One-hundred forty-six pounds. I glance at the scale again as I groan softly. I look around at the bathroom, it’s as clean as freshly washed dishes. Everything is perfectly in line, in its own place. Then again, that’s how everything in this house is. Well, with the exception of me. I look in the mirror. I suck in my stomach, as far as it can go. It still looks big. Chunky. Fat. Yet another day of all of this. When I say all of this, I’m talking about my looks. My appearance. My body. Especially my body. Yeah, so I’m pretty insecure about it. But it’s better than having no arms or legs or something like that. Then I would be the person getting beat up. But, that’s not my role. My role is the beating up of other pipsqueaks. Giving back to them what they gave me. When I was younger, I got bullied a lot. My only comfort was eating. So I did a lot of it. Look at where it’s got me. Now, since I just hate myself so much, I take it out on other people. I know it sounds bad, but in the long run, it works out perfectly fine. They bullied me, so I bullied them. 

“Come on, Cass,” Mom called from downstairs. “Time to go!”

And then there’s Mom. She’s pretty much the best. She’s always there for me, has ice cream sundaes with me at Perry’s Ice Cream Parlor every Friday (we call them Cassidy and Mom’s guilty pleasures), and we have the best mother-daughter relationship. You should be jealous. But yeah, besides the whole body-shaming thing that I do to myself every single day, I am pretty lucky. My dad left my mom and me when I was a baby. He wasn’t ready to have a kid, freaked out, and bailed on us. I don’t really care though. He’s in the past. Sure, I occasionally wonder about him, but not really. The other person that you have to know about is Paisley. She’s been my best friend since the first grade, and that’s when people started bullying me. She would help me. Every time someone would bully me, she would either give them a wedgie, toss them in the dumpster, or punch them in the face. It depended on her mood. She was the one who got the idea in my head that it was okay to fight back. You’ve got to fight fire with fire, right? I thank her for it, too. It was an amazing feeling, knowing that I mattered to someone other than my own mother. Knowing that I mattered so much to someone, so much that they would fight people for me. Even get suspended a few times for it. 

“Sweetie, we really got to go!” Mom yelled up the stairs. Oh, right. Time for another day at school. Assignments for that day were to get kids to do my homework, bully the pretty kids, and get through the day without a single thought about my body. The first two were a piece of cake. The last one was a little trickier. 

“I’m coming, Mom!” I shouted back to her. I ran as fast as my piggy legs could carry me down the stairs. My short, tan hair whipped against my cheeks as I hopped down each stair. By the time I got down the nine steps, I was panting like a dog. How did people run, but actually really like it? I could never do that to myself. Way too hard. 

“About time, little-miss-late pants,” Mom laughed.

“Well, sorry,” I apologized sarcastically, out of breath.

I started to eat breakfast as we listened to the radio together. I was already going to be late, so I shoved some Lucky Charms down my throat and left the cereal covered table to put on my jacket. I opened the door to the coat closet and looked inside for my jacket. After a few minutes of endless searching, I finally had found it. I had had this jacket since I was in fifth grade, and now, I was in seventh grade. I just didn’t have the patience to go clothes shopping. I hated going clothes shopping. It always felt like I was falling down a black hole and I was never going to get out. Mom loved clothes shopping. She always made me try on a bunch of different trendy tops and bottoms, but I never liked any of them. Well, scratch that. It’s not the fact that I didn’t like any of them, it’s just that I didn’t like any of them on me. They were always too tight, or too short. Too tiny or too revealing. I hated anything that showed off my body. 

After a while of trying to shove my tiny coat over my rotund arms, we hopped into our tiny, yellow Volkswagen. It’s named Frida. We have had her three years before I was even born, and I’m fourteen. You can only imagine how much we love it in order to still have her to this day. You can also only imagine how beat up she is for her to survive seventeen years. It’s not pretty. But, we love her. She’s practically part of the family.

Finally, when we got to school, I jumped out of the car and looked at the many students looking at me, fear etched on their faces. I loved it. You know, I used to fear those people. It feels so good to have them be frightened by my very presence. I start up the stairs. Kids clear a path for me. 

“Hey, Derner,” I yelled across the hallway. “You done with my homework yet?”

“Um,” she squeaked. Pathetic. All of these kids at this school. “I-I’m almost done with it, Cassidy.”

“Yeah, you better be,” I replied. God, all of these kids. They were just so annoying. They were tiny. Quiet. Did what I told them to do. Where was the fun in that?

