, right? Can my days as a pariah be coming to an end?" "Where does he think Will was?" "With you, of course.

He gave the briefest of glances at Lissie, barely acknowledging her presence as he gently eased Violet onto the seat. For good measure, and Violet was sure it was premeditated, he gave her a long, sweet kiss before closing her door. Violet was surprised at how quickly she responded to his touch, even when she knew it was more for Lissie’s benefit than for hers. But she had to suppress a triumphant smile when she stole a quick look at the other girl’s disgusted expression before Jay put the car in drive and left Lissie standing there, gawking after them. “Sorry about that,” he said apologetically as he concentrated on maneuvering through the busy parking lot. “I’ve been so worried about strange men following you around that I forgot how dangerous Homecoming Queens can be.” Violet smiled at him. “That’s okay. That kiss was a nice touch, by the way. Sheer genius.” “Yeah, that one just came to me,” he chuckled. “Maybe you can show it to me again . . . later,” she said playfully. He reached over and gave her leg a squeeze, his eyes never leaving the road. “I like the way you think, my friend.” “Is that how it is now, we’re back to just friends?” Violet asked, raising her eyebrows at him challengingly. “I’ll remember to keep that in mind next time we’re ‘doing homework.’” He was suddenly serious, his tone determined. “We’ll never be just friends again, not if I have anything to do with it.” And then with conviction he added, “I love you too much to go back now, Vi.” It was still strange to hear him saying things like that. The words sounded so foreign to her ears, but her heart responded, as if it had been waiting a lifetime to hear them, by beating erratically.

Violet didn't bother responding, and Jay bounded from the car to help her inside. He gave the briefest of glances at Lissie, barely acknowledging her presence as he gently eased Violet onto the seat. For good measure, and Violet was sure it was premeditated, he gave her a long, sweet kiss before closing her door. Violet was surprised at how quickly she responded to his touch, even when she knew it was more for Lissie's benefit than for hers. But she had to suppress a triumphant smile when she stole a quick look at the other girl's disgusted expression before Jay put the car in drive and left Lissie standing there, gawking after them. "Sorry about that," he said apologetically as he concentrated on maneuvering through the busy parking lot. "I've been so worried about strange men following you around that I forgot how dangerous Homecoming Queens can be." Violet smiled at him. "That's okay. That kiss was a nice touch, by the way. Sheer genius." "Yeah, that one just came to me," he chuckled. "Maybe you can show it to me again...later," she said playfully. He reached over and gave her leg a squeeze, his eyes never leaving the road. "I like the way you think, my friend." "Is that how it is now, we're back to just friends?" Violet asked, raising her eyebrows at him challengingly. "I'll remember to keep that in mind next time we're 'doing homework.'" He was suddenly serious, his tone determined. "We'll never be just friends again, not if I have anything to do with it." And then with conviction he added, "I love you too much to go back now, Vi." It was still strange to hear him saying things like that. The words sounded so foreign to her ears, but her heart responded, as if it had been waiting a lifetime to hear them, by beating erratically.

the cotton fields and strawberry patches of a much harsher world whose tragedies and daily burdens had blunted her temperament and quelled her emotions. But its most immediate impact on this teenage girl was not the lack of a demure coquettishness that otherwise might have defined her had she grown up in better circumstances; it was the visible evidence of the hardship of her journey. This was not a pom-pom-waving homecoming queen or a varsity athlete who had toned her body in a local gym. My mother never complained, but it was her struggles that had visibly shaped her shoulders, grown her biceps, and crusted her palms—while in a less visible way narrowing her view of her own long-term horizons. Decades later, when I was in my forties, I suppressed a defensive anger as I watched my mother sit quietly in an expansive waterfront Florida living room while a well-bred woman her age described the supposedly difficult impact of the Great Depression on her family. As the woman told it, the crash on Wall Street and the failed economy had made it necessary for them to ship their car by rail from New York to Florida when they headed south for the winter. Who could predict, she reasoned, whether there would be food or gasoline if their driver had to refuel and dine in the remote and hostile environs of small-town Georgia? My mother merely smiled and nodded, as

Because everything in the world is about sex—” “Except sex. Sex is about power,

Jennifer Briggis. For homecoming queen? Are they fucking serious?

People are starting to wonder if maybe you were the one to make the list. And now you’re pissed off that it’s backfiring. Because Jennifer might win homecoming queen instead of you.

Ariel looked queenly and elegant and ten years younger than her real age. Like Emma, her hair was blond and her boobs were big. She drove a convertible, wore diamonds with denim, and she never missed a homecoming game. She was so Southern that she cried tears that came straight from the Mississippi, and she always smelled faintly of cottonwood and peaches.

WOULDN’T LOSE another kid on his watch. If the homecoming queen was out here, he intended to find her. Even if he had to trek through the entire western edge of Glacier National Park, beat every bush, climb every peak. Unless, of course, Romeo had been lying. “How far up the trail did the kid say they were?” Behind him, Gage Watson shined his flashlight against the twisted depths of forest. A champion snowboarder, Gage looked the part with his long dark brown hair held back in a man bun. But he also had keen outdoor instincts and now worked as an EMT on the PEAK Rescue team during the summer. An owl hooted. A screech ricocheted through

had feet of clay,

It makes me want a sassy beautiful little girl who will be a cheerleader and Homecoming Queen and Sigma Chi Sweetheart, all of the things I rejected outright because they weren’t options.

