First of all, it’s learning you can’t trust anybody. Not your teachers, not your friends, not even your best friend. It’s learning from middle school that people are just teeth waiting to snap and angry flames begging to be lit and spread. It’s the girl who has her hair up every day and the boy whose outfit is so called ugly that are proof of the intoxicating evil of the art of being talked about, especially in high school.
First it’s through the grapevine, a silly little insult that only hurts as much as a skinned knee or a paper-cut. It’s what started as a joke turning into you lying to the nurse that you feel sick and begging to go home. It’s the tactless recaps that flood and stick into the creases of your brain, it’s finding group texts on your friends phone solely about what a drama queen you are. It’s hundreds of “Lets NOT invite her anymore” ‘s and “Lets tell her we aren’t going” ‘s and “She just needs to shut up and leave” ’s.
It’s paintbrushes turning into little silver sheets of metal painting a different kind of picture, it’s dark rooms and worried mothers, it’s snickering friends and sleepless nights and tired days, it’s missed homework and failed tests, it’s eating alone and therapy appointments, it’s Formspring debuts and Instagram posts on a joke account your “friends” made, it’s hitting the water and drowning into a wine dark sea of terror and loneliness and tears and tears and tears, and it’s smiling anyway because you can’t let them see.