Hannah

Hannah is one of Willowdean Dickson’s most candid friends and one of the clearest voices insisting that exclusion cannot be challenged from a distance. Her sharp humor can sound like hostility, but it sits beside loneliness, loyalty, and a willingness to appear publicly as herself. Through the Miss Teen Blue Bonnet Pageant, Hannah moves from entering to undermine its conventions toward urging Willowdean to take part, making visibility a shared demand rather than a private consolation.

Identity and Introduction

Hannah’s first impression is filtered through her irreverence. When she learns that Willowdean and Bo Larson have been making out in a girls’ bathroom, she teases Willowdean about whether they are really only friends, then whistles at the candid answer. The exchange establishes a friendship in which embarrassing truths can be met with amusement rather than judgment. Hannah also comments on Bo’s appearance with frank enthusiasm; Willowdean silently rates him even more highly, turning the conversation into a moment of easy, intimate banter.

Hannah’s remarks about attraction carry a possible disclosure. Willowdean wonders whether Hannah has just come out, but chooses not to make an issue of it, responding to the conversation rather than demanding an explanation. Later, Hannah describes herself as a half-Dominican lesbian with buckteeth, naming several parts of her identity that make her conspicuous in Clover City. The contrast matters: what Willowdean initially handles as an uncertain personal revelation becomes, in their later argument, part of Hannah’s explicit account of the pressures she faces.

Loneliness, Humor, and the Pageant

Hannah acknowledges that she keeps her claws out and lacks the kind of friends who will walk beside her in the school hallway. When Willowdean tries to reassure her that she has friends, the narration recalls Hannah’s black clothes and a mouth held in a way that might make people forget her. The image suggests not that Hannah is simply unfriendly, but that her defensive manner exists alongside a visible effort to manage how others see her. Her remark that she is not apologizing clarifies the toughness of her humor without erasing the vulnerability beneath it.

Her original reason for entering the pageant is deliberately disruptive: she hopes to sabotage it from within so she will be known as the girl who ruined the event, rather than as the girl with buckteeth. That plan changes when her mother finds the welcome packet and is proud that Hannah entered. Hannah leaves the consequence unfinished as she explains this to Willowdean, but the disclosure makes clear that the pageant has acquired a personal stake beyond provocation. Her mother’s pride complicates Hannah’s initial wish to make the competition collapse.

Friendship with Willowdean

Hannah’s support becomes practical when Willowdean withdraws from the pageant. After calling repeatedly over the weekend, despite disliking phone conversations, Hannah arrives with a container of her mother’s sancocho. The gesture brings family care into Willowdean’s home: Hannah says her mother now considers Willowdean her favorite person because of the pageant. Hannah’s teasing complaint about that affection quickly gives way to an attempt to keep Willowdean from quitting.

She challenges Willowdean’s belief that competing will only demonstrate how different she is from the other girls. Hannah argues that girls who are fat, have limps, or have prominent teeth cannot change who wins by staying absent; they have to make the effort and demand inclusion. Her argument is not that the pageant is already fair. It is that its familiar exclusions will persist unless the excluded are present to contest them. She asks Willowdean to do it for herself, for Amanda Lumbard and Millie Michalchuk, and, with some hesitation, for Hannah too.

That appeal also exposes a point of strain between them. Willowdean answers that Hannah can conceal the difference others notice by keeping quiet, whereas Willowdean’s size is immediately visible. Hannah calls this a low blow and insists that silence does not spare her from being marked: she is a lesbian with buckteeth in the same town. The argument gives their friendship more than easy solidarity. Hannah refuses to let Willowdean’s insecurity erase her own experience, but she continues to press for a decision that would help all of them. She also tells Willowdean that Millie cannot compete unless Willowdean does, making the consequences of withdrawal concrete.

Presence on the Pageant Stage

At the pageant, Hannah appears in a black slip dress, combat boots, and no makeup. Her look is distinct from conventional pageant polish, yet she follows the rules. She walks with Courtney Gans, whose slicked-back blond hair and fitted tux complement the pairing. Courtney kisses Hannah’s cheek after their turn and says they will meet outside later. The scene offers an image of Hannah’s public presence that is neither disguised nor disqualified: her clothes remain her own, while she occupies the stage on its terms.

Hannah’s route to that appearance includes an admission that she lied. When Willowdean asks what is happening backstage, Hannah laughs and acknowledges the lie, but the available exchange does not specify exactly what she had misrepresented. The later stage scene supplies the visible circumstances without explaining the earlier deception. After Courtney leaves earshot, Ellen Dryver laughs and calls Hannah a devil; Willowdean thinks Hannah may be blushing. The reaction preserves Hannah’s mischievousness while allowing a hint of embarrassment to break through her composed, dry manner.

The pageant does not soften Hannah into a conventional contestant. As the other participants take their turns, she joins the taught stage walk, then answers the question-and-answer session in her usual dry style, leaving the audience deep in thought. Her appearance links performance with self-presentation: she can comply with the formal rules without adopting the pageant’s expected look or abandoning her own voice. In that sense, Hannah’s sharp humor and insistence on being present are not separate from her participation; together they make her visibility an active challenge to the standards that had made her want to sabotage the event in the first place.