I kept crossing the hallway, pushing kids into the dark blue lockers as I went. But, hey, I was still being nice because I would only push the kids that were in my way. If I was irritated, some days I would just throw any kid I want into a locker, then I would crumple them inside of the locker, and finally, I would shut the locker, and lock it. It was hard being so mean, but at the same time, too easy. 

I looked up at the fluorescent lights. They were always super dark, and it was really annoying, yet it felt like a spotlight at the same time. It was a spotlight, just for me. And it shone down on me like butter gliding down my arms and legs, trickling down my back. It felt great to have that spotlight on me. I just wished I could look a little better in it.

After  a few minutes of wandering around the hallways aimlessly, admiring the bright lights, I saw her. One of my favorite people. 

“Hey, Paisley,” I shouted to her. She looked up immediately with a sly grin on her thin, beautiful, narrow face.

“Hey, Cass,” she greeted. “Oh, you might wanna consider these protein bars that my mom gives out at her exercise studio. They help you lose weight.”

Okay, so you may think that she sounds kinda mean and like she’s not a good friend, but she’s just trying to help, right? “Why do you say this?” I asked. “Is my shirt too tight or something?”

“Well, you just look super… well, big and bloated today,” she replied. “I thought I told you to lay off carbs for a while so you can get rid of all of this,” she frowned as she gestured to my stomach. I’m kind of used to her “behavior” by now, and at this point, I don’t really care anymore. So maybe it makes me feel a little self-conscious, but no biggie, right? It was fine. All good. 

“Yeah, well I don’t feel like doing that anymore,” I grunted. Anyways, what are you doing tonight?” I questioned. “Wanna come to my house? We can watch Clueless again! Ooh, maybe even Silence of the Lambs?”

“Yeah, no,” she turned down. 

“What? Why not?” I whined. “What else do you have going on tonight?”

“Well, I do have a really good plan,” she told me softly. “This is just a one man job kind of a thing though, so don’t get excited, and don’t freak out either.”

“What, are you just going to throw some kids in the dumpster again?” I said casually. “It’s getting old, Paisley, so predictable.”

“No, no, no,” she shook her head. “I am going to…. steal a painting from the museum!” 

“Wait, you mean my mom’s museum?” I quizzed my face twisting into a surprised frown. “The one that she owns and works at?” After my dad left Mom and me, she needed something to distract her from the pain, so she decided to open a museum in our hometown, St. George, Utah. It’s super boring here, but the museum brightens it up a bit, and we had just gotten a new painting in, so we were making some more money because it was attracting some new tourists.

“What other museum would I be talking about?” Paisley squealed excitedly.

“You can’t do that,” I muttered defiantly. “That’s my mom’s museum. That’s where we make money from. We need all those paintings. They're all, like, $30,000, or more.”

“Exactly!” she exclaimed. “I’m going to make some big money with this. I might even be able to go to college!”

“Okay,” I started. “First off, when have you wanted to go to college until right now? Second off, I know that I can’t stop you from doing this, so even though this is costing my college, which I actually want, go ahead and steal it. The last thing I’m going to say though is this: whatever you do with it, do not sell it.”

“What the heck, Cass?” she spat in my face. “I wasn’t really listening to anything else you said, but what else am I going to do besides sell it? Otherwise, neither of us get money. And you should be happy for me.”

“Happy for you? We are best friends, aren’t we?” I snapped back. “Best friends are supposed to have each other’s backs, they’re supposed to willingly make sacrifices for one another. I am making a sacrifice for you right now. I am letting you take away a painting from my mom’s museum. Even if you aren’t going to sell it, you think I care? It’s still a sacrifice because I’m risking my mom’s job and any chance I have at getting into a good college, and all of that stuff. But obviously, you could care less,” I finished.

“Geez, Cass, didn’t know you had it in you,” she sneered. I gave her a nasty grimace. “Okay, okay. I won’t sell it, I promise. But, you know, we’re the top dogs at this school. Start acting like it.”

She strutted away. I was left with my mouth hanging open, tears threatening to roll down my fat cheek. Why was I chosen for this life? I could have gotten any other life, but instead, I was chosen for this one. Life stunk. But this situation could not get any worse. It wasn’t possible. Was it?

