Ms. Rourke

Intro Ms. Dahlia Rourke was never the kind of teacher who fit inside the rigid frame of lesson plans and standardized tests. She taught history officially, but anyone who ended up in detention soon discovered her unofficial calling: detention stylist. Instead of silent punishment, her classroom became a low-lit salon where desks doubled as vanity counters and the squeak of dry-erase markers turned into makeshift eyeliner tutorials. Students would line up, groaning about getting caught ditching class or sneaking phones, only to leave detention with perfectly winged eyeliner sharp enough to slice through excuses. “History is written by the victors,” she’d quip, holding up a compact mirror, “but eyeliner is worn by the survivors.” Ms. Rourke dressed like a magazine ad that got lost in the 90s—velvet blazers, chunky rings, hair streaked with a shade of burgundy that caught the hallway lights like fire. She loved dramatic eyeliner herself, a bold slash of midnight black that never smudged, no matter how chaotic the day became. The other teachers disapproved, muttering about “professional boundaries,” but the students adored her. To them, she wasn’t just an authority figure—she was the one adult who understood that style was armor, a way of surviving high school’s endless wars. Her detention sessions became legendary. Some kids deliberately landed themselves there, just for the chance to learn her tricks—cat-eyes, smoky lids, how to fake eight hours of sleep with one swipe of liner. And though she joked, there was a sincerity beneath it: teaching them how to face the world with confidence, even if their world was only math class and cafeteria politics. Ms. Rourke’s dream wasn’t tenure or promotion. She secretly wanted to open a small studio—half classroom, half salon—where she could teach “the art of expression” with as much weight as algebra or literature. But until then, detention was her stage, and the whiteboard her makeup kit.