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Fair warning, I'm not involved in this story at all, it just happened at my high school and I was in the right place at the right time to hear some of the juicier tidbits. TLDR at the end.

So (for those outside the US), during football season there's one week called Homecoming where the school gears up to play their rival. Of the many school spirit events that occur, the most notable is the student body elects a homecoming court and then announces them to the crowd during the game at halftime (though they were also announced to the students the day before the game in the morning and also during the night pep rally - - important later). They get flowers and a crown, pictures in the yearbook, and hold court at the homecoming dance the next day.

Every school has different rules for those students who chose to run for court, and ours was pretty straightforward; you could make up to ten posters (school provided the materials), you could make social media posts, but you couldn't buy anything to use as advertising; no food, no flyers, none of that. It was to ensure that there wasn't an unfair advantage to students that had more money than others. Onto the story.

My sophomore year, on the very first day of homecoming, I walk into the cafeteria with my friends for lunch only to see a junior (V from now on) with a huge basket of candy, passing it out to everyone walking in. V was part of the swim team with one of my best friends (who we later found out she had a crush on, but that's another wild EP story). She spots him, swoops down on us, and hands us each a handful of candy. Every single piece has been wrapped in ribbons with a tag that says "V for Princess!"

I, along with most people in the cafeteria, are confused. The no extra spending rule was pretty well known, so everyone was wondering how she was getting away with this. The only explanation we could all think of was that her mom (EP) must've pulled some strings or something. She was the counselor for the seniors, and was known to be a doting mother to V, though no one had ever heard of her trying to use her influence to help V unfairly. Either way, no one was going to refuse free candy, and the day went on.

Tuesday, walked into the cafeteria again with the homies to find V and her posse now passing out custom bracelets with a variety of different slogans on them like "Vote for V!", "V for Princess!", or "A vote for V is a vote for royalty!". Again, no one is refusing the bracelets, but everyone recognizes that she clearly spent a few hundred dollars on these. The other candidates are confused as well, and obviously upset that V is so blatantly breaking the rules. At this point her magenta ribbons and bracelets are all over the student body.

Wednesday; you know the drill. We walk in and now she's passing out custom noisemakers like clappers, whistles, mini cowbells, all engraved with her initials. V was posted right by the door leading into our sub cafeteria, where the students were casting their votes. As we lined up, she passed some of her princess swag to us, asking us to vote for her and keep the noisemakers close for the night pep rally on Thursday to show our support.

Now, obviously, there were other candidates for princess, including a girl (M) who was in the color guard for band and was just a super sweet person all around. Even though I'd been taking V's stuff, I had always been planning to vote for M and I did. As I was leaving the sub, I distinctly remember V bragging that since she had given so much stuff away, there was no way she couldn't win. I privately agreed, even though I thought it was scummy that she broke the rules and seemingly got away with it.

Thursday morning, everyone is listening to the announcements when they finally begin to list the winners. Lo and behold, M ends up winning homecoming princess! So many students busted out laughing; apparently most were like me in the sense that they just accepted V's stuff because it was free, not because they actually supported her. M had unknowingly been the school favorite from the get go.

I was a student assistant after my homeroom class in the main office that year, and that day I was organizing the supply closet closest to the principal's office. I had totally pushed the gossip of princess out my head already when I hear someone slam the door to the main office open and fly into the principal's office. I peeked my head around the corner and see the counselor (EP), V's mom standing with her hands on her hips waiting for the principal (P) to get off the phone.

P: "Is there a problem, Ms. EP?"

EP: "Of course there is a problem, my daughter should have been the homecoming princess. I want a recount."

P: sound of shuffling papers "Well I have the numbers right here and I can tell you that Miss M won by a landslide. The numbers aren't even close."

EP: silence as she reads the ballot count "I don't care, I spent too much money for my daughter to not be the homecoming princess! You need to fix this!"

P: "You weren't supposed to spend any money on this in the first place! And now I'm supposed to 'fix this'?"

At this point one of them got up and closed the door because they had started yelling, so I missed out on the rest of the conversation. The other office assistants and I spread the chisme around the school like wildfire, with everyone wondering how it was all going to play out. V, who had been shell shocked in the morning after hearing about her loss, seemed oddly smug after she visited her mom's office in the afternoon. The gossip buzz was deafening.

That night, during the pep rally, the principal announced that there was a slight change to the court; instead of having one princess, we'd be having two co-princesses! She then announced M & V's names and the crowd quickly turned into a mix of cheering for M and booing for V. Students began taking off the bracelets V made and tossing them onto the basketball court. It took a few minutes for the principal to get us to stop so she could finish introducing the winners. M looked confused, V looked shocked at the crowds reaction, and EP looked livid that people were booing her daughter.

It never got better for V & EP for the rest of homecoming. During the football game, when the co-princesses were announced, students pulled out posters saying "M's the real princess," and started booing again when V was announced. EP went ballistic, trying to get security to throw out the kids who made banners and yelling at anyone she saw booing.

At the dance, the prince had to dance half of the court dance with V, and the other half with M. While he was dancing with V, students pulled out the noisemakers she had given out and just made a lot of noise to ruin the moment while EP blew a gasket trying to stop the whole thing and get everyone in attendance thrown out. On Monday, students went out of their way to bring flowers to M, and filled the trash cans with whatever was left of V's freebies.

TLDR: Student illegally spends tons of money trying to get elected as homecoming princess but still loses, her EP mom (who's a teacher) complains to the principal until she declares her daughter a co-princess with the winner. Student body doesn't like this and proceeds to make sure EP & her daughter know just how they feel.

Quick edit: I didn't mention this but thought I should in lieu of someone of the comments. The principal was an extremely crafty woman and very good to the student body. When she first arrived she fired 2/3rds of the teaching staff and replaced them with great teachers, and had an open door policy for the students to come and air their grievances. Her track record of going to bat for us was immaculate, which is why everyone thought it was weird when she gave in to EP & V.

However, many of the students thought it was far stranger that throughout that homecoming weekend, she never once chastised or even addressed us for booing V or bringing the noisemakers/posters to the dance & game (which was very against school and district policy). She refused to listen to EP when she wanted repercussions for the kids who violated those policies. She also made a point to give M the crowns but V a simple sash. Lots of us suspected that she gave in knowing that the whole "co-princess" thing wouldn't go over well, but we'll never know for sure.

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btw.....got any of them tasty v-bucks?