I went through the whole day, questioning every decision I had ever made. Paisley was a good friend. We were just in a rough spot right now. That was all. But what if I had made the wrong decision by trusting her to be my friend? What if she really wasn’t a good friend? I knew that she wasn’t acting like a great friend now, but this must be a one time thing. Right?

As I walked the lengthy road home, I looked at all of the light snowflakes gently falling down from the sky. They looked so effortless. Like they didn’t have a care in the world. They all seemed slim, lean. When I was little, I thought that when snowflakes would clump together in little piles of snow, it was because they were all friends. It would always make me a little upset, knowing that something as tiny as a snowflake can easily make a friend like that when someone as big as me can’t make a single one. They seemed so content. With their looks, feelings, friends, lives. Why couldn’t I feel that? Why couldn’t I feel okay with myself, instead of hating myself? Just one time was all I was asking for. 

The next day was pretty lonely. Paisley wasn’t talking to me, so I didn’t have anyone else to talk to unless I was beating up other kids. When I got home from school, dreading to see if Mom had noticed that the painting was missing, I headed straight for my room. But before I could even make it to the stairs, I was stopped. “Sweetie,” Mom called, obviously very worried. Uh-oh. Here it comes. 

“Yeah, Mom?” I answered in a shaky voice as I tried to look like I had no idea what was happening. Her face looked red, but at the same time, pale. Her eyes were watering with worry, but also dry with what looked like...anger.

“I have a very serious question for you, and you must answer it truthfully,” she uttered. “Last night, someone stole our top painting that we just got. That painting put us in debt because it was so expensive. People have finally come in to start to see it but… but… oh, honey, it’s gone!” she concluded, her eyes bubbling with fury and sadness.

“What?” I breathed. I thought that Paisley was just going to steal one that didn’t cost a lot. I knew that she had always had the worst taste in art because whenever we would go to the museum together, she would always say that she liked the cheapest and ugliest ones. My lips curled downwards into a frown. Mom wasn’t the only angry one now. 

“Sweetheart,” she started. “I-I know that you, well… you don’t have the all-time best record, but I am very disappointed in you.”

“Huh?” I wondered as I tilted my head. Wait, this couldn’t be happening.

“Why would you steal that painting?” she asked desperately.

“Mom, I didn’t, I promise!” I pleaded, still not believing what was happening. “Why would you think that I would do something like that?”

“Besides me, you are the only other person who has the keys, you know all of the building’s weaknesses, and you know where the painting is,” she finished. I could not believe this. Now, everyone thought I was a bad person. Even my own mother.

“Mom, I swear on my life, I didn’t,” I begged, tears rolling down my chubby cheeks.

“I thought you were better than this,” she muttered before leaving the room. She walked out, as fast as she could. She headed right for my bedroom.

“Mom, what are you doing in my bedroom?” I demanded. 

“I’m finding that painting,” she cried down the stairs in a determined voice.

“You aren’t going to find anything, Mom,” I shouted. “Mom, please just believe me, I didn’t steal it!”

“Wow,” she shook her head disapprovingly, her voice breaking more and more with every word. I saw a single tear trickle down her chin. “Are you really going to make me call the police because of my own daughter? I thought you were better than this, Cassidy. You can go to juvie for stealing something like that, you know. You should know better.”

“Call the cops on me all you want, but it wasn’t me,” I implored through ugly tears. “Mom, I promise you.”

She hesitated for a moment. After what seemed like an eternity, she instructed, “You may sleep in the backyard tonight. I hope that you come to your senses and admit that it was you.”

It wasn’t me. If she had only heard Paisley and I’s conversation, then she would know. And I couldn’t possibly rat out Paisley. Even though I hated her at the moment, she had done so much for me. She had helped me see the light. But was it the wrong light? That was something that I needed to decide on my own. 

After a week of endless questioning from my own mother and sleeping in the backyard, Mom had had enough. One rainy Sunday morning, she woke me up outside, in my little, green tent. I had tried to make it as comfortable as possible, but it was obviously not working because I would still cry myself to sleep. Every night.

“Come on, Cassidy. We’re going to the police station. Now here are your options. Number one: you can give back the painting right now and we don’t have to go to the police station, or number two: we can go to the police station, and you can get interrogated until you admit something. Which one is it?” she finished.

“We’ll go to the police station. I’m just saying though, Mom, I think that the fact that I am choosing to go to the police station instead shows that I really didn’t steal the stupid painting,” I pressed. “Come on, Mom. Please.”