I’m alone,” she wrote, “and I want to share something with somebody.”4 Loneliness. It’s a cry. A moan, a wail. It’s a gasp whose origin is the recesses of our souls. Can you hear it? The abandoned child. The divorcée. The quiet home. The empty mailbox. The long days. The longer nights. A one-night stand. A forgotten birthday. A silent phone. Cries of loneliness. Listen again. Tune out the traffic and turn down the TV. The cry is there. Our cities are full of Judy Bucknells. You can hear their cries. You can hear them in the convalescent home among the sighs and the shuffling feet. You can hear them in the prisons among the moans of shame and the calls for mercy. You can hear them if you walk the manicured streets of suburban America, among the aborted ambitions and aging homecoming queens. Listen for it in the halls of our high schools where peer pressure weeds out the “have-nots” from the “haves.” This moan in a minor key knows all spectrums of society. From the top to the bottom. From the failures to the famous. From the poor to the rich. From the married to the single. Judy Bucknell was not alone.

Have you met Terry? The housekeeper?” Molly nods. “Actually, she’s Jack’s mother.” Dina perks up. “Wait a minute. Terry Gallant? I went to high school with her! I didn’t know Jack was her kid.” “Yep,” Molly says. Waving a chunk of hot dog around on her fork, Dina says, “Oh, how the mighty have fallen.” Molly gives Ralph a what the fuck? look, but he just gazes placidly back. “It’s sad what happens to people, y’know?” Dina says, shaking her head. “Terry Gallant used to be Miss Popular. Homecoming Queen and all that. Then she got knocked up by some Mexican scrub—and now look at her, she’s a maid.” “Actually, he was Dominican,” Molly mumbles. “Whatever. Those illegals are all the same, aren’t they?” Deep breath, stay cool, get through dinner. “If you say so.” “I do say so.

Democrats expend energy and weaken their power pining for the die-hard voters of their opponents, the homecoming queens of the electorate, while taking for granted the majority that they already have.

For their part, Democrats constitute a diffuse majority of the electorate, but seem at times lukewarm toward a base that the party has often lectured to or taken for granted, chided, if ever there is lower-than-expected turnout, despite voter suppression, sadly buying into caste assumptions rather than bolstering their most loyal voters as do the Republicans with theirs. Democrats expend energy and weaken their power pining for the die-hard voters of their opponents, the homecoming queens of the electorate, while taking for granted the majority that they already have.

was a competitive gymnast as a kid, got perfect attendance every year in school, was terrified of getting anything worse than an A minus, and had an eating disorder in high school. Oh, and I think I was the homecoming queen. Yep. I think I have some issues with perfectionism! But I have been working on it. As a kid, I equated being perfect with being loved…and I think I still confuse the two. I often find myself doing what Brené calls “the hustle for worthiness.” That dance we do so that people don’t see how incredibly flawed and human we are. Sometimes I have my self-worth wrapped up in what I do and how good I look doing it, but mostly I am learning

Thomas and Rose stood against the wall, sipping on a mixture of juices sparked up with ginger ale. The Homecoming king and queen led off, two fiddlers playing a catchy Michif march. The spotlight cast a wavering patch where Sharlo appeared. Her crown, topped by a silver star, caught what light there was and she seemed to float along as she advanced. Perhaps she wasn’t even touching the floor. That’s what Thomas thought, disoriented, watching her move magically along through the gloom. She was one of the star beings, given, for her time on earth, human shape and form

The crown and engraved scepters every Lovett High homecoming queen receives aren’t the run-of-the-mill plastic tiaras you see at nearly every other high school. A family-owned local jeweler has crafted and donated the pieces to our high school’s queens since the daughter of the family’s patriarch won the title two years before my grandmother. The designs of the crown and scepter have varied over the years, but the quality remains the same. The sparkling accessories are made of sterling silver and adorned with hundreds of cubic zirconia crystals.

Old homecoming queens never die.

everything to make sure it all looked

No one is perfect, not even you. Everyone has shit thrown at them from time to time. It’s how they deal with it that tells you what kind of person they are.

Years from now, no one will remember this dance, no one will remember who made homecoming queen, no one will remember the list. What people are going to remember are their friends, the relationships they've made. Those are the things to hold on to.

Who was I? I played so many roles: daughter, friend, babysitter, runner, girlfriend. I'd been proud when I was elected team captain, but now I wondered who my teammates had thought they'd voted for. And who my classmates had thought they'd elected Homecoming Queen. Sam had said that I was someone who smiled at people in the hallways. In my birthday card just a month ago, Vee had thanked me for always being there to listen. My junior yearbook had been full of notes using words like nice and sweet. But if that was who I was, how had people turned on me so quickly? Take away the people around me and who was I? Just another smiling face? There had to be more.