This was first posted on PPMB and cross-posted on AO3.
Identity crises weren't new to Quinn. She had known for years that something was wrong with her, that the emptiness she felt inside wasn't normal. It was like she had a hole where her personality should have been. She could tell you what she liked and what she didn't, but that was it. She needing something, to substitute for the last of substance in her. Something to plug the hole.
When she was little, it was ballet. She practiced every day, for hours on end, making sure she was the best student she could be and that she performed perfectly. It worked, and she became Quinn the Ballet Dancer, known for pliés and pointing her toes. Her parents made sure she attended every practice, happy to see their daughter's interest becoming a successful endeavor, and she stole the show at every recital.
But ballet eventually became a chore, something she had to do to make sure she didn't let down "Quinn the Ballerina", or perform lest than her best. Ballet stopped consuming her or taking her thoughts away like she desperately needed it to. She no longer enjoyed it, and when opportunity came for her in the form of a sprained ankle, she milked it for all it was worth. Long after her ankle had healed, she complained of pain, until her mother's suspicions grew too large to dismiss.
"Quinn, why don't you want to go back to practice? You love ballet!"
"I don't. I don't want to go back."
"What do you mean? You've been dancing for five years!"
"I'm not going back!"
It took several such arguments to convince Helen to leave it alone and give in, but the dissatisfaction left Quinn feeling worse than ever before. She was hollow without a thing to preoccupy her thoughts, or an obsession to divert to. Nothing defined her other than being Quinn, and even that was fading. If she wasn't a dancer, who was she?
She found a sense of self the summer before seventh grade. She would be a popular girl. She would know all the fashions, date the cutest boys in school, and all while disappointing the other girls who hoped to be her. It was difficult at first, but with a new wardrobe and a permanent subscription to Waif, she was halfway there. Quinn weaseled her way into the popular circles, able to be the low girl on the totem pole if it meant being a step closer to the top. She devised a system of dating, so she was with no guy for more than two weeks, and could go through the entire male population of her middle school by the end of eighth grade. It worked, and she found herself an average member of the in-crowd, wearing shallowness like a badge of honor.
But the summer after eighth grade, she moved to Lawndale. She gave her tearful goodbye to her "friends", knowing they were happy to lose the competition, and became excited for the prospect of a new opportunity. She could manipulate her status as a new girl to ascend to a higher status much quicker than it had taken her to wrangle a good reputation back in middle school. Her hopes turned out to be correct, and before the lunch period on her first day at Lawndale High had ended, she was the Vice President of the Fashion Club, with many other offers lingering that she would deign with a rejection in the coming weeks.
Even more than before, Quinn could become consumed in this lifestyle. She was discussing the latest trends featured in Waif with the Fashion Club, or on a date with a boy, or shopping for even more clothes to add to her wardrobe, which was bursting at the seams as it was. Her fleeting thoughts on her future or her insecurity could quickly be replaced with a reevaluation of the status of the male population of Lawndale High, or which eye shadow went both with her eye color and the current neutral.
By the time she reached her junior year, however, she began to feel the burn out. Shallowness, she found, could not occupy her mind for ever, not when her friends continued to say the same remarks back and forth over the stagnant state of fashion, or each boy she went out with only sought after her for the status she hoped to find in them, or when she'd tried on every outfit at Junior 5 and couldn't fit anymore purchases on her mother's credit card. The thoughts finally began to seep in, about how she could continue her adult life, or how to rescue the sorry state of her grades for college, or who she was. Once again, her sense of identity was crumbling, and she didn't know where to turn to.
She let it carry on, the mindless droning of a truthfully boring occupation of fashion, dating, shopping and popularity, until she felt she was going to explode. That was where she found herself, sitting in front of her mirror, gazing into the abyss.
Quinn knew something had to change. There was nothing left she could turn to for distraction. She had to do something different, and it had to happen that night. With that sense of purpose, she walked her way over to the new megastore. With the stream of different, useless items confronting her, she nearly lost her determination, but eventually she found what she had been looking for and headed off with it. A set of clippers was pretty expensive, but she managed to cover the cost, and headed home still in a state of fog.
Again, she had to face the mirror. Dissatisfied with herself, she plugged the clippers in and took one final look at her hair before she began shaving. As the locks fell, she began to cry, not for the loss of her hair, but for the void she was about to face for the third time in her life. She continued to cry, and shaved everything, until there was nothing left but the signs on her bald head that hair had existed there before.
Still tormented, she tore through her closet, searching for something to wear, something new that didn't encapsulate everything she was throwing away. All she could come up with was a pair of skinny jeans, a dark blue t-shirt, and a leather jacket. Ignoring the fashion sense she was trying to bury that screamed how terrible the whole thing looked, she put it on anyway.
Quinn looked at herself again, bald and blotchy from crying. She was a hot mess, and she knew it. She had no clue how to fill it this time, but decided to shed the snake skin and try to salvage something left. She had no hair. She was wearing something that made her look like Daria, or that burn out girl. She didn't know who she was, or what to do next.
She sized herself up one final time, and mustered up a smile. Maybe something could come of this, wiping the slate clean. She had one friend, that she was certain of. Stacy was anxious, and constantly begging for approval, but she was the only member of the Fashion Club who gave a shit about Quinn beyond a sense of competition. Stacy would stay with her, and keep her company while she sorted this out.
Daria, too, Quinn realized. It was always her sister who had bemoaned most loudly her transition to shallowness. Maybe Daria could help her through this, help her figure out what to do with life. Daria was the ideological one, who had her own idea of how life should be led, and wouldn't budge in her opinion. She could sort this out, and maybe, just maybe, she could finally see the real Quinn. The Quinn that was kept under wraps, because she felt she didn't exist. The Quinn that filled herself up with fakeness to keep from having to acknowledge the lack of anything left. Maybe Daria could help her fill it with something meaningful, that wasn't an act.
Her mother would be very mad, she realized with a laugh. She'd be kicked out of the fashion club, and no boy worth anything in the popular circles would date her. But she'd finally be free.
She stepped into the hallway, and knocked on her sister's door. This was the new start she needed.