“I am not your mother. You are not my daughter. Just get into the car,” she uttered, her face contorted with disappointment. 

Not her daughter? Not my mom? No, this couldn’t be happening. I remember people always used to joke about getting disowned, but now it was happening for real. They would say things like, “If I don’t find my phone, my mom will disown me.” I had no mother, my father had abandoned me when I was a child because he wasn’t ready to be a father, I had no siblings. I was alone. I didn’t even have Paisley anymore. You know, I always was kind of a lone wolf, but at least I had Mom and Paisley. Now I had no one. Absolutely no one.

After a long car ride in Frida, Mom - I mean, May (I was calling her by her first name now, since she wasn’t “Mom” anymore) - and I arrived at the tiny, tan, and not-so-terrifying police station. As I stepped inside, I smelled sweat, cologne, and a tinge of coffee. It felt like I was in a cardboard box, suffocating because of how tiny and smelly it was. It felt like the walls had started to squeeze around me. Why was I getting so nervous? I felt heavy butterflies squeeze around in my stomach, their wings flapping up against my skin and the organs in my stomach. It felt highly uncomfortable. 

“Hello, ma’am,” one of the police officers at the front desk greeted us in a bored voice. “How may I help you?”

“I would like an interrogation,” she said simply. “For this girl.”

“Your daughter?” he questioned. He looked at her with a suspicious face.

“Not anymore,” she answered coldly, glaring at me. I felt tears fill my eyes, but I shoved them down and bit my tongue. I looked at the walls and the ceiling. They were all brown yet slightly different shades of it, whether it was tan, brown, beige, khaki. 

“Alrighty, then,” the police officer replied as he looked at May with a touch of confusion. “Names?”

“My name is May Brown,” she answered, glad that the last conversation was over and done with.

“Cassidy Brown,” I stated meekly.

“Oh, actually, I think that she will take her father’s last name, won’t you, Cassidy?” she asked me in a fake sweet voice. “You can put her down as Cassidy Rays.” I didn’t say anything. I just looked at my feet, but realized that I couldn’t even see them because my big stomach was blocking my way. So I looked at my shameful stomach instead. The thing that had caused me so much pain.

But suddenly, a realization hit me. Why isn’t Paisley backing me up right now? I pondered. She should be here right now. She’s supposed to have my back, no matter what. Especially in a situation like this one. When I am being accused of the crime that she committed. That wasn’t being a good friend. Also, now that I think about it, it also wasn’t a good thing to do when she had a bad influence on me and made me start to bully other people, when all along, she was bullying me.

I couldn’t believe it. This was it. I wasn’t going to rat her out, but I had to do something. Then, I came up with a magnificent idea. Paisley hates being questioned and hates big conversations. It makes her “uncomfortable” or something. So, I was going to put her into one. Well, right after this interrogation was over. 

Before I knew it, we were heading into a small, square room. May was asked to wait outside. I followed the main officer into the room. There was a recorder, sound proof walls, and no windows. The door locked with a loud click. I also saw a big machine, with wires, pads, a bunch of weird stuff. Oh no. Were they going to hurt me?

“Sit down,” the officer ordered. “You may call me sir.”

“Yes, sir,” I replied. “Sir, I’m sorry, but what is that?” I asked as I pointed to the wiry machine.

“That is a lie detector,” he answered. “We will be using it on you. Now, I recommend that you answer the questions correctly, otherwise, this ‘wiry machine’ will shock you.”

“Isn’t that technically like child abuse,” I wondered out loud.

“Sir!” he yelled at me.

“Oh, right, isn’t that technically like child abuse, sir?” I repeated.

“No, it is not. It’s discipline is what it is. Otherwise, how do we know if you are going to say the truth, huh?” he quizzed. I said nothing. “Now, let’s get started.”

As he strapped me up in the machine, I wondered my fate. I didn’t usually believe in God, but in that moment, I was praying like I had never prayed before.

“Now, let’s start off easy, just to check,” he told me. “What is your name?”

“Cassidy Brown… well, now that I think about it, according to May, I’m now Cassidy Rays, sir,” I replied sadly. The machine gave two high beeps. I didn’t receive a shock of any sort. Okay, this wasn’t as bad as I thought. As long as I don’t lie. 

