As a child I would always sit and watch mom and dad. Toys and coloring books held no real interest to me as they did for most children of my age but by then I had known for awhile now that in no way was I like them. I would constantly find refuge through the power of writing as i struggled to somehow manage the pain. Because unlike the other Children of my age I had cancer. And the daily visits to the hospital drained the life out of me, suffused me in a shroud of sorrow that I couldn't even begin to shake off. But I concealed it well, the worst of it hidden even from my parents as I struggled in vain to convince myself that I was more then a Diagnosis that would claim my life in the next couple of years. Inevitably, the stage my cancer was in started to make itself known. My hair loss was gradual until there reached a point in eighth grade where I had no more hair to loose. My once luminous eyes that held so much life were now sunken in and circumscribed by a purplish hue due to the lack of sleep my pain caused and I feared looking into a mirror only to see a skeletal version of myself staring vacantly back at me. The other kids noticed my abnormalities yet kept their thoughts to themselves for  which I was thankful for. It was only until I entered high school that the realization hit that the only monsters in life weren't just the ones under my  bed and nobody ever forgot to remind me as much. My biggest fear was no longer waking up knowing that I had one less day to live but rather that I had to endure another 8 hours of school and the ceaseless bullying that caused an emotional pain that rivaled the physical pain of my cancer.  I was up against a sea of synonymous looks and my own stood out like fire in a pool until I finally convinced my parents to buy me a wig. I deluded myself into thinking that maybe if I had hair like everybody else I would finally fit in and be able to enjoy a life that was promptly reaching its end. But still the bullying commenced. I could no longer find solitude within the confines of my writing because by then I had long since lost the strength to do even the most simplistic of tasks such as holding a pen in my hand for a long period of time. No matter where i escaped to solitude never found me. Their words, always in the back of my mind, drove me to such extremes that the only place that i could take refuge was in my room as i watched the blood trickle from my wrist down to the length of my arm. Because while i couldn't control the teasing and taunting, at least i had control over that. It made me realize that I didn't need hair or stylish clothes or even to gain more weight. Thinking back, all I needed was a friend. For any  one of those dozens of bystanders to step forward and prove to me that at least one person cared. That maybe I wasn't as alone as I had originally thought. But they stuck to the shadows,allowing fear to consume them and allowed the name calling to continue, the verbal abuse to worsen, and the void to slowly shift into an abyss. And  by then, I was already dead even before the heart  monitor reached zero.