Long ago, in the dreadful year of 2021, the school of East Chapel Hill was in a sorrowful state. The lunchroom was frequently erupting in fights, the bathrooms were under siege, and the plague’s ghastly hand still had a grasp over the population of East.
Yet, on one gloomy December day, a group of students, including myself, decided to finally do something about these miserable circumstances. Gathering on Freshman Hill, we devised a plan to create a new club that would provide an escape from the current calamity of our school. We created the Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) Club—a place where people could enjoy playing Tabletop Role Playing Games without having to know other giant nerds beforehand. We already had around 13 members, and were confident that our concept and numbers were more than sufficient for the school to accept our proposal.
But then, disaster struck. The Administration had caught on to our club’s plans, and realized that if the students at East had something fun to do in their free time, they might stop spending it on the seven AP classes each of them were taking. Thus, in a terrifying act of authority, the Administration told us that we could only be recognized as official if we waited an entire nine months—not until September, 2022. This verdict killed any hopes of the D&D club having an official presence for the school year, and heavily limited the growth we could achieve.
And yet, our club survived—and ultimately prospered. We met unofficially after school and during lunch, anxiously awaiting that fateful month of September when we could finally become the schoolwide powerhouse we knew we could be.
However, near the end of the school year, we were hit with a final curveball. After an incident known as “Wellness Wednesday,” one of the teachers had also realized the power of a D&D club, and decided to gather a group of students to make her own. The new club could advertise itself easier, had access to better resources for planning meetings (such as Google Classroom), and were even permitted to meet in one of the most coveted rooms in the school: the media center.
Word quickly spread, and our original club was caught off guard by the introduction of this seemingly impostrous club. None of our founders were asked whether they wanted to help create this club, and our members soon started expressing their annoyance within the group.
“They don’t even have enough time for a campaign!” one of our members cried. “We were told we needed to wait ‘till September!” another member exclaimed.
The result became a power struggle between the two clubs, as the first club had a disdain for the new club, who had no idea that the original even existed. The primary issue was who would be considered the “official” club, and who would have to disband to join them. If the newer club were to become “official,” then none of the founders of the original club would be able to influence the official club’s decisions, and vice versa.
Despite the threat the new club posed, we devised a plan. If the two clubs could find a way to make peace, then our dream for D&D could be reached much faster than before. I was able to infiltrate the new club and plan a meeting between both of them. The founders of each of the clubs negotiated over a tense set of emails. Eventually, they agreed to join together to expand each of their abilities. The dream was finally within reach, now it was only a matter of time…
It’s been an entire year since the original club was formed. Now, combined with the late arrivals, all founders new and old look forward with promise and enthusiasm toward the new school year. September has at last arrived, and the newly official D&D club has epic plans for the students of East. Stories of adventurers traveling through terrifying demiplanes, uncovering the secrets of a macabre dungeon, or escorting royalty away from a terrifying revolution are yet to be told, and you can be the one to tell them.
Photo by Will Pazzula/ECHO; character illustrations by Elizabeth Pazzula
