So yesterday, bombed my first college exam. I think it's karma for making Julie bomb her first Calculus exam.
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"This is it," Bree told Julie as the two of them walked onto the stage for their final speeches before the voting took place. She didn't respond, instead just continued to lead the way to two of the six chairs that were aligned upstage. Carrie and Jordan were already there, sitting down with their matching baby blue skirts and blazers smoothed to perfection. Bree sat next to Jordan, who grinned at her as Julie also took a seat. Seconds later, Ryder took a seat next to her and Stefan followed, increasing the already-present awkwardness on the stage.
"Ok," said Emma as she nervously stood in front of the three podiums that had been set out on stage. "I'm not exactly, uh, sure why I'm here but... I guess I was seen as having the least-important thing I could be doing right now."
Bree cleared her throat. Emma looked back at the girls widened eyes and took this as a sign that she should get off the stage as quickly as possible.
"Great," said Emma, turning back around. "So this year we had several contestants for the presidential election so umm... Let's hear what they have to say. First up, your candidates for the vice president position, Jordan Stern, Bree Welsh, and Stefan Montgomery." She clapped her hands as she rushed off of the stage and three went up to their separate podiums.
"Have you noticed that all of the contestants are either jocks or former cheerleaders?" John asked Sam as the two walked in quietly and took their seats in the back row of the auditorium. There were plenty of people there, all waiting to see what they expected to be a bloodbath, considering all the feuds between contestants.
From her new place in the judging table at the front row, Emma cleared her throat and said, "Let's begin with Stefan. According to you and your views, why should your peers care about school politics and student council?"
She looked up at Stefan expectantly, while the latter looked at the crowd and hesitated, racking his brain for the correct answer to this question. Ryder tapped his foot nervously and muttered, "Come on, you know this... Come on..."
Stefan cleared his throat and began, "Everyone should care about what student council does and doesn't do because student council represents every individual at the school. If not for student council, many of the privileges we take for granted, such as seniors having free periods at the end of the day, or the ability to go off-campus during lunch... Those things wouldn't be available to us if not for the hard work of student council. And who doesn't enjoy school dances, am I right?"
He flashed a smile at the audience and the crowd erupted with cheer, particularly from the female population. Ryder clapped proudly from the back and the girls on stage acknowledged him respectfully.
"I wrote that for him," Kitty grinned as she whispered to Harmony. "I'm practically the brains behind that handsome face."
Emma smiled and said, "Very well, moving on to Jordan."
"I wholeheartedly agree with—" she began, stopping when Carrie began to clear her throat. "I mean, I think he made good points, but there is flaw in Stefan's argument."
"Flaws?" Kitty said, feeling insulted.
"Yes, we should all participate in Stu Co.," Jordan said, struggling with a way to make Stefan's words seem false or controversial. "But, uh... Should we really consider senior privileges as that? Isn't it in our rights as students to get the best treatment from the school or faculty available? Or should we just settle for whatever scraps can be afforded to us by student council?" She said this intensely, stopping only momentarily to flash a smile at the audience, one which did not result with the same uproar as Stefan's but did get her an applause.
Carrie clapped for her, rolling her eyes and sighing as she figured she was going to have to make up for that somehow. "Bree?" Emma prompted her.
Bree took a deep breath and said, "The truth is that not everyone should care about politics." Marley, who had written her a perfectly-crafted response to this that was similar to Stefan's, looked up, seeing as Bree had gone off-script.
"What in the world..." she muttered.
"Politics aren't for everyone," said Bree. "I mean, you shouldn't force someone to attend all football games if they just aren't interested, right?"
"Go Titans!" a jock chanted from the audience. He was joined in for some cheering.
"Alright, alright," Bree said, smiling as she got the crowd's noise to die down. "My point is that we all have different interests and not everyone is going to care about how a group of twenty people's meeting about health options for our lunch menu went. But that also doesn't mean that there aren't people here who do care. And isn't that what student council is about? Not just adhering to the opinions and values of the majority, but of every individual? Thank you."
The crowd cheered with a mixture of surprise and approval. Julie clapped for her friend, who truly seemed to have spoken out of her heart and not out of her ass like Jordan, or someone else's thoughts like Stefan.
"Our next question," Emma said with twinkling eyes, "is from Twitter user @titans4lyf3, that's the number 4 and life with a y and a 3, for clarification... And the question is for Bree. It says, 'How can we trust you with student government when we couldn't trust you to keep the Cheerios from literally collapsing last year?'"
