The first part of the day at Lake Point High School passed uneventfully. It did not seem to make much of a difference in the earlier classes who the 'queen bee' was. Jonnie enjoyed the admiration and the envy of so many of her classmates, but aside from that, classes were basically the same old, same old. Mr. Matheson the math teacher noted she was a bit distracted, but otherwise math class was just a chore to sit through.
Lunch time, however, was very eventful. Sure, it all started out routinely enough. Every clique had their own tables. The Goths (Athena DeVries, Zelda Whitefield, Sabrina Johnson, Trevor Blake, Stephanie Wright, and Jonnie's younger sister Zoe Gibson) sat at their table, the Geeks/nerds (Jay Duncan, Kyla Leeson, Leonard Drullers, Walter Smukmeyer, Carl James, and Gladys Brewer) sat at theirs, the drama club (Drama club president Jennifer Taylor, her twin sister Sarah Taylor, and resident critic Starla Stanfield, among others) sat at theirs, and so on and so forth.
Jonnie sat at the cheerleader/Prep table, which was adjacent to the Jock table dominated by Biff Meadows, Steve "The Stud" Farber, Mike "Moose" Matthews, Randy Goodman, and a bunch of the other jocks. At the Cheerleader table also sat Tiffany Sanders (the attractive boy-crazy bimboish girl), Melissa Smith (pretty and fashion obsessed), Amber Levine (well-meaning but not all that bright seemingly), Allison Wright (the only Black cheerleader in the main squad), Lauren O'Brien (the redheaded Irish cheerleader), Lucy Corinth (the air-headed flier of the squad) and the smart and tall leggy brunette Nicole Tiller.
Sarah McMillan, the previous head cheerleader and now deposed queen bee, approached the cheerleader table with an angry expression on her face. "You're sitting in my spot." Sarah said venomously.
"My spot now." Jonnie replied smugly.
"It was mine before it was yours." Sarah said, glaring at Jonnie.
"And now it's not. I'm head cheerleader now. Everyone accepts me as their Queen, and if you can't handle that, go sit somewhere else." Jonnie replied in a matter-of-fact manner.
"This is still my table. My squad." Sarah growled.
"My table. My squad. Be glad I didn't have you kicked off the squad altogether." Jonnie replied.
Sarah was starting to lose it. "You think you can just walk in and take over and steal everything I've worked so hard to get over the past year, and NOT face any consequences for it? Move over!"
The other cheerleaders were watching this situation nervously. "Sarah, I think you need to, like, chill out." Amber said.
"All right, anyone who thinks Sarah needs a time-out, raise their hands." Jonnie said. Amber raised her hand, followed by Lucy, Lauren, Allison, and Nicole. Melissa and Tiffany seemed undecided.
Nicole stood up and walked next to Sarah. "I know you're upset, but this isn't helping any." Nicole told Sarah.
"Okay, majority rules." Jonnie said with a satisfied smirk. "And the majority says you can't sit with us. Since you're creating so much drama, why don't you sit with the drama club? Oh, right. You can't because then they'd be over the One Sarah Limit."
Jonnie wasn't sure why she said that. She wasn't even sure why she ever browsed that Tropes site in her spare time. She went on with her speech. "Or maybe you could sit with the Geeks or the Goths. Oh, wait. They all hate you."
Jonnie smiled evilly at Sarah McMillan, who continued staring daggers at her. By now, the rest of the students in the cafeteria were watching the drama unfold closely.
"So, maybe your best place to sit is with the has-beens and the never-wases." Jonnie said, "because that's just what..."
"YOU BITCH!" Sarah exclaimed, grabbing Jonnie's food tray and tossing it at her. Spaghetti was now dripping all over Jonnie's face and hair, and she stood up growling angrily at Sarah. The cheerleaders, jocks, and the rest of the students in the cafeteria all gasped as Jonnie and Sarah stood there exchanging death glares at each other.
Sarah charged at Jonnie, only to be restrained by Nicole. Jonnie, likewise, lunged at Sarah, only to be restrained by Allison Wright and Amber Levine.
"Back off, Sarah. Now's not the time." Nicole said softly, in a tone clearly hoping to calm Sarah down.
"It's not worth it." Allison told Jonnie. Allison was looking at the cafeteria staff.
"This isn't over!" Sarah declared, storming toward the cafeteria exit. Nicole followed Sarah out the door.
Oh, I think it will be over soon enough, Jonnie thought to herself as she watched Sarah leave. Amber was at Jonnie's other side, offering her some napkins.
"Do you need any help?" Amber asked, her tone showing genuine concern.
Jonnie wiped some of the spaghetti off her face with the napkins Amber had so helpfully provided. "It's okay. I'll just go to the bathroom and wash this off. You don't have to come with me, I can handle it myself."
With that, Jonnie headed toward the exit and toward the ladies' room nearest the cafeteria as the students from the other tables watched and started talking to each other about the drama they'd seen unfold.
"Wow, she looked really pissed!" "I'm staying out of that one!" "Do you think they'll get detention?" were among the statements Jonnie heard as she left.
But Jonnie already had a few ideas in mind. All she needed was some privacy.
