Whenever someone says some- thing about us, it gets written inside us, permanently. The good words, the ugly words, it’s all right here.” I placed a palm against my chest. “Sure, you can scribble out the words or try to paint over them, but beneath the layers of paint and ink, they’re still there, branded to our cores like initials carved in a tree.

If Amber kept up her act forever, it would only be a matter of time before the broken pieces of her real self were too small to ever be put back together. I didn’t know what happened to people once they were unfixable. I only hoped I never had to find out.

Don’t you think it’s sad some people are only remembered by the graffiti about them on the bathroom stalls?

It was a single line amid a wall of hate. It barely made a difference.But it was a start—and that was all that mattered.

Why do you do it, Amber? Why do you go after people like you do? It’s not who you are.”“That’s the point,” Amber said. “I’m not allowed to be who I really am.