YOU KNOW HOW IT IS with little girls. It’s all about the princesses. Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Ariel—gorgeous cartoon females yearning for their princes and trapped by jealous old witches. When I was a kid, me and my two best friends, Francesca and Elodie, had a princess club. Every day at school, we’d get together at recess and do the princess thing. The rules were strict: You could not be a princess if you didn’t wear a dress to school that day. You could not be a princess unless you had something pink on your person—socks, hair band, whatever. And you had to have a favorite. In case you care, mine was Snow White. I was wild for that black hair–red lips combo.

However, it was understood that you played a princess who had the same color hair as you. Francesca had blond hair, so she could do Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. Elodie had red hair, perfect for Ariel. I had dark brown hair, which meant I was stuck with Belle from Beauty and the Beast. No one ever wanted to play the Beast, so we didn’t do a lot of Belle stories.

We couldn’t do Snow White either, no matter how much I begged. Francesca said Snow White was too scary for her. So, for one reason or another, I never got to do my story.

When we played Cinderella, I was the stepmother and Elodie was the fairy godmother. We did Little Mermaid. Francesca was the made-up part of Flounder’s sister, Goldie, and I was Ursula. Once I said we had to do Mulan, but Francesca and Elodie got bored with it because she wasn’t really a princess and there was only one girl part. Also, she cut off her hair, which was a big fat no-no.

And that’s how it was. Day after day, we would meet by the old iron bench under the tree in the recess yard. While the rest of the kids were climbing and swinging and chasing each other, Francesca and Elodie would sigh and dream and pretend to talk to woodland creatures—while I got stuck playing whatever lousy role they gave me.

And what I started wondering was, why did they get to decide? Who put them in charge?

One day, we were on the playground. Our teacher, Ms. Tina, was standing by the door, keeping an eye on the boys in case they started shoving. Francesca and Elodie were sitting on the little bench, trying to decide whether we would do the scene where Cinderella’s stepmother says she can’t go to the ball or the one where the fairy godmother turns the pumpkin into a coach. I stood to one side, waiting to hear if I was a stepsister, one of the mice, or what.

And that’s when I said “I’m tired of Cinderella.”

Francesca and Elodie looked at each other. Francesca said, “It was your day yesterday. I get to pick today.”

“My” day. We had spent “my” day with me singing to my backpack, which was standing in for the talking clock, while Elodie said “Belle wouldn’t say that” and “Those aren’t the words to the song.”

Francesca looked stormy. I had never challenged her before. If I pushed too hard, I could very well be kicked out of the club. Which meant I would have to hang out by myself in the dirt patch at the end of the playground.

So I said, “What about Sleeping Beauty?” Francesca would be Aurora, but there were a lot of good parts in Sleeping Beauty: the fairies, the mom …

Francesca thought about it, then said sweetly, “Okay. But you have to be the witch.”

The witch. We never did witches. Supposedly, the whole reason we couldn’t do Snow White was because the witch was too scary. In Sleeping Beauty, we always did the scene when the fairies are dancing around getting ready for Aurora’s birthday.

Seeing me hesitate, Francesca said, “You’re so good at Ursula.”

Meaning: You’re a good bad guy. You’d be a great witch.

But playing the witch would be like a curse. I knew if I played her this one time, I wouldn’t ever get to be a princess again. But if I said no, I still wouldn’t get to be a princess, because I’d be kicked out of the club.

So I said, “Okay.”

While Francesca and Elodie tried to decide who Elodie would be—Aurora’s mom or one of the fairies—I tried to figure out how to do the witch. Her name was Maleficent. Even not knowing what the name meant, I could feel its darkness.

Maleficent gets mad because she’s not invited to a party held in Aurora’s honor. Listening to Francesca and Elodie chatter away, I understood that I had also been left out. I could still play with them, but only if I played certain roles. Only if I understood that they were the princesses and I was not. I was always going to be the outsider. The accepted but not-quite-as-good. The tolerated, as long as I played by someone else’s rules.

However—Maleficent did have black hair. And red lips.

Francesca said, “Let’s start when I’m a baby and you come in and curse me.”

I felt a fierce desire to do this well. Looking at Francesca curled up on the bench and sucking her thumb, I thought, I’m going to win. I’m going to beat you. You are not going to have the power anymore.

I snatched up a stick, then said to Elodie, “Who dares not let me in?”

Waving her hands in the air, Elodie cried, “Oh, please don’t hurt my baby.”

“I shall not hurt your baby—yet,” I sneered. “But on her sixteenth birthday, she shall prick her finger and fall into a sleep that shall last forever!”

And I pointed the stick at Francesca. “You are doomed.” She started crying loud baby sobs.

Then she said, “Okay, let’s do the part where I fall asleep.”

Francesca loved fainting. Picking up a twig from the ground, she pretended to stab herself in the finger and swooned backward on the bench.

“Sleep,” I said in a low voice. “Sleep as if you are dead till the prince comes to waken you.”

Francesca giggled, then started to get up.

“No,” I said. “Stay down, you’re dead.”

She looked scornful. “No, I’m not.”

“You are. I made you dead.” I held the stick out, let it float above her head.

“Sleeping Beauty comes back alive,” she argued.

“The prince makes her come back alive.” I looked all around the playground to make my point: no prince.

“I’ll be the prince,” said Elodie quickly.

“No!” I snapped. “No changing. You have to stay what you are.”

To Francesca I said, “You can’t get up till I say.”

And she lay back. I’m not sure why. Either she was genuinely scared of what I might do with that stick or she realized that that’s how the story goes. The princess can’t rescue herself. As we waited, Francesca uncomfortable on the bench, Elodie standing awkward and bored, I realized that the witch and the prince had the same power over life and death. I could take it away; he could give it back. A princess couldn’t do anything.

But the princess gets the prince in the end; the witch goes away and dies. That made me feel strange and lonely at first. Then I noticed Francesca squirming because her legs were too long for the bench. Really, she’d never been my friend. Only now, she had to do what I said.

Ms. Tina called for everyone to come in. Francesca looked at me.

“You’re still dead,” I told her.

“But my leg hurts,” she whimpered.

You made me be the witch, I thought. So this is how it goes.