Girls

Virtually

It was just a few megapixels on a screen.

Just a few little words and links and suggestions.

Nothing that should’ve upset me.

It’s not like it’s permanently engraved in my brain or anything.

You were just a young, bored teenage girl filled with wrath and estrogen and I was the first target in your path.

Girls will be girls.

When I was 7, my mom taught me not all girls would be as nice and understanding as I was.

She said girls were mean for fun.

That they had nothing better to do and were unhappy with their own lives.

They would try to make me sad so they could take my happiness.

I looked up at her big, brown, worrying eyes asked her why they would do that

and she didn’t know.

I figured nobody could truly be that mean, those were all stories from TV, but I knew if they were real and I stayed out of the mean girls’ paths and stayed true to myself, I’d be okay.

I didn’t deserve to be hurt by them so they wouldn’t hurt me,

right?

Girls will be girls.

I called you a friend.

You called me a whore.

I called you sweet and kind and funny.

You called me worthless.

I called you nice.

You called me hideous.

I said your smile lit up an entire room instantaneously.

You asked me why I was so boney and explained how nobody ever wanted to be around me.

I guess I stood out to you because I was different.

Because I didn’t speak about others or wear skirts so revealing.

I tried to achieve my grades I wanted and was kind to all.

I was naive

and you took advantage of that.

I guess that’s what Mommy meant from those warnings, all those years ago.

Girls will be cruel and harsh and relentless and if that is what it is to be a girl,

then no wonder I didn’t fit in.

Girls like you will be cruel.

-“Have you ever been cyberbullied?” Yes. In the 7th and 8th grade.