“When you get two beeps, that means that you answered the question truthfully. If you answered the question with a lie, there is only one beep and a shock, got it?” he explained. I nodded. He started asking me a bunch of questions, about the painting, my family, my relationships with people. I don’t know why all of that stuff mattered, but I just answered everything truthfully, without receiving any electric shocks. But after around an hour and a half, he asked the question I had been waiting for. 

“Cassidy, I recommend you answer this question with the truth and nothing but the truth,” he told me sternly. “Did you steal the painting?”

He gave an expectant look. I felt my hands sweating, my heart beating faster, like a drum. “I did not steal it, sir,” I promised. After what seemed like forever, I heard two more high beeps. I had done it! I gave a victorious, almost triumphant smile to the police officer. 

“Well, not what I expected,” I gave him a good, long, menacing stare, “but, it looks like you didn’t steal it. I just have to ask one more thing though. Why does your, uh, acquaintance think that you stole the painting?” he stuttered.

“Well, I’m not going to lie to you, I am kind of a troublemaker, sir,” I admitted with a guilty tone. “Nothing huge or anything, I mean, I would never steal something, especially from my own, uh, acquaintance’s museum, you know, the one that provides food for me, and everything else like that. But I would never commit a crime or anything, sir.”

He gave me a look, his eyes squinting, his eyebrows raised, and a skeptical, thin line for a mouth. “Alright, kid,” he gave up. “I guess we’re done here.”

He took off the lie detector and untangled the chords and wire. He led me out of the doorway to May. “So, she did it, right?” she expected.

“Actually,” he started. “She didn’t. She is innocent.”

May looked at me, a guilty look on her face. “Sh-she didn’t?” she repeated.

“No ma’am,” the officer responded. He had a simple look on his face. It’s almost like it said, “Don’t judge a book by its cover, even though she has done some bad things, you shouldn’t accuse the person of it right away.”

“Thank you,” I mouthed to him. He smiled at me. 

“Now, don’t get into any more trouble young lady,” he stated plain and clear to me in a stern chuckle. 

“I won’t, sir,” I promised. “Sorry to waste your time, sir.”

I looked at May coldly as I said this. May walked me out of the place that I entered in feeling super nervous, and walking out, seeing everything differently. You would think that I would see everything differently after walking out of some kind of scarring place or even a museum. Yet I was just walking out of the police station, the one that smelled like sweat, looked like a cardboard box from Amazon, felt like it was squeezing in around me.

Then I realized what it was. I had made myself vulnerable. I had made myself vulnerable to Jim, and now, he was one of those kinds of people who I knew could fend for me, have my back. I knew that this sounded weird considering that he was a middle aged man, and I was in the eighth grade. But, it was true. He had helped me out back there, and that’s something that nobody else in my life, not even Paisley, would do for me. Then, I realized one more thing. Mom would do that for me too. No matter what I called her, May, Mom, Ma’am. 

Right as we pulled Frida’s handles to get into the car, I decided to go for it. It was now or never. “Mom, I-” I started.

“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry!” she cried. “I was horrible. I was a bad mother, a bad person, and most importantly, I was a bad friend to you. All at once. I just, oh… I just couldn’t stand it being you that did it, but now I realize that it wasn’t you at all, I accused my own daughter of committing a crime and stealing a painting at my museum! I don’t know how I could ever make it up to you!”

She didn’t even have to. I pulled her in for a hug. “Mom, I missed you so much,” I whispered as tears poured down onto her shirt, my head perfectly nuzzled into the divot between her right shoulder and her collarbone. I buried my face into it, deeper, deeper, even deeper. I squeezed her so hard, I thought I might suffocate her. I just wanted her to never let me go again.

“I missed you more, sweetie,” she chuckled, her soft voice breaking with every word. I had always admired mom so much. But it was in a bad way. I was so jealous of her. I was jealous of her blue eyes, her thin, silky hair, her thin waist, her ability to do things with such ease. But in that moment, I admired her because I laughed with her. Because I loved her hugs. Because I didn’t have to share her love with anyone else. Because I loved her.

“I missed you the most,” I promised. And I did. 

“Oh, you stinker,” she laughed. 

We happily hopped into Frida. I held her hand the whole way home. My mom’s hand.

As soon as we got home, I knew exactly what I had to do, and it had to be done right away. I had to talk to Paisley, to tell her that she couldn’t take advantage of me anymore. I didn’t know why I hadn’t realized how bad she always made me feel. I never did anything to her. And now, she has messed me up. I couldn’t keep taking my problems out on other people. Before I walked to Paisley’s house though, there was another thing that I did. Something that I think I should have done a long time ago. 

