The Ugly Girl on Instagram
A whimsical satire on a world that preaches about inner beauty & secretly revels in everything outer.
‘I will never be on Instagram’, are famous first words, said by the girl, who is the reluctant protagonist of our story. ‘I simply don’t have the energy to create, curate and serve looks or reels for that matter’, she added. ‘Babe, that’s old news already’ the kind best friend says unkindly. The girl pouts, frowns, throws a pillow at her best friend, and thinks about the merits and demerits of opening one.
Fifteen days in and the Instagram account is opened. The girl is nervous, playing cool, and secretly happy. She has pondered long and hard, thought over every possibility that might go wrong, and knew she wanted to do it. The only collateral would be her fragile heart. Or what her mom called sensitive. For who would spend so much time rethinking over and over about comments made by people in passing? Who are these people and why they would even matter? No, the girl thought, I’ll do it my way and not care about what others think. I am not trying to be an influencer, I will just show what I want to. Thirty minutes in, the notification bell chimes in, and she has her first follow request. She smiles wide and adds her best friend to her followers.
‘I heard you opened an account, I didn’t see a follow request from you though’, the pretentiously popular classmate enquires. In a rare fit of personality, the girl replies she didn’t see one on her account either. Strained laughter later, they are mutuals. And naturally, very naturally, the girl’s following count increases, twice as fast as her followers, and she feels that this has finally filled the gap that had grown wide due to her almost zero interactions with her peers. She is just too shy, prefers the company of a few, and is branded a loner. Now, she feels a part of the community. Too sad, the community is shallow and erringly virtual.
For all there is to gossip and discuss material acquired through social media, the picture-perfect, out-of-this-world visuals make the girl hesitate. She has never been to those places in the pictures her peers shared (she’ll try to visit the new cafe in town though, the frappes looked delicious!), what she does for fun is go to the arcade, the movie theatre, and the library. Perhaps this is why she doesn’t fit in. ‘No dude, you do you, you are just best the way you are, don’t think of all that nonsense’ the best friend reassures the eleventh time. There is a sparkle of hope and some flutters in the stomach, and the girl starts planning her first post.
No amount of thinking will ever help, she should just post the picture with her grilled lizard plushie. Yes, she wants to look good, but she doesn’t want to pretend. Does posing and trying to align the space count as pretending? Absolutely not. But the picture doesn’t turn out as she envisioned it to be. Forget glamourous, it’s a far cry from the pretty pictures that her classmates post. But this is me, the girl reasons internally, and even if I am less confident now, I should take pride in being me. Ten seconds later, a picture is out. And the plushie is pink.
Twenty days later, she has three likes and one comment on her post (‘so cute & a kissy emoji’), she loves her best friend and promises to not concern herself at all about the number of likes. That was never the goal, remember, she chides her internal child, equally bothered and hopeful. So what if other posts amount to more than a hundred likes, that’s not important. I have people who love me. And that should be enough.
‘She is so childish’ the girl hears voices from inside the bathroom stall. ‘Who takes a picture with a crocodile soft toy at this age, thank god I don’t follow her’ voices uttered. The girl remains silent inside the stall and the chasm opens. They must be making fun of me in their groups, I must be an inside joke to them. No, let’s not care about it, these idiotic people don’t matter. The eternal struggle continues.
‘It is a grilled lizard, not a crocodile’ she whines to her best friend, who laughs lightly. ‘Don’t listen to those idiots, you know how they are’ the best friend says sagely. I want to unfollow all the unnecessary people, the girl shares, I want my account to be a safe space for me, and I have no energy left for appeasement and courtesies. The best friend smiles, and they are off to the library to check the latest comic collection. That night, forty-one accounts are unfollowed, and the girl feels nothing.
The class is interesting the next day. Her classmate enquires about her well-being, that’s a first, and fishes for gossip. People were discussing your ‘mass unfollowing’, but you didn’t delete your account. Well, I just wanted to de-clutter my account, the girl serenely replies. Raising an eyebrow, the classmate pushes, ‘Is it because “someone she” from that group called you ugly?’ Dumbstruck, the girl looks at her classmate with a surprised look. Oh, she’s that naive, the classmate thinks, relays the formalities (Oh, so sorry, I thought you knew!) and rushes to cook new stories. There are weights pulling the girl's lips down, and nothing brings them up that day.
‘Beauty with brains’. The class is discussing the topic. Well, the girl thinks, depends on how you define beauty. And apologies, but have any of you gained the capabilities to gauge people’s mental faculties? She feels beyond them, and it’s not the first time that she has found herself alone in the crowd. Her phone pings and the notification reads ‘Those with beautiful besties — by a best friend’. She is amused, smiles, and agrees to the movie outing. Above everything else, happiness is beautiful.
Months later, for the school graduation, everyone is clicking pictures. The girl is continuously smiling and takes pictures with her parents, teachers, her best friend, and classmates. ‘You have a nice smile’ someone says. The girl smiles, says her goodbyes, and prepares for life.
For only beauty had that many metaphors.
