naive, desperate part of me still craved their approval. A part of me believed that if

place in a city-wide student art exhibition. My painting was hung in the lobby of the city hall for a

room, poring over brochures for

" I said, holdin

ear." She immediately turned back to Emily. "Now, this camp in Swit

're busy. Don't you see we're trying to p

ion. A nuisance. My success was an unwelcome reminder of my presen

rankish" cruelty, arranged with her friends to have me shoved into a locker after gym class. They held the door shut while I begged and screamed, my panic risin

and nearly unconscious. The school insisted I see a therapist. I was offici

n the page a validation of the terror I had lived with for years.

nds trembling. "Mom, please read this.

proving line. She then passed it to Emily, wh

tor's note? She's so dramatic. I bet she paid a friend to forge it so s

y's earnest, concerned face. Then she lo

rom Emily and, without a second thought, ripped it into four neat pieces, letti

hey would never believe m

the terror, by the pain, by the desperate need for their love. I could see them, clear as day, though they were an ocean away. They were in Florence, sta

t I was dead. And I knew, with an even more profou