I had seen this thing on Pinterest where you would write down everything you are worried about on a glass plate. Then, you would go to a clear road, and you would smash the plate. I knew a lot of things that I would write about. So, I said I would be back in a bit to Mom, walked out the pale green front door, and towards our empty road. We basically lived in the middle of nowhere. In Utah. Who would ever say, “Oh, boy do I love Utah! Let’s live there because there are so many exciting things to do there!” Seriously though! But, I do suppose it is convenient for this. I had brought a plate that we had inside. It was a glass plate. A plate that I had been wanting to get rid of for a very long time. It was Dad’s old plate. He didn’t have a place here, and neither did any of his stuff. It was just a plain, old, white plate. Nothing special about it. I started to write on it with a black Sharpie. The gentle squeaks from the marker on the plate only made me feel more determined. I wrote down everything troubling my mind. Fat, Dad, Mom, Paisley (big, fat, and centered in the middle), painting, stolen, lies, truthful, disbelief, bullies, mean, accused. I pushed the cap back onto the black marker. I swung the plate around, took a deep breath, and threw it, as hard as I could against the road. It shattered into a million pieces. I was happy, relieved, content. I looked down on my body. You know what? I loved the way I looked. I loved all of those imperfections that always got me down. I loved the stomach, the piggy legs, the chubby cheeks. I loved it all.

After an hour of preparing myself to go to Paisley’s, I walked down to her house. Every step just made me a little more confident, and every bit more confident made me know that I was going to do great things in the future. I knew that my past didn’t matter anymore. All that mattered was that I would learn from it, grow from my mistakes. 

After a very short and happy walk, I arrived at Paisley’s house. I rang the doorbell to her small home. She answered the door. “What do you want?” she snarled. 

“Can I come in, Paisley?” I asked politely.

“When did all these manners show up?” she insulted. I gave her a glowering stare. “Yeah, fine, come in.”

“Thank you,” I said in a condescending tone. As we walked inside, I looked over at her home. It was hardly a home. She had six brothers that always tore the place up, so the whole place was an utter mess. Her mom was never really around, so she was left to look over the little monsters. She was the eldest child, after all. We headed up to her room, careful to not be chased down by the six little boys. 

“Now, what did you say you were here for again?” she asked rudely. She truly was the worst listener I had ever heard.

“I didn’t,” I stated as she rolled her big, pale, blue eyes. “But I’m here to say that you should give the painting back. I won’t tell anyone that you stole it, but you should give it back.”

She looked at me in a way that I had never seen before. She looked at me with pure guilt. But I couldn’t stop there. I was on a roll. “Paisley, you have not been a great friend to me. When I was getting bullied in first grade, I thank you for defending me, but you did it in the wrong way, and now, I’m a bully, just like you. That’s not fair to me though, because that’s not who I want to be. And, that’s not even the least of it. You are constantly putting me down, Paisley. You are always talking about my weight, how I look. It makes me feel really uncomfortable, and until now, I’ve never felt good about myself, and it’s clearly because of you. Listen, I don’t know why you do it, but you should stop. And you should also return the painting. You shouldn’t sit back and watch me being interrogated by the police and disowned by my own mother when you are the one who committed the crime. Return the painting. It’s the right thing to do,” I finished, a little out of breath. I felt good, adrenaline was pumping through my veins, through every part of my body. It felt like a breath of fresh air after being compressed for oh, so long. I turned away from Paisley. “I’ll walk myself out.”

I left the room, feeling so good, that I just might burst.

And now, here I am. I’ve lost twenty-five pounds after this because of my new program. I made a fitness program for people who don’t feel good about themselves. If they feel too big, then they can join this fitness program to lose weight and get therapy to feel better about themselves while still having fun. You are not only building your physical health, but also your mental health too! I have even made a few speeches at my school about anti-bullying, and I’ve apologized to any of the people I bullied. Boy, have I come a long way or what? I’m even a little popular if you can believe it. I guess it all goes to show how you have to go through some bad times first to get to the good ones. And surprisingly, that’s okay with me. Because looking at where I am right now, I would have gone through a million obstacles to get to this point. But here I am. Happy with myself, nice, Paisley-less. Looking back, I finally feel like that snowflake that I had seen exactly a year ago when all this started. Free, light, and most importantly, happy.