Bree winced as she thought of an answer to that question. Julie looked at Carrie, sure that she had sent that tweet or had someone else do it for her. Meanwhile, Sam turned to John and chuckled as he asked, "Remember when I stripped?"
John turned to him and gave him a look before sighing and saying, "It was the moment I told myself never to befriend you..."
Bree took a deep breath and said, "Whether you think I did the school a favor or disfavor by making the Cheerios lose... I believe in second chances. And third chances. Everyone here knows I've made a few judgement errors in the past. Maybe even... terrorized a good lot of you." She laughed nervously but the room was silent. "I can't promise that I'll be the best vice president to ever walk this school—well, I probably could considering in the past we've had some awful ones—"
"Hey..." Sam and John muttered in unison.
"—but I can promise that I will take this seriously," said Bree. "And I should add that the Cheerios collapsed under Carrie's leadership, not mine."
That final part was so quick that it was almost missed but not by everyone. Julie sighed and shook her head. It was going so great until she decided to play dirty and throw an insult at Carrie. Speaking of, the blonde was first to get up and make her way to the podium when the presidential candidates were called up after a short series of additional questions.
After giving their answers to the general questions, it got down to individual questions, which as seen with Bree did get a bit personal. "Ryder," Emma began, "user @edgy_llama would like to know how it feels to know that your friends had a boyfriend draft and your own girlfriend did not select you."
Ryder's face turned red as Julie looked down at the podium with embarrassment. "Well..." Ryder said carefully. "The truth is that she wasn't my girlfriend anymore. Hadn't been for some time. And I respect her decision and wish her the best in all aspects of her life. Next question, please."
Emma nodded, wanting more than anyone for the questions to end as she asked, "Juliet... Let's see... It says here, 'When you were head cheerleader, your position as captain was sporadic at best. Will your administration be as fickle as your leadership in' continued in another tweet... 'the Cheerios and your choice of... male companionship...' Ok, wow." Emma trailed off and put her list of questions down awkwardly.
Julie cleared her throat. All eyes were on her as she looked around the audience for the comforting faces of her friends but all she could see was the glare of a terrifying light. "Uh..." she began. "The truth is... I..."
"Come on, don't panic," Bree muttered from behind her. Stefan and Ryder felt a little bad about the attack, but Carrie and Jordan were smugly awaiting a response, like most of the people in the room.
"I know I can seem a little on-and-off," Julie admitted with a soft nod. "But I think it's that flexibility that will make me a great leader. I can adapt quickly to change and I can compel others to adapt with me." She looked around the room, her eyes focusing to the strong light, and saw her friends smiling in a supportive manner. She could barely make out Sam and John in the back, but when she did see them she added, "Fact. My time as head cheerleader was the only in which not a single individual received a slushie to the face."
Carrie rolled her eyes as the crowd murmured, noting this. Sam grinned at the sound of her answering that question in the same manner he would've, proud to see he'd taught her something.
"Next question then," Emma nodded as she was handed more questions from a few students who were taking down live tweets for her. "For Ryder again... 'Are you tired of Jake Puckerman taking all of the girls you like?' Seriously, who's sending these?"
As Ryder shrugged off the question and talked politics, the New Directions in the audience began to worry about the outcome of the election.
"Carrie's probably going to win now," Kitty muttered. "Everyone's attacking Jyder just because they're a couple. Or were a couple."
"Wait a minute," Marley said, turning to Jake. "You dated Carrie. Any dirt on her?"
"I wouldn't exactly call it dating," Jake responded. Unique rolled her eyes as he sighed, "But I do know a few things, I guess. All trivial."
"What is it?" Marley asked, pulling out her phone.
"Oh my gosh, Marley, you're a genius," Kitty mumbled as she pulled out her own phone.
"Carrie, how do you respond to the claims that your hair color is not natural," Emma said a few moments later, "and that last year you used hundreds of dollars out of the Cheerios budget to have your roots retouched by a professional stylist?"
"What?" Carrie said, her eyes widening as she turned to Jordan. Jordan shrugged with a terrified look on her face. "Uh," Carrie panicked. "I don't know why anyone would even... Next question please."
Ryder and Julie shot glances at each other, both sharing the thankfulness for whoever decided to turn things on Carrie. "Ok then," Emma said as she flipped to the next question. "For Carrie, also... What can you say about allegations that, quote, 'you slut-shamed several of your fellow Cheerios publicly at a party, yet are running your campaign on feminism'?"
