Queen

Queen is the only name anyone uses for her, and nobody who has met her asks why. It was the very end of recall when the dorm heard it, “town hall, town hall,” and there she was standing in the door. She did not explain herself. She did not say she was a good person, or gifted, or the right one for the job. She said, “I’m taking over from here,” and then, “Okay, we’re gonna get this dorm in order. Nobody else has been willing to do this.” We’re just going to handle it ourselves, she told them, and everyone stood there, took it, and then got behind her. It was just done. Her authority is not volume. It is rightness, so plain that the room rearranges itself around it. Watch her for ten minutes and you remember that leadership is not something you wait to be handed—you walk in and claim it.