"What?" Carrie responded once again. "I'm not... I mean, I don't—"
But Emma went on, receiving a multitude of new questions at a time and trying to get through them all quickly. "Ok," she said in a haste, "you're being accused here of sleeping with boyfriends of your friends, stabbing others in the back, bullying your classmates, umm... This is... inappropriate, everybody."
Julie raised her eyebrows as she turned for a response from Carrie. "I have just one word for you," she said, turning to Julie. "I will never let you take charge again." She turned to everyone else and said, "Vote for Carrie!" with a perfect but forced smile.
"Ok..." Emma said hesitantly. "Should we, uh... Should we continue? I guess we can cut out all of these incoming questions already. Julie, any closing statements?"
Julie took a deep breath and looked around. She looked at Bree, at Stefan, and finally at Ryder before turning back to the audience. "I know what most of you think of me," she said with a sigh. "That I'm insane or a jerk or unreliable or... I don't know, unapproachable. And I can be all of those things. But I know what it's really about is the fact that last year... All of you found out that I have bipolar disorder. But that doesn't make me a freak of nature or a dangerous psycho. I'm really like all of you... I'm really cranky in the morning... I don't have a license because I'm terrified of getting behind the wheel... I try hard to keep my grades up but sometimes I let things like friends and boys and what not distract me... I care way too much about what's in my shampoo. And I care about McKinley. The fact that I'm just like everyone else, flawed and proud, is one of the reasons why I think you should all vote for me." She was applauded weakly and when it died down she said, "Although there's also no doubt in my mind that Ryder will make an amazing leader."
"Ryder?" Emma said, turning to him.
Ryder looked at Julie thoughtfully and then down at the podium. He had plenty of great words written in front of him, so many to choose from. But none of them were the ones he wanted to use, so he said, "Uh, yeah... I, uh, I want to... I'm dropping out of the race, effective immediately."
This announcement sent everyone into an uproar. Murmurs surfaced among the crowd as everyone reacted. The only person who seemed to remain silent throughout this was Julie, who the declaration affected the most.
***
"CONGRATULATIONS!" buzzed into Julie's ears as she walked into Breadstix, which once again was home to the post-election celebration party. She thanked as many people as she could, with Jake proudly walking in front of her and clearing the way until they made it to a booth with Marley, Bree, Dan, Amity and Unique.
"Victory!" exclaimed Bree as they sat down. "We did it, we won!"
"Only because our guy sacrificed his inevitable win," Kitty said, appearing in front of them with Alex, Harmony, Stefan, Shana and Rory. They all quieted down until Kitty turned to Julie and said, "But I should also say... You're the perfect person for the job and everyone is rooting for you. Including me."
"Thanks Kitty..." Julie responded, unsure of whether it was sincere or not. Kitty nodded and walked away, leaving the rest of New Directions to wonder what to do with each other.
"So I'm glad that's over..." Rory muttered. "We can all go back to being friends now."
"Most of us," Harmony retorted, making a face as she looked away.
"Ok, I knew things might be a little weird after the election," Marley said as she stood up, "so I convinced the guys to do a song tonight that will surely lift your moods up. Prepare for the once in a life time chance." Before anyone could ask what she meant, she got up and rushed to the stage, where Sam, John and Ryder were setting up their instruments.
"I've hated this place since they got that stage," muttered a waitress as she approached the table. "What can I get you guys?"
Nobody gave her an order because as soon as Marley had reached the keyboard, John started to play.
[Cue "We Got the Party" by Hannah Montana and the JoBros. Admitted, you're getting sentimental.]
Marley: Come on guys tell me what we're doing. We're hangin' around when we could be all over the place.
Julie covered her face with her hands as she laughed. "Please let John sing," she muttered. "He hates this song."
Sam: The sun is shinin' just the way we like it. Let's get out of this hallway. Show the world our face.
The waitress gave up on getting an order and sulked away as Marley bobbed her head and grinned at the crowd.
Marley: It's Friday but there's nowhere to go. Anywhere is cool but we're not going home.
John: And we can do anything we wanna do. It's all up to me and you!
"Yes!" Julie exclaimed, clapping her hands as they all stood up and got closer.
All: Turn this park into a club. The stars and lights and the moon is the vibe from above. Skateboards, here's our ride so pull on up everyone is waiting for us. So anywhere we are. Anywhere we go. Everybody knows. We got the party with us. Anywhere we are. Anywhere we go. Everybody knows. We got the party with us. Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh. We got the party with us. Oh oh oh oh oh oh. We got the party with us.